159.2 CHALLENGE TO PROMOTIONAL SURVEYS, Christopher Schneider
Rick Perlstein, Associate Editor, _Lingua Franca_, edit@netcom.com.
To The Serials Community:
For an article I am preparing for _Lingua Franca_'s Inside Publishing column on the UnCover system at LSU, I'd appreciate it if interested parties could email or call me (212-302-0336, ext 29) with responses to the following questions:
1. Most of the Serials Pricing Newsletter deals with issues in STM pricing. I'm interested, however, in the effect of STM cost increases on humanities and social science acquisitions/ cancellations. Chuck Hamaker argues that cancelling paper subscriptions of expensive science journals makes it easier to keep up subscriptions to humanities and social science publications, and also humanities and social science books. Does this square with your experience?
2. Are you considering copying LSU's experiment?
3. Is there a significant difference between the usefulness of document delivery systems for humanists, social scientists, and hard scientists?
4. Sandy Thatcher argues, if I take him correctly, that scientists should consider how the skyrocketing costs of the journals they use negatively impact on the acquisition of liberal arts serials. Is there anything to this, in your opinion?
5. When your institution does a cancellation, what is a typical ratio of STM to liberal arts cancellations?
6. I would appreciate any reflections on the effect of document delivery systems on the pleasures of library browsing.
I look forward to hearing from you!
159.2 CHALLENGE TO PROMOTIONAL SURVEYS: THE REST OF THE STORY
Christopher Schneider on behalf of Gordon & Breach, Gordon & Breach, Christopher.Schneider@gbhap.com.
The message posted by American Physical Society (APS) and American Institute of Physics (AIP) contains amazing distortions of recent court decisions in its dispute with Gordon and Breach Science Publishers. The same statement also appeared in _APS News_ and a similar one in _Physics Today_. PT has confirmed that they will print the G&B response to these statements in their upcoming issue. Thus, we present only the key elements of our response below, and refer readers to the upcoming issue of PT for further explanation.
The dispute between Gordon and Breach and the societies is about questionable journal pricing surveys published by the societies. We would like to make it clear to readers that Judge Sand of the United States District Court in New York ruled against the societies on the dispute's key legal point -- that there was ample evidence that APS/AIP were using the survey for commercial purposes to promote their own journals, thus bringing their activities within the scope of the federal unfair competition statute known as the Lanham Act. Judge Sand said, "[APS/AIP]'s use of the surveys directly to target relevant consumers is precisely the type of promotional activity that the Lanham Act seeks to regulate . . . This element of consumer-orientation -- of directly targeting relevant purchasers -- pervades virtually all of defandants' secondary uses."
Documents from the societies' own files make it clear that the author of the surveys (Henry Barschall) worked together with the marketing and business officials of the societies to help the societies' business interests. Not only were these officials asked by Barschall if such a survey would be "useful," but the business officials actually provided suggestions on how to present the surveys to better serve the societies' interests.
The same evidence shows that the societies timed the publication of the surveys so that reprints could be sent to subscribers during the upcoming renewal period. Moreover, the documents show blatant statements by APS officials about using the survey to "justify [their journals'] price increases."
The societies also distort the results of the dispute in Europe. Switzerland's Appellate Court has recently decided that the Swiss Commercial Court must consider this new evidence which shows that the societies worked closely with Barschall to develop and use the survey to influence the purchasing decisions of subscribers. The societies are well aware of this decision, but nowhere mention it in their statement.
Apart from the flawed methodology used in the surveys, G&B has always objected to the societies' cloaking their promotional activities as "scholarly" research and publishing the results in journals normally reserved for scientific research. Indeed, evidence from the societies' files showed that they considered publishing Barschall's survey as an advertisement if PT would not publish it in time for their annual billing. G&B wants to remind readers that the dispute is not about inhibiting publication of material that can engender significant debate, but about ensuring that when so-called scientific studies are used in advertising and promotion, as the societies have used Barschall's surveys, that they are subject to the same standards as other advertisers. By using their venerated status as scientific societies to present their own advertising as science, APS/AIP are being unfair to other publishers, and their own subscribers and members.
The mailbox is: tuttle@gibbs.oit.unc.edu.
From Peter Graham, Rutgers University, psgraham@gandalf.rutgers.edu:
Re: _Journal of Academic Librarianship_ and the serials crisis. Tony Schwartz is correct indeed to raise the question of what our friends on the JAL editorial board are doing while the price of JAL has gone up about 100% in just over two years. Meanwhile the technical services department at Rutgers University Libraries has just dealt with its serial crisis by cutting 50% of our two departmental subscriptions: we are keeping the _Chronicle of Higher Education_, but JAL has had to go.
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From Carol Fleishauer, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, fleish@MIT.EDU:
I was disturbed by Tony Schwartz' piece on JAL's copyright fee in that he does not acknowledge that libraries have limits on how many articles per journal title they can order on ILL according to the CONTU Guidelines, and that after those limits have been reached the only choices are to pay the copyright fee, to purchase the journal, or to do without the article. This is the kind of writing that understandably leads publishers to believe that libraries do not adhere to copyright law and the guidelines. We need to be more careful in our actions and in our expression of them.
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From Paul Metz, Virginia Tech University, pmetz@vt.edu:
Oh Leonard B. Sand, oh Leonard B. Sand,
You're the second coming of Learned Hand.
We're glad it's you that we beseeched
When we were nearly gored and breached
. Oh Leonard B. Sand, oh Leonard B. Sand,
You're the second coming of Learned Hand.
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From Albert Henderson, _Publishing Research Quarterly_, 70244.1532@compuserve.com:
In spite of all the discussion pro and con, I have heard very little about the usefulness of the kiloword-per-dollar price surveys published by the AIP, OSA, AMS, and others. The literature of selection and weeding makes little or no reference to them.
So, my question is: Have librarians found the surveys useful? Have the surveys actually contributed to the collection development process? Or, are they simply a topic for conversation only?
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From Chuck Hamaker, Louisiana State University, NOTCAH@LSUVM.SNCC.LSU.EDU:
I don't know if it is a record or not, but the discovery of the subatomic particle known as the "top quark" announced in the spring 1995 issue of _Physical Review Letters_ was publised in two papers, with, between the two papers, 831 authors "claiming" authorship. See the _Chronicle of Higher Education_, Feb. 16, 1996, for a discussion of changes needed in the arena of multiple-authors of physics papers.
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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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