Alexis Turner

New Models for University Publishers

(academia, digital, economics, publishing, uselessness — )

31 Jul. 2007

It turns out, people just don't want to pay for academic books these days. So there've been a lot of rumblings the last few years about the possibility of changing publishing models, particularly for university presses and journals. Should we go digital? Should we have a sliding pay scale? Should we make the author pay for us to publish their work? Should we make the author's university pay?

But, all other things considered, I can't help but wonder if the real issue lies in this tiny, buried statement:

"Stanford rejects about 90 percent of submissions. Of the rejected ideas, Harvey said that about 60 percent either aren't of high enough quality or don't reflect Stanford's emphases as a press. But the other 40 percent are worthy of publication, he said. 'There are a huge number of project that we think "this is wonderful material, but there is a limited market."' " [emphasis mine]
- Inside Higher Ed

The Nature article linked above points the the same problem, even as they fail to note it as a problem (see Table 1).

Really, sometimes I just wonder what the point of academic publishing even is any more, aside from gladhanding and grandstanding. I mean, it definitely doesn't seem to be about educating or disseminating knowledge, so those are pretty much the only alternatives I can come up with given my limited imagination.