Newsletter on Serial Pricing Issues 070 (February 12, 1993) URL = http://hegel.lib.ncsu.edu/stacks/serials/nspi/nspi-ns070 ISSN: 1046-3410 NEWSLETTER ON SERIALS PRICING ISSUES NO 70 -- February 12, 1993 Editor: Marcia Tuttle CONTENTS 70.1 SUPERJANET, Fred Friend 70.2 ELECTRONIC JOURNALS TO BE PIONEERED ON SUPERJANET, Institute of Physics 70.3 LETTER TO AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIETY FROM WEST CHESTER UNI- VERSITY, John Christensen 70.4 FROM THE MAILBOX 70.1 SUPERJANET Fred Friend, Librarian, University College London, ucylfjf@UCL.AC.UK. [The latest _STM Newsletter_ (no. 88) carries a letter from Friend inform- ing STM members about the trial described below. It says, in part: "I would like this trial to take place in the spirit of consultation rather than confrontation between publishers and librarians,..." The editor expressed pleasure "with the open and frank way in which we were apprised of the Trial." I asked Friend to describe the project for this newsletter. -ed.] I am happy to give readers of the Newsletter a brief description of the SuperJANET document delivery trial you heard about from STM, although to many of your US readers it will be "old hat" (do you know that expression?) because it uses the RLG Ariel software now common in the US. I saw Ariel in operation in Philadelphia two years ago, bought it for UCL to see whether it would work over our network, which it does but it would clog up our existing network, JANET (Joint Academic Network), if used on a large-scale. JANET has been around for a long time now and UK universities have persuad- ed the UK Government to fund the first stage of a new high performance optical fibre network to be called SuperJANET (a corny name but easier to remember than NREN?) My university, UCL, has been at the forefront of the SuperJANET development and when I heard about it I realised that the capac- ity of the new network was the answer to the future development of Ariel in the UK. So I put forward a proposal for a trial between six UK universities and this proposal has been accepted. The trial will run from March to Aug- ust this year and, for the benefit of your readers who do not know the Ariel system, it involves scanning a document -- e.g. journal article -- into a 386 or 486 PC, transmitting the image over the network and printing it out in the receiving library on a laser printer. The software is reason- ably-priced (contact RLG for details) and the hardware is all standard, so it is relatively cheap and easy to set up. Your readers might also be in- terested to know that that there is another document delivery trial taking place in the UK, using X400 to deliver articles from the British Library Document Supply Division at Boston Spa to Nottingham University Library. We are friendly rivals! 70.2 ELECTRONIC JOURNALS TO BE PIONEERED ON SUPERJANET Press Release from Institute of Physics Publishing, dated 21st January 1993. Nine society and commercial publishers are collaborating to pioneer elec- tronic journals on the new high-speed academic network. SuperJANET, cur- rently in its pilot phase, offers publishers the first practical opportuni- ty for transmission of images and interaction over a network. The three- month project, ending in April, will demonstrate the feasibility of storing and using text in a flexible way and of displaying colour and high-resolu- tion images. The nine publishers have committed themselves to a pre-competitive collabo- ration and will contribute academic articles for trial distribution through SuperJANET and technical expertise. The work is supported by funding from the British Library Research and Development made to Institute of Physics Publishing, on behalf of the nine publishers, with Dr. David J. Pullinger as Project Head. The grant of L54.2k covers the first three months of 1993 and covers project co-ordina- tion and programming done at the SuperJANET site, Edinburgh University. The project will move beyond viewing images of documents on screens to flexibly interacting with them. One might, for example, want to enlarge a colour or half-tone image to look at it more closely, or lay sections of text alongside each other. In time, publishers want to explore 3-D and moving images, mathematics and other services to the academic community. The nine publishers are: Blackwell Scientific Publications, Cambridge Uni- versity Press, Institute of Physics Publishing, Institution of Electrical Engineers, Nature (Macmillan Publishers), Oxford University Press, Pergamon Press, Rapid Communications of Oxford, Sage Publications. The work received an enthusiastic response from the group of librarians and information scientists who were studying the opportunities for information on SuperJANET. The report of the group, under the chairmanship of Michael Breaks, Librarian of Heriot-Watt University, is due to be available soon. For further information contact Dr. David J. Pullinger, Electronic Product Manager, Institute of Physics Publishing. 70.3 LETTER TO AMERICAN CHEMICAL SOCIETY FROM WEST CHESTER UNIVERSITY John Christensen, Brigham Young University, LIBJOC@VM.BYU.EDU. Regarding the letter to the American Chemical Society from West Chester University, cited in Issue #69, I realize that 20% increases in serials subscription prices sound large but I continue to be surprised to see as many attacks on major society publishers as there have been recently, con- sidering what the commercial publishers have been doing for years and con- tinue to do to libraries. The research I have done ("Cost of Chemistry Journals to One Academic Library, 1980-1990" in _Serials Review_ 18(3):19- 34, Fall 1992 issue) clearly indicates that commercial publishers have been charging on the average 4 times as much as non-profit publishers when con- sidering dollars/million characters or the ratio of cost to impact factor (ISI). Among the non-profit journals, ACS are among the least espensive. Of the 6 least expensive journals in 1990, 5 of them were ACS titles. For instance, JACS cost $7.41/million characters in 1990 while the average commercial journal cost $110.91/million characters. A 20% increase on the 1990 JACS price would be $1.48/million characters. A 2% rise from the aver- age commercial journal ($2.20/million characters) would more than match the ACS increase on JACS. Of course, we are seeing increases in commercial journals far in excess of 2%. Even if ACS increased their price on JACS 20% per year and the average commercial journal increased in price only 5% per year it would be the year 2011 before JACS would pass the cost per million characters of the average commercial journal. I am confident this will not happen. In fact, I am confident that commercial rates will increase as fast as or faster than non-profit society rates. I am not affiliated with the ACS, AIP, or any of the other professional societies and I know they are not perfect, but I think they should be com- mended for the years of quality, inexpensive publishing they have given libraries and the scholarly community. Rather than sending letters to crit- icize them I think we should concentrate our efforts on the far more expen- sive commercial publishers. If non-profit publishers were publishing all chemistry journals my library subscribes to, at the same rates they charge for the journals they do publish, my library would not be having the diffi- culty it is. Given the 4 to 1 ratio of costs of non-profit journals to commercial journals (see my previously referenced article) and the fact that about as much quantity is being published by non-profit as by commer- cial, my library's chemistry journal bill would drop from about $150,000 to about $60,000 if all the journals were published at the non-profit average. And the ACS is significantly lower than the non-profit average. Unless they make some very radical changes (much more radical than the 20% increase cited in the West Chester University letter) I will always be happy to encourage my library to pay the ACS bill. In fact, I would like to see the ACS and other non-profit publishers agressively grab a greater percentage of the publishing market in scientific journals. 70.4 FROM THE MAILBOX The mailbox is: tuttle@gibbs.oit.unc.edu. >From Joe Wible, Stanford University, wible@krypton.stanford.edu While the legal battle between Pergamon and Raymond Wegmann continues, Stanford has decided to cancel both versions of _Cellular and Molecular Biology_. During 9 weeks of sampling over a 3 year period, the library had to reshelve this title only 4 times. Also, during a 3 year period, faculty in the Department of Biological Sciences at Stanford only cited the journal twice. A search of the _Science Citation Index_ database from 1974 to the present found only 14 times this journal was cited by Stanford faculty. Only one of these citations was from a faculty member in the Department of Biological Sciences. When this faculty member was approached about the journal, he was surprised to learn he had cited anything from _Cellular and Molecular Biology_. Upon further examination it was discovered that he had incorrectly cited the article which was actually from _Molecular and Cellu- lar Biology_. After other faculty consultation, the decision was made to cancel the title. While this title represents an unusually bad situation, even regular title changes produce significant problems and extra work for libraries. Do pub- lishers realize when they make title changes they draw attention to their title and increase the risk of having the title cancelled by libraries? A recent study by Afes and Wrynn reports that when a journal title changes, 10% of the libraries that subscribe cancel (_Bulletin of the Medical Li- brary Association_ 1993 81(1):48-53). ------- >From Dana Roth, Catech, DZRLIB@ROMEO.CALTECH.EDU: Does the recent letter from Robert Campbell (Blackwell Scientific) mention- ing the 20% increase in the value of the US dollar after the 12th of Sep- tember 1992 mean that refunds of 20% should be in the mail to libraries who made subscription payments after that date? This refund presumably should also apply to other British publishers (i.e. Pergamon, G&B, Royal Society, etc.), where US$$ payments were made, by their vendors, after 9-12-92. Does Faxon, et. al. have anything to say about this? ------- >From Judy Rieke, University of North Dakota Health Sciences Library (AUJZR@UNDJES.BITNET): One of our faculty members with whom I'd consulted on the dilemma of _Cel- lular and Molecular Biology_ brought a recent article on the topic to my attention. It appeared in the "News & Comment" section of _Science_ 259, 22 January 1993 (page 453). It gives an interesting summation of the situation and presents some behind the scenes information that did not appear in the official communications to subscribers. It also reinforced our decision not to renew our subscription to either version. This was a decision that was fully supported by every faculty member with whom I discussed the issue. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 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 Uni- versity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Readers of the NEWSLETTER ON SERIALS PRICING ISSUES are encouraged to share the information in the newsletter by electronic or paper methods. We would appreciate credit if you quote from the newsletter. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 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 27599-3938; Telephone: 919 962-1067; FAX: 919 962-0484. Editorial Board: Deana Astle (Clemson University), Jerry Curtis (Springer Verlag New York), Janet Fisher (MIT Press), Charles Hamaker (Louisiana State Universi- ty), Daniel Jones (University of Texas Health Science Center), James Mouw (University of Chicago), and Heather Steele (Blackwell's Periodicals Divi- sion). The Newsletter is available on the Internet and Blackwell's CONNECT. EBSCO and Readmore Academic customers may receive the Newsletter in paper format from these companies. Back issues of the Newsletter are available electronically. To get a list of available issues send a message to LISTSERV@GIBBS.OIT.UNC.EDU saying INDEX PRICES. To retrieve a specific issue, the message should read: GET PRICES PRICES.xx (where "xx" is the number of the issue). To subscribe to the newsletter, send a message to LISTSERV@GIBBS.OIT.UNC.EDU saying SUBSCRIBE PRICES [YOUR NAME]. Be sure to send that message to the listserver and not to Prices. You must include your name. To unsubscribe (no name required in message), you must send the message from the e-mail address by which you are subscribed. If you have problems, please contact the editor. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++