Paula kindly alludes below to an article I wrote in 2005 for the
Charleston Conference but a more recent one on the academic monograph
appeared in the Journal of Electronic Publishing last year which gives
figures for the ANU e-press in terms of POD sales, which while still
relatively small in proportion to the large number of complete pdf
downloads, does show that POD book sales are going up. As the Espresso
POD machines come down in price and are more widely available, the pay
for print copies will surely accelerate in sales?
Scholarly Monograph Publishing in the 21st Century: The Future More Than
Ever Should Be an Open Book, vol 11, no 2, Spring 2008, Journal of
Electronic Publishing,
http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=jep;cc=jep;rgn=main;view
=text;idno=3336451.0011.201
The initiative also last year of Bloomsbury Academic publishing is also
based on this premise of free online and buy a POD version.
"Publications will be available on the Web free of charge and will carry
Creative Commons licences. Simultaneously physical books will be
produced and sold around the world. For the first time a major
publishing company is opening up an entirely new imprint to be accessed
easily and freely on the Internet. Supporting scholarly communications
in this way our authors will be better served in the digital age".
http://www.bloomsburyacademic.com/
The list also might be interested in the recent study from University
College, London on the academic monograph...
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/infostudies/research/ciber/downloads/monographs.pdf
The Role and Future of the Monograph in Arts and Humanities Research A
research project carried out by CIBER / UCL Centre for Publishing for
the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, UCL.
Best
Colin
--------------------------------------------------------------
Colin Steele
Emeritus Fellow
Copland Building 24
Room G037, Division of Information
The Australian National University
Canberra ACT 0200
Australia
Tel +61 (0)2 612 58983
Email: colin.steele_at_anu.edu.au
University Librarian, Australian National University (1980-2002)
and Director Scholarly Information Strategies (2002-2003)
-----Original Message-----
From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
[mailto:AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG] On
Behalf Of Paula Callan
Sent: Monday, 2 March 2009 10:04 AM
To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
Subject: Re: Monographes and Open Access
Hi Falk
RE: your question ".... does open access increase or decrease sales
figures of hardcopy monographs?"
A really interesting paper by Colin Steele, from the Australian National
University in Australia, on the future of the scholarly monograph, cites
a paper Eve Gray and Associates that may provide the 'evidence' you are
seeking.
BOOK TO THE FUTURE: 21ST CENTURY MODELS FOR THE SCHOLARLY MONOGRAPH
Colin Steele
Excerpt:
"...Evidence from those publishers who provide material free of charge
on the web is that free access to books on the web actually generate
more conventional book sales. A South African Open Access publishing
project made books available free of charge online, but then the sales
turnover of the HRSC Press in question rose by 300%. The conclusion was
that "availability of full text online for scholarly publications does
push up sales". (Eve Gray and Associates, 2004)" p5
http://dspace.anu.edu.au/bitstream/1885/43261/1/Charleston_publishing_do
cument.pdf
Referenced source:
Eve Gray and Associates. (2004) Digital Publishing and Open Access for
Social Science Research Dissemination. p22. Available at
http://www.lessig.org/blog/archives/eve_gray.pdf
**************************************************************
Paula Callan BA (UQ), GradDipLib&InfoSys (QUT), GCEd (Higher) (QUT)
e-Research Access Coordinator Queensland University of Technology,
Brisbane, Australia CRICOS No. 00213J
Email: p.callan_at_qut.edu.au Ph: (07) 3138 8336
Location: V704 Library (Gardens Point Campus)
http://eprints.qut.edu.au
Publications
http://eprints.qut.edu.au/view/person/Callan,_Paula.html
***************************************************************
-----Original Message-----
From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
[mailto:AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG] On
Behalf Of Reckling, Falk, Dr.
Sent: Saturday, 28 February 2009 5:27 PM
To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
Subject: Monographes and Open Access
Is anybody aware of recent valid empirical studies on monographes in
science and humanities and open access? For example, does open access
increase or decrease sales figures of hardcopy mongraphes?
Many thanks, all the best
Falk Reckling
__________________________________________________
Falk Reckling, PhD
Social Science and Humanities / Strategic Analysis Austrian Science Fund
(FWF) Sensengasse 1 A-1090 Vienna
email: falk.reckling_at_fwf.ac.at
Tel.: +43-1-5056740-8301
Mobil: + 43-699-19010147
Received on Sat Mar 07 2009 - 01:49:39 GMT