155.2 PRICE MISQUOTATIONS FOR THE AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR MICROBIOLOGY 1996 JOURNALS, Daphne H. Greenwood
155.3 IMPACT OF CANCELLATIONS ON JOURNAL PRICES, Guy Dresser
155.5 HAMAKER RESPONDS TO SAMPSON, Chuck Hamaker
Keith Renwick, UMIST Library and Information Service, kdrenk@fs3.li.umist.ac.uk.
[The following message is reposted from SERIALST. -ed.]
One aspect of the journal inflation problem has not, as far as I am aware, been investigated or costed, yet is fundamental to the situation in which librarians find themselves.
Each year an unspecified number of libraries cancel journal subscriptions, often the more expensive titles (partly because savings are easier to achieve with the minimum amount of effort). It also seems to be the case that the more expensive the journal, the higher the increase in subscription price. Is this due to the fact that more expensive titles have higher overheads or are published by the multinationals?
An undisclosed proportion of our subscription increases are due to cancellation of subscriptions and the increased unit costs which ensue from that. Faxon have indicated in their recent projection for 1997 subscriptions that cancellations will account for around 4.5% of subscription increases next year. Has anybody projected this for a few years ahead to calculate the increasing cancellation element of subscription price increases?
As a simple example:
A title costing stlg1,000 may have a subscription base of 100, of which 5 may decide to cancel due to lack of funds, etc. Of the subscription price (including profit) 80% of costs are estimated to be fixed, which amounts to 1000 x 5 x 80% = 4000.
This will have to be divided among the remaining subscription base of 95 libraries, adding stlg42.10 (4.2%) to the price.
The following year the price will be stlg1042 (I am ignoring additional price increases) resulting in another 5 cancellations and no new subscriptions, therefore 80% of those costs will have to be recouped from only 90 libraries as follows:
1042 x 5 x80% = 4168 divided by 90 = stlg46.31(4.6%).
The point is that within 5 years, assuming five cancellations each year, no new subscriptions and no other increases, the subscription cancellation element of price increases will have increased from 4.2% to 6.3%.
I haven't projected these figures any further, but I'm sure the picture is obvious.
Would any publisher care to produce a figure for subscription cancellation increases on particular titles? I await the figures with interest!
155.2 PRICE MISQUOTATIONS FOR THE AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR MICROBIOLOGY 1996 JOURNALS
Daphne H. Greenwood, American Society for Microbiology, dgreenwood@asmusa.org.
Library customers of Dawson U.S. or Turner Subscription agencies may have received incorrect 1996 price quotes on journals from the American Society for Microbiology. In some cases, the agencies misquoted prices by $50 to $500 over the actual subscription prices.
ASM has refunded all overpayments to Dawson and Turner, so if you subscribed at the incorrect rate, you should receive a refund.
Dawson and Turner have promised to send a price correction notice to their clients shortly. Meanwhile, if you have any questions about 1996 subscription rates for any of the journals listed below, please contact me directly at:
Daphne Greenwood
Marketing Manager, Journals Department
American Society for Microbiology
1325 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005-4171
(202) 942-9357
(202) 942-9355 (fax)
dgreenwood@asmusa.org
Journals published by the American Society for Microbiology:
Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy
Applied and Environmental Microbiology
Clinical and Diagnostic Laboratory Immunology
Clinical Microbiology Reviews
Infection and Immunity
International Journal of Systematic Bacteriology
Journal of Bacteriology
Journal of Clinical Microbiology
Journal of Virology
Microbiological Reviews
Molecular and Cellular Biology
ASM News (magazine)
155.3 IMPACT OF CANCELLATIONS ON JOURNAL PRICES
Guy Dresser, Allen Press, gdresser@allenpress.com.
Increasing journal prices because of cancellations does suggest a certain arrogance on the part of publishers, and no doubt serves as a further irritant to the already strained relationship between the commercial publishers and the library community. However, there is an economic (perhaps better to say arithmetic) principle involved, namely that a large share of the cost of scholarly publishing is fixed, and the potential market is limited; therefore the fewer subscriptions over which one can amortize the start up costs, the higher the individual subscription price must be to recover cost.
We can certainly argue that the costs at the publishing houses are too high, and that they should cut costs rather than raise prices, or that societies should self-publish to avoid costly publisher overheads, but there will still be fixed costs, some of which will remain no matter what medium is used to deliver the product, whether paper or electronic.
This principle becomes even more important as methods of delivering the product electronically may deprive the publishers (commercial or non-profit) of sources of revenue to which they are entitled by copyright, further eroding the subscription base, and causing more price increases, leading to more cancellations, and so on until the journal does have to cease publication. I don't see how that is a good outcome for scholarly communication, or for librarians for that matter, not to mention the printers and publishers.
Even if scholarly communication becomes entirely electronic, and academic volunteers do all the work, the product will have a cost. The bill will go to the universities and governments and their taxpayers rather than to the users of the information, which, depending on your point of view, may seem an awkward way to fund the business of scholarly communication, or the right way.
The mailbox is: tuttle@gibbs.oit.unc.edu.
From Luke Swindler, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, luke_swindler@unc.edu:
As libraries move increasingly to document delivery in lieu of ownership, the fear of outrageous copyright charges looms in the background. I subscribe to CARL's Reveal service for tables of contents of journals. As part of this service I recently received a list of citations for JOURNAL OF ACADEMIC LIBRARIANSHIP. It now charges $50.25 per article as a copyright fee! (By way of contrast,.. the library's annual institutional subscription charge was $158.[including use tax and service charge -ed.]) There's nothing like academic librarians being screwed by their own publications. Maybe we should call them on this practice? It makes the Elseviers of this world look good.
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From Mignon Adams, Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science, adams@shrsys.hslc.org:
The January issue of _College and Research Libraries_ carries an excellent article called, "The Economics of Professional Journal Pricing." Written by two economists (Michael Stoller and Robert Christoperson) and a librarian (Michael Miranda) at SUNY/ Plattsburgh, it is the most readable and cogent article I have read on the subject. Must reading for anyone concerned with the costs of journals.
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From Glenda Myers, Witwatersrand Medical Library, Wits, South Africa, myers@minerva.med.wits.ac.za:
I've just read Chuck Hamaker's article in your newsletter no 154. He talks about the cost of subscribing to a journal vs the cost of borrowing. I wonder if anyone has actually costed out an interlibrary loan or document delivery service though? Here at the Medical Library our staff costs are prohibitive, and in fact, if the staffing salaries, benefits, etc. are taken into consideration, the cost of the journal subscription is the cheaper option for all but the most expensive titles!!
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From Zora Sampson, University of Oklahoma, qa5305@uokmvsa.bitnet:
Chuck Hamaker's description of the LSU cancellations brought up a question. He says that they paid $1,300 in one year for 100 articles from 4 years of a journal whose most recent year would have equalled that price. But if he had bought the journal he would still have some of the 100 articles. And for that price or less, over each of the four years, he would have had all 100 articles and more. But he paid that much to give them away to the researchers for their use. He cannot retain copies of them and thus has nothing left for other patrons to use for his $1,300. At least in the case of this journal, it just does not make much library sense to me. And the only way it could make economic sense is if the price of articles does not increase in proportion to the price of journals. But why would publishers let that happen?
David Salt's observation on the cancellations portion of the price increase justification given by publishers has also struck me as ridiculous for quite some time. It stikes me as a sort of blackmail. "If more of you cancel then the price will get even worse."
155.5 HAMAKER RESPONDS TO SAMPSON
Chuck Hamaker, Louisiana State University, notcah@lsuvm.sncc.lsu.edu.
_Sensors and Actuators_ is a title we are considering for adding in paper. The point is that out of 936 journals we ordered articles from that is the ONLY title that came anywhere near being cost effective to own. And it was a title we never did own. As a demonstration of the utility of owning vs. access titles, it is the sole example we had where we needed to own the title. Looking more closely at it, however, it turns out that the primary use of the title seems to be a single graduate student. If we invested the $5,000 in it we'd have it, in case someone else ever wanted it. But we had 1,500 titles, apparently, in that category where our purchase just didn't make economic sense. About all I can say is that we had a demonstrated need for $5,000 worth of a journal that we satisfied at a cost of $1,300. We now have to assess whether or not we "need" it in a more permanent form. I suspect the answer is yes. But, in terms of demand, I have another 1,000 titles faculty surveys say we "need", and have ONE title where I can demonstrate clearly that need out of the thousand they have recommended for subscription. _Sensors and Actuators_ is NOT the most highly rated "needed" title faculty say we should have. In fact, I have on my desk right now a request for $30,000 worth of new subscriptions from ONE department. All are titles that have been out a while and none of them show any Document delivery demand. I can justify ALL of them based on a "collecting" profile. I seriously doubt even 1 of them is justified on either short term or long term use. _Sensors and Actuators_ was literally one out of a thousand. Can anyone guess right with those odds? And face it, collection development is all about educated guesses. Should we spend a half million dollars looking for that $1,300 title? What did we really "throw away"? I think it makes more sense to "throw away" about $50,000 a year on document delivery for what we really need in place of continuing to guess about half a million dollars worth of things we "own" that aren't needed. Maybe, in the ideal world, we would do both, buy what we "think" we need for long term and what we need now when people want it. In fact, that is exactly the kind of balancing we have to do. But for now, I don't think that $1,300 was thrown away. It was money well spent.
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Statements of fact and opinion appearing in the _Newsletter on Serials Pricing Issues_ are made on the responsibility of the authors alone, and do not imply the endorsement of the editor, the editorial board, or the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
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The NEWSLETTER ON SERIALS PRICING ISSUES (ISSN: 1046-3410) is published by the editor through the Office of Information Technology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as news is available. Editor: Marcia Tuttle, Internet: tuttle@gibbs.oit.unc.edu; Paper mail: Serials Department, CB #3938 Davis Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill NC 27514-8890; Telephone: 919 962-1067; FAX: 919 962-4450. Editorial Board: Deana Astle (Clemson University), Christian Boissonnas (Cornell University), Jerry Curtis (Springer Verlag New York), Janet Fisher (MIT Press), Fred Friend (University College, London), Charles Hamaker (Louisiana State University), Daniel Jones (University of Texas Health Science Center), Michael Markwith (Swets North America), James Mouw (University of Chicago), and Heather Steele (Blackwell's Periodicals Division). The Newsletter is available on the Internet, Blackwell's CONNECT, and Readmore's ROSS. EBSCO customers may receive the Newsletter in paper format.
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