Responses: Angela, blue, Janet Green
I.
Do we need
to analyze the existing market in Library science journals? Andrea and Anita have both raised this
question. The reasons for doing so fall
into two categories: 1) Determining
need—are
quality articles going unpublished for lack of an outlet; does the
world need
another library journal? And 2) Identifying the competition as a way to
help us
define the scope of our proposed journal.
My view:
I’m not inclined
to spend a great deal of time on this task (at least at the beginning)
for the
following reasons. One of the reasons
the journal was proposed at all was as an experiment in alternative
open-access
publication. The rhetoric in the
Library community (I’m thinking of Dan Greenstein among others right
now) is
that academics need to develop new models of scholarly publishing as
sustainable alternatives to typical journal publishing.
I think this notion is problematic, but
that, if anyone can pull it off, it ought to be librarians. As a group, academic librarians should be
uniquely well-informed about the publishing crisis; especially
supportive of
innovative alternatives; and less reluctant to publish in
non-traditional
venues. Ideally the journal would
attract authors who would otherwise seek to publish in established, but
expensive titles (of which librarianship has a surfeit).
Assessing the size of the pool of
publishable articles isn’t that relevant in this scenario.
I think the greatest benefit
of this analysis would be in helping
us define the scope of the new journal.
In this regard, my preference would be to describe our ideal
journal
first and then see how it might be adapted to have the greatest chance
of
success in the market.
What are your thoughts?
ANGELA: Although I do
think it is important
to be informed about the kinds of journals that are out there, I tend
to agree
with Dan that we don’t need to spend too much time on an in-depth
analysis. I
do think we should outline our “ideal journal” with the competition in
mind,
which would require a fairly good knowledge of what is available in the
commercial market, but I’m thinking that the members of this committee
are
probably quite familiar with our competition already.