Dear Leo
I am a little puzzled by your comment that:
>In The Netherlands ... For those who neglect the (price of) the trajectory
>from submission to publication in a toll gated journal, self archiving is the
>perfect solution: high quality articles for free! For those who pay for this
>trajectory, i.c. the libraries, self archiving is better than nothing...
Is it the library that is responsible for the cost of self-archiving? Is
it the library that runs the server, or pays for the Internet
connection? Is it the library that does the proofreading, or scans
the photographs?
I compare this with the operation of archives such as arXiv, where the
author does the proofreading and the scanning and the preparation of the
manuscript, and the system operator controls the automatic processes
that place the manuscript on the server.
You compare it to the cost of preparation of the manuscript for print in
conventional journals: Has it been the custom for the library to provide
this service in the Netherlands?
Even if the Dutch library does do the tasks in the first paragraph, it
is undoubtedly doing them in addition to subscribing to its customary
journals, as other countries are not as up-to-date. The sustainable
cost to look for is that of having the archive instead of the
conventional journals, once the rest of the world catches up. I know that
Stevan considers that his self-archiving will not hurt the conventional
journals, but this nonetheless seems to me one logical conclusion. Perhaps
the solution is for those journals to now take on the role of preparing
manuscripts for the archive and arranging for peer-review.
But we need not have everything worked out yet, since it is obvious
already that there is no unmanageable obstacle.
Dr. David Goodman
Associate Professor
Palmer School of Library and Information Science
Long Island University
dgoodman_at_liu.edu
(and, formerly: Princeton University Library)
--------------------------------------------------
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Received on Wed May 26 2004 - 21:56:28 BST