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Publishing information
- To: epc@iucr.org
- Subject: Publishing information
- From: Pete Strickland <ps@iucr.org>
- Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2003 13:20:21 +0000
- Organization: IUCr
Dear All
Please see below a Newsletter sent to us by Blackwell.
Best wishes
Peter
Journal News - December 2003, Number 2
Journal News
Our first issue of Journal News was well received by many of our
journal editors and society officers, and we would always welcome
more feedback as we develop this new service.
Among other news items and information in this issue, we have included
a report on the Charleston Library Conference. We should like to
know if you find such meeting reports, which summarize current issues
in the world of journal publishing, useful, as we could provide these
on a regular basis.
Best wishes, and many happy returns for the season,
Bob Campbell
President, Blackwell Publishing
_________________________________________
Blackwell Publishing Storms Ahead
As reported in the Company News section of the October issue of
Scholarly Communications Report, the share price of Reed Elsevier
dropped after a warning from Citigroup Bank about the possible threat
of open access publishing.
This is followed by news of Wolters Kluwer cutting 8% of its workforce
as part of a three-year plan to turn around the Dutch publishing
group.
However, after these negative reports, Blackwell Publishing is seen in
a very different light:
'Blackwell Publishing has been successful within its selected
publishing niche in recent years, having an organic growth rate of
some 12% per annum (compared with approximately 4% by most of its
competitors). This three times average growth is to some extent
picked up in the Wellcome Trust report (outlined in the last issue)
as a consequence of being seen as a 'honorary not-for-profit'
publisher'. It stems from the contract publishing which Blackwell's
undertakes for learned societies, a business which can only be
sustained if strong emphasis is given to providing good customer
care.'
_________________________________________
The Sabo Bill and Open Access
Named for Rep. Martin Sabo (D-Minn), and supported by the fledgling
Public Library of Science (PLoS), the Sabo Bill has been watched
closely by publishers, societies, editors and authors since its
introduction to the US House of Representatives in June 2003.
If enacted into law, the legislation would prohibit copyright
protection for any work supported by US federal funds and could
radically alter how journals function.
Specifically, the Bill would amend US copyright law by adding federal
grant recipients to an existing provision that already bars federal
employees from copyright on their publications. There is no
indication in the Bill concerning what percentage of total funds
would need to be derived from federal funds in order to trigger the
prohibition.
Many scientists, librarians and publishers argue that, without
copyright, journals would not be able to continue to maintain the
quality and integrity of the scientific record as they would lose
control of the distribution and republishing of articles.
Others point to the fact that the Bill is so broadly written that, in
addition to journals, books and even TV documentaries could be
negatively affected by its provisions.
Fortunately, Washington insiders believe that, due to its now
well-recognised flaws, the Sabo Bill has little "traction" and will
not survive far into 2004. Nonetheless, there is also little doubt
that this is just an opening gambit by the open access movement in a
campaign to seek legislative support for their viewpoint.
_________________________________________
Subito document delivery service
Blackwell has been working with other publishers to ensure that the
Subito document delivery service complies with international
copyright law. Subito ( <http://www.subito-doc.com/>
http://www.subito-doc.com) is managed by a network of university
libraries across Germany, Switzerland and Austria and has the backing
of the German government. Until recently, a user anywhere in the
world could order journal articles for e-mail delivery at EUR4, with
none of this coming back to the journals.
As a result of the legal pressure that we have exerted, they have now
ceased delivering articles outside Germany, Switzerland and Austria.
We are working with them to negotiate a license which would allow
them to link users through to journal articles on Blackwell Synergy,
to operate a document delivery service for older non-digitised
content, and to continue their legal activities within Germany,
Switzerland and Austria. These negotiations are at an early stage and
will be concluded in 2004.
_________________________________________
The 'preprint server' hits legal problems
One of the basic principles of preprint servers has been that there is
no peer review or even any checking of what is posted. In an article
posted on the physics preprint server, ArXiv, on October 27th, Alvaro
De Rújula alleges that Martin Rees, Britain's astronomer royal, has
claimed credit for other researchers' ideas. Subsequently Rees
modified his paper to cite the relevant work, but this could lead to
others posting similar complaints.
If such accusations can be proved in court to be defamatory then there
is a huge potential liability inherent in publishing systems
following the ArXiv model. This may lead to routine checking of
contributions and occasional referral to legal advisors. This
represents a new overhead to be faced by proponents of the model, who
are already looking at another problem (and potential cost),
screening for plagiarism. It is unlikely that insurers will provide
cover without formal checking procedures in place. For more
information see Nature, volume 426, 6 November 2003, page 7.
_________________________________________
Editorial Best Practice: Understanding ISSNs
What is an ISSN?
The International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) is an internationally
accepted code that identifies the title of serial publications. It
is an eight-digit code consisting of seven numbers plus a check digit
that enables a computer to recognise when the number is incorrectly
cited. The check digit may be an X - otherwise the ISSN is fully
numeric.
The ISSN is not connected with ownership of the journal, nor does it
confer copyright or protect the title of the serial from use by other
publishers. The ISSN does not change if, for example, the journal
changes publisher.
However, a new ISSN is required if the title of the journal changes.
This affects the way that the journal is catalogued within library
systems, and how it is recorded in abstracting and indexing services,
such as ISI and Medline. For this reason we recommend that the
decision to change a journal title only be taken when the anticipated
benefits outweigh the bibliographic risks associated with the change.
What are ISSNs assigned to?
ISSNs are currently assigned to the titles of serial publications in
accordance with the definition below:
A serial is a publication issued in successive parts, usually having
numerical or chronological designations (e.g. Vol.1, no.3, Summer
1996, etc.) and having a common title which is intended to be
continued indefinitely. The definition encompasses journals,
magazines, newspapers and series statements on books or monographs.
ISSNs should not be assigned to one-off publications, magazine
specials, newspaper specials or web sites.
Displaying the ISSN in print
The number should be printed thus: ISSN 0000-0000.
That is, it should be preceded by the initials ISSN followed by a
single space, then the first four digits, then a hyphen, then the
last four digits. This form of presentation is intended to make the
ISSN easier to read and recognize internationally. The ISSN should
preferably be printed on the top right-hand corner of the cover of a
printed journal. However, if design, binding or other considerations
mean the cover is unsuitable, the number may be printed in some other
prominent position. The printing of the number is voluntary but is
recommended in order to gain the full benefits of the ISSN system.
Electronic ISSN
A different ISSN from the print edition (the e-ISSN) is used for the
online edition of the journal. This is to enable librarians and other
users to distinguish between their print and online holdings.
The e-ISSN is also used within the structure of the digital object
identifier (DOI). Every journal article published by Blackwell is
allocated a DOI which is then used as the basis on which electronic
links between articles can be established. Authors can also use the
DOI in article citations.
The structure of the Blackwell DOI is as follows:
10.1111/j.2003.1536-7150.00002
where:
10.1111 is the publisher identifier
j indicates that this is a journal article
2003 is the year when the article was received
1536-7150 is the e-ISSN
00002 is the internal article tracking number
ISSN in future
Due to the rapidly changing nature of the electronic publishing
environment, the International Standards Organization (ISO) has
established a new Working Group to review the ISSN system. The
revised standard should, among other things, specify any agreed
extensions or changes to the scope of the ISSN, clarify the types of
resources to which ISSN may and may not be assigned, specify the
required metadata associated with each ISSN assignment, and clarify
policies for assigning ISSN to different editions or versions of a
resource. We will keep you informed about these changes once they
come into place.
For more general information on ISSNs, visit:
http://www.issn.org:8080/pub
For more general information on DOIs, visit http:// www.doi.org
_________________________________________
All about Online Journals: Reference linking
One of the great benefits of conducting research online, compared to
in print, is that readers can more easily find and link to referenced
and other related material. They are very often able to trace the
sources of articles simply by clicking on links in the reference list
which take readers to the cited abstract, or even to the full-text
article, without having to leave their desk.
For the journals on Blackwell Synergy, our goal is to make research
easier and more fluid. The majority of articles on the service
include HTML reference lists which allow for linking to cited
articles, where they are available online. These reference lists are
regularly updated so that more links are added as more cited material
is loaded onto the internet. Once an article is published on Synergy
its reference links will be continually updated - ensuring that the
links are as up-to-date as possible, and certainly far more so than
many other online journals services.
We are pleased to have added three new linking partners to Blackwell
Synergy in the last month - JSTOR, CSA, and CIS. This means that
researchers now have a greater number of options when finding source
material online.
An example of reference linking in an article on Blackwell Synergy:
Many of the online articles on Blackwell Synergy now include reference
links to the following:
1. Related articles in Blackwell Synergy - including to both
cited articles, and to those that cite the article being read (also
known as forward linking)
2. CrossRef - taking readers to cited articles in other
publisher databases
3. PubMed (MEDLINE)
4. ISI Web of Knowledge
5. JSTOR - the scholarly journal archive
6. Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature
(CINAHL)
7. Astrophysics Data System (ADS)
8. Current Index of Statistics (CIS)
9. Cambridge Scientific Abstracts (CSA) - includes 50 databases
covering materials science, environmental sciences and pollution
management, biological sciences, aquatic sciences and fisheries,
biotechnology, engineering, computer science, sociology, art history,
and linguistics.
_________________________________________
The Charleston Library Conference - Key journal issues
Why should this particular library conference be of special interest
to journal editors and society officers? It is an annual gathering,
held in Charleston, South Carolina, of 600+ mostly academic
librarians, along with several curious publishers and intermediaries.
The special thing about this conference is its congenial and
collegiate atmosphere, and the fact that it draws the real opinion
leaders - the movers and shakers - of the library world. It is this
group that are very often forming and influencing the opinion of the
wider community of serials librarians, the main subscriber base for
most journals. This year, Blackwell fielded 5 delegates at
Charleston who were able to report back on the key issues for
journals:
* US libraries really are suffering from budget cuts. The Big
Deal (purchase of complete collections of journals from one
publisher) is being challenged and whatever replaces it must be less
expensive, encourage a move to electronic only, and allow for more
selection by librarians of what they think their "patrons" want.
* 2004 will, however, not be the crunch year for the overthrow
of the Big Deal. David Goodman, librarian at Princeton University,
projects 2006 as the year in which journals will begin to lose out if
they do not respond positively to new models like open access.
* There were a number of presentations on open access,
although many librarians worry about the practicalities and
implications of the 'author pays' model.
* There is a general acceptance, grudgingly, of pricing by the
number of students in an institution. The bigger research libraries
tend to have to pay more. It was recognised that this model was
linked to the potential use of journals and that, at present, actual
usage data cannot be part of pricing models.
* Perhaps the most immediately relevant presentations were on
how to measure usage within libraries, and what the results mean. It
was relevant particularly because Blackwell is taking part in a City
University project to measure user behaviour. Early results indicate
that patterns of behaviour on Synergy match those of other platforms.
There is also increasing evidence that high usage correlates with
high impact factor, though less so in applied journals.
* The Canadian guru Steve Abram gave a keynote on libraries
and the next generation of learners. According to him, the new
generation "learn differently, and it is not the way we learn".
* There were many suggestions at the conference about the need
to provide a seamless online experience with statements such as "if
libraries do not give seamless access to students, they will go to
Google". What was really fascinating was the session when librarians
interrogated three local students and found that the students tended
to go to one database, out of all those the library purchased, and
stay there.
* Mass discarding of print is still inhibited by worries about
the archiving and preservation of e-content. There were four
presentations on this topic. The concept of the trusted archive is
very much to the fore, with, in the US context, local non-profits
like OCLC and JSTOR more trusted than either other libraries or the
Library of Congress.
_________________________________________
Rowecom subscriptions agency - a resolution in sight
Librarians, publishers and agents met at the Charleston Library
Conference to consider the consequences and lessons to be learned
from the bankruptcy of the US subscriptions agent, Rowecom.
Following the sale of Rowecom Europe to Ebsco, and the subsequent sale
of the assets of Rowecom's parent company at a good price, there is
some optimism about the prospect of a resolution which should see
publishers being able to recover in 2004 a proportion of the losses
suffered in respect of 2003 subscriptions.
There was some considerable discussion in the session about how
libraries should recognise the contribution made by those publishers
who continued supply. Many librarians were keen to express their
gratitude and most said that they would be trying to take it into
account when looking at priorities for purchasing subscriptions in
2004.
Questions were raised about how libraries could take more
responsibility for monitoring the health of organisations with whom
they place millions of dollars of business every year. It is to be
hoped at least that they begin to subject them to scrutiny by their
institution's purchasing department as would be the case with other
major suppliers.
At Blackwell, we received full payment for Rowecom Europe
subscriptions in the summer. We have been actively communicating
with all other former Rowecom customers to verify the status of their
subscriptions and to ensure that we receive payment from those who
had moved to another agent or who wanted to pay us directly.
The crisis has occupied hundreds of hours for tens of thousands of
people over the last year. The silver lining is that its resolution
has involved publishers, librarians and the subscriptions agent,
Ebsco, in real collaborative work towards the common goal of ensuring
the uninterrupted flow of information in the scholarly research
community. A good precedent for solving some of the other thorny
questions that face us all perhaps.
_________________________________________
Preview of forthcoming topics for Journal News:
* Editorial best practice - citations, ISI ranking and impact factors
* Editorial best practice - refereeing/peer-review
* Information about copyright assignment
* Trends in consortia buying
* Developing world access to research
* The impact of Google
Do let us know if you have any suggestions for topics to include in
future issues, or any comments on this issue of Journal News.
-------------------------------------------------------
--
Peter Strickland
Managing Editor
IUCr Journals
----------------------------------------------------------------------
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Phone: 44 1244 342878 Fax: 44 1244 314888 Email: ps@iucr.org
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