LETTER: Academic journals running a nice little racket
Research funded by the taxpayer should be in the public domain but are provided by publishers at hugely inflated prices
12 December 2022 - 19:04
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It is hard for me to dredge up much sympathy for the complaints by the InterAcademy Partnership over the “predatory practices” moving in on the scientific establishment’s turf (“Forum warned predators are on the loose in science circles”, December 9).
As an avid follower of scientific and technological progress, I am constantly floored by the cost of journal articles or subscriptions. For example, $47 (R812) for a seven-page article written in SA by an employee on the payroll of a university, funded by our tax rands and peer-reviewed by a further three state employees, possibly in work hours and without remuneration from the “established journal”.
Discounted subscriptions to this journal are then resold to our/the same university from student fees. Research hours by postgraduates are generally not paid for, indeed rest on either their heavy student loan, to be repaid over many years, or their parents’ subsidy. For them it is about the joy of the work, rewarded perhaps by the prestige of publication.
More often, though, it is about fulfilling the requirements of a qualification. And to get it published as “open access” another $10,000 to the publisher, thank you. All this in an age where the cost associated with printing presses have evaporated and dissemination has become almost free.
Seen this way, it sounds like a nice little racket, to which University of California, Los Angeles dropped the gauntlet in 2019. About 18% of its staff output went into an Elsevier journal only to be bought back for their libraries at $40m per year.
Worst of all, the specific example quoted above has a material bearing on our political discourse, yet remains hidden behind a “paywall” when, because the taxpayer funded it, it should by rights be in the public domain.
This gross distortion in pricing and access is exactly what makes the predatory sector so lucrative.
Jens Kuhn Cape Town
JOIN THE DISCUSSION: Send us an email with your comments to letters@businesslive.co.za. Letters of more than 300 words will be edited for length. Anonymous correspondence will not be published. Writers should include a daytime telephone number.
Support our award-winning journalism. The Premium package (digital only) is R30 for the first month and thereafter you pay R129 p/m now ad-free for all subscribers.
LETTER: Academic journals running a nice little racket
Research funded by the taxpayer should be in the public domain but are provided by publishers at hugely inflated prices
It is hard for me to dredge up much sympathy for the complaints by the InterAcademy Partnership over the “predatory practices” moving in on the scientific establishment’s turf (“Forum warned predators are on the loose in science circles”, December 9).
As an avid follower of scientific and technological progress, I am constantly floored by the cost of journal articles or subscriptions. For example, $47 (R812) for a seven-page article written in SA by an employee on the payroll of a university, funded by our tax rands and peer-reviewed by a further three state employees, possibly in work hours and without remuneration from the “established journal”.
Discounted subscriptions to this journal are then resold to our/the same university from student fees. Research hours by postgraduates are generally not paid for, indeed rest on either their heavy student loan, to be repaid over many years, or their parents’ subsidy. For them it is about the joy of the work, rewarded perhaps by the prestige of publication.
More often, though, it is about fulfilling the requirements of a qualification. And to get it published as “open access” another $10,000 to the publisher, thank you. All this in an age where the cost associated with printing presses have evaporated and dissemination has become almost free.
Seen this way, it sounds like a nice little racket, to which University of California, Los Angeles dropped the gauntlet in 2019. About 18% of its staff output went into an Elsevier journal only to be bought back for their libraries at $40m per year.
Worst of all, the specific example quoted above has a material bearing on our political discourse, yet remains hidden behind a “paywall” when, because the taxpayer funded it, it should by rights be in the public domain.
This gross distortion in pricing and access is exactly what makes the predatory sector so lucrative.
Jens Kuhn
Cape Town
JOIN THE DISCUSSION: Send us an email with your comments to letters@businesslive.co.za. Letters of more than 300 words will be edited for length. Anonymous correspondence will not be published. Writers should include a daytime telephone number.
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