Publisher

SCIEDU Press OA APCs

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Results for SCIEDU Press:

  • 2015 APCs for journals sampled in 2014 show no change
  • average APC in 2015 ($272 USD) is the same as 2014 ($275 USD)
  • average APC from Solomon & Björk 2010: $200 USD (all sampled this price)
  • increase in average APC 2010 – 2015: 38% or $75 USD (note it is important to consider amount and not just percentage in understanding increases)
  • 12 Sciedu journals are listed in DOAJ. Of these, 11 are listed on the publisher website
  • 18 OA journals listed on the Sciedu website with APCs are not listed in DOAJ (title list follows)
  • Sciedu is one of the few publishers that does not mention any variations in APCs (e.g. discounts, extra charges, differential fees based on article type)
  • Data will be released with the main spreadsheet (in progress)
  • Thanks to Lisa Desautels for assistance with data gathering
  • Please note that our investigation is limited to article processing charges
  • This post is part of the OA article processing charges project

Sciedu APC journals not listed in DOAJ

Artificial Intelligence Research
Business and Management Research
Case Reports in Clinical Pathology
Case Reports in Internal Medicine
Case Studies in Surgery
English Linguistics Research
International Journal of Diagnostic Imaging
International Journal of English Language Teaching
International Journal of Healthcare
Journal of Biomedical Engineering and Informatics
Journal of Biomedical Graphics and Computing
Journal of Business Administration Research
Journal of Curriculum and Teaching
Journal of Epidemiological Research
Management and Organizational Studies
Studies in Asian Social Science
World Journal of English Language
World Journal of Social Science

Cite as:

Morrison, H. (2015). SCIEDU Press OA APCs. Sustaining the Knowledge Commons / Soutenir Les Savoirs Communs. Retrieved from https://sustainingknowledgecommons.org/2015/07/03/sciedu-press-oa-apcs/

OA APCs: beware introductory pricing

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Kudos to BioMedCentral for this explanation of why there is no APC (yet) for some of their journals: “† No article processing charge is payable for this newly-launched journal, for a promotional period.” from: How much is BioMedCentral charging? (viewed Aug. 1, 2014).

This is a straightforward explanation of a very common business model (for many kinds of businesses, not just OA journals) of free or low cost introductory pricing, the purpose of which is to attract customers with a view to eventually instating different and quite possibly substantially higher pricing. This is most important to keep in mind when projecting potential future costs, as the low costs of commercial for-profit open access publishers today may be substantially less than what some intent to charge after their journals become successful.

This is not meant to suggest that this is the practice for all open access journals and publishers using the APC method, or even most, rather it is one approach to be aware of that the second-largest publisher using this method is rather helpfully telling us it is a method they consciously employ.

Cite as:

Morrison, H. (2015). OA APCs: Beware introductory pricing. Sustaining the Knowledge Commons / Soutenir Les Savoirs Communs. Retrieved from https://sustainingknowledgecommons.org/2015/06/20/oa-apcs-beware-introductory-pricing/

Libertas Academica: average 18% to 56% price increase 2015 over 2014

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Update December 2019: in 2016 Sage acquired Libertas Academica. As noted on SKC in 2018, some of the Libertas Academica titles have ceased publishing. Titles that are still publishing are available via the Sage website; titles that have ceased publishing are available via CLOCKSS. These are good practices, but at the same time a good illustration of a danger that assuming that an OA publisher is “forever”. The Libertas Academic website per se is no longer available; any author, reader, or editor who goes to this site looking for content that used to be there might not find what they were looking for.

Libertas Academica posts APCs in three currencies, USD, Japanese Yen, and Euro, which results in 3 different average APC price increases: 18% for USD, 56% for Japanese Yen, and 21% for Euro. The only price decreases were in Euros; a few journals decreased 12% in price. In Japanese Yen, the range of price increases is from no increase to 249% of the 2014 price (i.e. more than double the 2014 price). In USD, the range is from no increase to a 79% price increase. The current inflation rate as calculated by Statistics Canada (may vary elsewhere) is 1.2%, so these average price rises are a very great deal higher than inflation. These are price increases that match or exceed the steep price increases of serials in the past century as recorded in the report of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Serials Pricing Project.

These are price increases on already substantial prices. For example, journals with APCs of $1,699 USD in 2014 are now $1,848 (9% increase). Journals that were $950 USD in 2014 are now $1,699 USD (79% increase).

Average APCs for Libertas Academica in 2015

1,848 USD
22,550 Japanese Yen
1,705 EUR

There are 76 titles listed on the Libertas Academica website today, down from 81 in 2014. It is not clear how readers would find articles published in the other 5 journals. This poses issues for readers and authors alike; discussion and recommendations are available in the title not found: room for improvement in maintaining access to content in ceased journals post.

Full data for the above has been posted in the OA APC dataverse.

50 of the Libertas Academic titles are listed in DOAJ. Another 32 OA APC Libertas titles are not listed in DOAJ. The titles are:

Advances in Tumor Virology
Bone and Tissue Regeneration Insights
Cell & Tissue Transplantation & Therapy
Cell Biology Insights
Cell Communication Insights
Clinical Medicine Insights: Psychiatry
Clinical Medicine Insights: Trauma and Intensive Medicine
Clinical Medicine Insights: Urology
Gene Expression to Genetical Genomics
Genomics Insights
Glycobiology Insights
Health Services Insights
Healthy Aging & Clinical Care in the Elderly
Human Parasitic Diseases
Immunology and Immunogenetics Insights
Immunotherapy Insights
Indian Journal of Clinical Medicine
Indian Journal of Clinical Medicine
Journal of Experimental Nuroscience
Journal of Genomes and Exomes
Lymphoma and Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemias
Medical Equipment Insights
Organic Chemistry Insights
Particle Physics Insights
Perspectives in Medicinal Chemistry
Primary Prevention Insights
Proteomics Insights
Rehabilitation Process and Outcome
Reproductive Biology Insights
Signal Transduction Insights
Tobacco Use Insights
Translational Oncogenomics

This post is part of the open access article processing charges project.

Cite as:

Morrison, H. (2015). Libertas Academica: Average 18% to 56% price increase 2015 over 2014. Sustaining the Knowledge Commons / Soutenir Les Savoirs Communs. Retrieved from https://sustainingknowledgecommons.org/2015/05/15/libertas-academica-average-18-to-56-price-increase-2015-over-2014/

Who is served by for-profit gold open access publishing? A case study of Hindawi and Egypt

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by: Jihane Salhab and Heather Morrison

Abstract

The highly successful Egypt-based open access publisher Hindawi is presented as a model of quality publishing and commercial success. However, this success is not accompanied by obvious benefits to Egypt’s own research and researchers. Even in the best-case scenario for academics in Egypt’s public university system, it would take three month’s salary for a full professor to pay the $1,500 USD OA APC of Hindawi’s high-end Disease Markers. Egypt’s largest public university, Cairo University, has no institutional repository. Fortunately for Egyptian researchers, there are open access journals that do not charge APCs, and not all open access repositories are institutional repositories. Open access may not be the most salient issue for Egyptian researchers at any rate. It is not clear that the pre-revolutionary state interference with research detailed in a 2005 Human Rights Watch report has been resolved, and the need to take on other work due to low salaries leaves many academics with little to no time to do research. In this instance, commercial success is not correlated with social benefit.

Details

Hindawi is an open access commercial publishing success story and an Egyptian business success story. Hindawi Publishing Corporation was founded by Ahmed Hindawi who, in an interview with Richard Poynder conducted in September 2012, confirmed a revenue of millions of dollars from APCs alone – a $3.3 net profit on $12 million in revenue, a 28% profit rate (Poynder, 2012). Hindawi is highly respected in open access publishing circles, and was an early leader in establishing the Open Access Scholarly Publishers’ Association (OASPA), an organization that takes quality in publishing seriously.

However, it seems highly unlikely that Egyptian researchers could afford to publish in the larger Hindawi journals. It would take three months’ salary for a full professor in today’s public university system to pay the $1,500 USD APC of Hindawi’s Disease Markers; this would take six months’ salary for a lecturer. This is the best-case scenario, assuming a university that has been able to implement the raise for academics decreed by Morsi in July 2012 to 3500 EGY monthly for a full professor ($579 USD) (1).

In addition to the financial factor, years of the pre-revolution regime’s interference with research subjects and methods formed a stagnant nature of contemporary scholarship where “the state restricts who can research what and severely punishes those who overstep their bounds” (Human Rights Watch, 46). Though there is a slight improvement after the revolution, still “economic, political, and physical insecurity in the country make it very difficult for serious changes to be made” (El-Awady, 2013).

There are other options for Egyptian researchers: the vast majority of open access journals do not charge article processing fees (Morrison et. al., 2015), there are subject as well as institutional open access repositories, and Egyptian researchers can read open access works of others. Still it might be reasonable to ask whether the most appropriate route to “open” in the short-term for researchers in Egypt involves opening up time to do the research through adequate salaries and opening up freedom to conduct and share research by building support for intellectual and academic freedom.

Note

1. In July 2012, more than a year after the revolution that ousted the Mubarak regime, elected president Morsi issued decree 84, amending the wages for academics that had not been changed since 1972. Published on July 14th in the Egyptian Official Journal (issue 28), Decree 84 (translated from Arabic by Jihane Salhab). lists the amendments of academics’ monthly wages as follows: 3500 EGY ($579 US) for professors, 3000 EGY ($497 US) for associate professors, 2500 EGY ($414 US) for lecturers, 1500 EGY ($248 US) for assistant lecturers and 1000EGY ($165 US) for teaching assistants respectively (using XE currency converter for that same date at a rate of $1=6.045 EGY). That raise was supposed to be only the first phase, but in February 2013 Egyptian minister of higher education Mas’ad confirmed in a statement that no other phases would follow (Bedewi, 2013).

References

Bedewi, M. (24 February 2013). Higher education: the country cannot endure the second phase of ‘academic wages.’ Al-Youm Al-Sabe’ [In Arabic]. Retrieved on 10 April 2015.

El-Awady, Nadia. (8 June 2013). Higher education still suffering after the revolution. University World News. Retrieved March 28, 2015 from http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20130606161959301

Human Rights Watch (2005). Reading between the “Red Lines”: the repression of academic freedom in Egyptian universities. Human Rights Watch, 17(6): 1-109. Retrieved February 17, 2015 from http://www.hrw.org/reports/2005/egypt0605/egypt0605.pdf

Morrison H, Salhab J, Calvé-Genest A, Horava T (2015). Open Access Article Processing Charges: DOAJ Survey May 2014. Publications 3(1):1-16. Retrieved April 10, 2015 from http://www.mdpi.com/2304-6775/3/1/1

Poynder, R. (2012).The OA interviews: Ahmed Hindawi, founder of Hindawi Publishing Corporation. Retrieved March 10, 2015 from http://www.richardpoynder.co.uk/Hindawi_Interview.pdf

This post is the first in a series analyzing the actual or potential impact of APCs.

Cite as:

Salhab, J., & Morrison, H. (2015). Who is served by for-profit gold open access publishing? A case study of Hindawi and Egypt. Sustaining the Knowledge Commons / Soutenir Les Savoirs Communs. Retrieved from https://sustainingknowledgecommons.org/2015/04/10/who-is-served-by-for-profit-gold-open-access-publishing-a-case-study-of-hindawi-and-egypt/

 

OA APC variation: english language editing

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MDPI provides a good example and explanation of a variation on article processing charges that reflect the work involved, that is, english language editing services. From the MDPI APC website (August 5, 2014):

For journals with an APC of 500 CHF or lower, a charge of 250 CHF will be applied to articles requiring extensive English language editing or formatting. To avoid surcharges, authors are recommended to carefully follow the instructions for authors and use the MS Word or LaTeX template files available on the instructions for authors page of the journal website. We encourage non-native English speaking authors to send their manuscripts to a professional English editing service prior to submission. If you use a service that provides a confirmation certificate, please send a copy to the Editorial Office. Authors from developing countries should consider registration with AuthorAid, a global research community that provides networking, mentoring, resources and training for researchers in developing countries.

This illustrates an important point about scholarly publishing when viewed as a service rather than as a good for sale: there is an inverse relationship between quality and the amount of work involved, i.e. the higher the quality, the less the work that is needed. This is because publishers do not pay for the largest portion of the work, conducting the research and writing the article. A well-researched and well-written article is less work for a journal at every step, as high quality articles make for easier editorial and peer review decisions as well as less work at the copyediting stage.

This approach provides an incentive for authors to submit articles in much better shape along with clear instructions about what that means, and also points to assistance for authors from developing countries.

One suggestion that fits with this approach is that it may be more effective to shift much of the support work of formatting and copyediting from publishers to the author’s institution. This way, institutions could hire local assistants and pay at rates appropriate for their own country and in their own currency, as well as creating local jobs, perhaps jobs for their own graduates in the case of universities.

For authors and copyeditors, there are advantages to working together over multiple projects. The copyeditor then has an opportunity to learn the terminology and approach preferred by the author, lessening the workload for both parties, as well as an opportunity to observe the growth of the author and research project over time. Perhaps a staff person in this position can help researchers with similar administrative tasks such as filing paperwork for grant proposals. This would free up the time of researchers to focus more on research. Where would the money come from? My suggestion is that in the process of transition to OA, we should not be looking to or funding publishers for services such as copyediting and formatting.

Of the 124 journals listed on the MDPI website, 124 or 85% offer english language editing services, generally at 250 CHF.

As a methodological note: while MDPI listed 124 journals, as of May 15, 2014 DOAJ listed 48 titles for MDPI. Correction August 5, 2014: note that DOAJ lists 104 journals for MDPI; the 48 titles are ones for which there are APCs. Many MDPI journals do not charge APCs, so the discrepancy is much less than I had thought.

I am finding that these large variations in title lists between websites of publishers relying on OA APCs and DOAJ are quite common. Simply collating these lists is proving to be a fair bit more challenging than anticipated.

Cite as:

Morrison, H. (2014). OA APC variation: English language editing. Sustaining the Knowledge Commons / Soutenir Les Savoirs Communs. Retrieved from https://sustainingknowledgecommons.org/2014/08/05/oa-apc-variation-english-language-editing/