On 15 Dec, 2003, at 12:24, Stevan Harnad wrote:
> In response to:
>
>sh> it would be helpful if Richard could consider
>sh> and reply to the points made by Helene Bosc
>sh> http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/3269.html both
>sh> on the number of suitable journals of various kinds, and on the very
>sh> important question of "consanguinity": Should there be many independent,
>sh> competing journals, as now, or a few under the same roof, a possibility
>sh> Jan Velterop of BioMedCentral has suggested? ("Why not just 250?")
>sh> http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/3272.html
>
> On Mon, 15 Dec 2003, Jan Velterop replied:
>
>jv> For the record, I *never* said, suggested, or implied
>jv> "under the same roof".
>
> It would be very helpful if Jan could describe the topology of fitting
> the 2,500,000 annual articles (which currently appear under 24,000
> different roofs) under 250 roofs instead, while not fitting any subset
> of them under the same roof? (Full context for the above quote
> follows [at end]:)
A subset under the same roof? Sure. But that's not the same as the
either/or proposition you put in my mouth of "many independent,
competing journals, as now, or a few under the same roof"
>jv> I fully agree with what Mike and Sally say. 'Numbers of journals'
>jv> is a bad metric, as their sizes differ so dramatically. But
>jv> what Mike brings up is very important. It's not the number of
>jv> journals that count but the range of options to publish with
>jv> open access. Why would the current universe of 25,000 toll access
>jv> journals have to be replaced by 25,000 open access journals? Why
>jv> not just 250? Or why not 50,000? It is the proportion of the
>jv> literature that is available with open access that counts. Small
>jv> now, but growing fast, and likely to reach a 'tipping point'
>jv> in the foreseeable future.
Received on Mon Dec 15 2003 - 18:00:58 GMT