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Comment by twoslide | Hacker News Reader

I agree with what you've said - one thing that is sometimes overlooked is that publishers pay academic societies for the right to use the journal. I am on an editorial board for a small-ish society: we make about $5000 per year in member dues (they are low) and about $120,000 per year in publisher royalties. We use this to fund grant programs, scholarships, conferences, etc, so it is not all bad, but yes the publisher is probably making much more.

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Well, academic societies like this are the problem.

When high journal fees are talked about an often over looked fact is that scientists chose this model. Scientific journals were originally run as non-profits by their members.

I guess it was considered too much hassle, and they decided to move production too an external company... that’s when all this rent seeking behavior began.

My opinion really, is that scientists themselves should move back to the scientific society runs the journal model. It doesn’t make much work to publish a bunch of PDFs in an archive anymore.

In physics, we do. The American Physical Society (APS) journals are the gold standard in my field.

I'm a huge proponent of open-access publishing, but one must also appreciate the importance of the journals to the health of the society.

Here are relevant passages from statements by both candidates for treasurer in the 2018 APS election:

Candidate 1: James Baird

For now, there would seem to be three principal threats to the financial health of the Society. These are:

1. Open Access Publishing: Paid library subscriptions to APS journals constitute the largest single source of income to the society. Open access publishing threatens this subscription model. If paid library subscriptions disappear entirely, a new payer or payers will need to be found. Currently, this appears to be the author or the author’s institution. APS open access journal, Physical Review X, and the open access opportunities offered by the other Physical Review journals, are an ongoing experiment. The treasurer will need to be alert to financial trends in open access publishing.

Candidate 2: James Hollenhorst

APS is in very good shape, both in carrying out its mission and in its financial health. Nevertheless, the Society and its membership face many challenges, not the least of which is the threat to the business model due to rapid changes in the scientific publishing field. Open access is the rallying cry from the government, the universities, and from the readers and authors of our journal articles; but someone has to pay for the added value that APS brings.

What is the "added value" the society brings? If there was enough value add for researchers, then it could be incorporated into the membership fees. Conferences can be funded by commercial booths or higher attendance fees (most academic attendees are already paid for by grants); student conference scholarships can be paid for by a trust estabilshed by and promoted to senior scientists. The only other added value I can think of is political lobbying.

The society is a network of researchers with like interests. Political lobbying is also important for a lot of academic societies (like APS).

I find it interesting that you are advocating the removal of a current capitalistic/greedy funding model and replacing it with...another capitalistic/advertising model.

That post doesn't advocate for a new model; it just points out possible deficiencies in current conceptions.

>The society is a network of researchers with like interests.

So, the added value is for the researchers in the network, but that value is subsidized by the "payers", who are not the researchers?

>Open access publishing threatens this subscription model. If paid library subscriptions disappear entirely, a new payer or payers will need to be found.

Your scientific society sounds bad, and essentially has morphed in to a publishing company.

Seriously, a society should not be funded by publication fees.

Personally I think it would be better for the societies to stay small and be funded by membership fees or grant funding (as part of out reach other activities, meetings etc on grants).

If you find it through publishing you can’t really complain about the rent seeking behavior of journals...

Here is my hot take. Strictly speaking for APS, this funding model does not seem to be a big deal. If you are an active physicist in research, you are very likely to be part of an institution that has a subscription to the journals (university or national labs). If you are not an active physicist in research, the papers are probably prohibitively incomprehensible to you. I also think it makes sense for a society to publish journals. Societies facilitate the communication of research progress. This is clearly one of the goals of conferences. Papers in journals are usually a better format for communicating advances (more detail, can refer back to it at your leisure, peer reviewed, etc)

This. Several societies I am a member of are essentially only financially solvent due to their journals.

I’m a member of a few professional societies and while we do get revenue and sponsor scholarships, we also employ a bunch of people to promote and represent the society.

So it’s probably a wash if we lose the revenue, but don’t pay for the various people.

Largely, I think it’s tradition.

I'm confused by the relationship. Don't the publishers own the journals? What rights are the getting from the academic societies? Please excuse my ignorance. :)

Naming rights, like when you want to call your journal the Proceedings of the X Society.

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