Scholarly Communication and Publishing Issues

What Stanford is Doing

Highlights what has been happening at Stanford to address issues in scholarly publishing. Shows profile of expensive journals in the Stanford University Libraries. Shares strategies and invites support and advice in aligning library resources with programmatic needs.

Academic Senate

• Motion re Stanford’s Reaction to the Serials Crisis (html) (pdf version)
• Crisis in Scholarly Publishing: Executive Summary (18 May 1999)

News, Articles, and Web Sites

• NIH Public Access Law in a Nutshell
• SULAIR Scholarly Communications Colloquium (Nov. 6, 2006). PDFs of posters and presentations can be downloaded from the website.
• Requirements for Digital Preservation Systems (D-Lib Magazine, November 2005)
• Public Symposium on “Intellectual Property in the Digital Age: The Tragedy of the Commons Revisited”: April 27, 2005
  • Event Flyer
• Profit, patents, and progress: Science Commons aims to balance (The Stanford Daily, 4 January 2005)
• Open Access Publishing (Lane Medical Library)
• HighWire Press: Press: Keeping the Scholars in Scholarly Publishing (E-Content July/August 2004 Issue)
• At What Cost? As the Cost of Scholarly Journals Skyrockets, Stanford Fights Back (Stanford Magazine, May/June 2004)
• Faculty Senate addresses costly journals (The Stanford Daily, 20 February 2004)
• Faculty Senate discusses journal fees (The Stanford Daily, 7 February 2004)
• HighWire Press awarded publishing prize (The Stanford Daily, 7 October 2003)
• Donald E. Knuth, letter to Journal of Algorithms Editorial Board (October 25, 2003) (pdf)
  • See also: Journal of Algorithms Resignation
• Prof wants research online (The Stanford Daily, 1 October 2002)
• Law and Tech: Internet library necessary before more is lost (The Stanford Daily, 28 November 2001)

Library Actions and Initiatives

• Expensive Journals Profile

  Learn more about journals and journal packages that cost $1,000+ in the Stanford University Libraries. Because pricing for some titles is confidential (e.g. journal packages and online-only subscriptions), we created two versions of the Expensive Journals Profile.

  Version	Contains	About
  Public	Key information on individual titles	Definitions, Caveats, Sources
  Stanford-Only	In-depth data and summaries of individual titles and journal packages	Definitions, Caveats, Sources

• Expensive Journal Packages

  The Stanford University Libraries have journal packages and online subscriptions that have Stanford-specific pricing. Examples include: major professional societies (e.g. ACM, ACS, AGU, AIP, APS, IOP, IEEE, RSC) and core journals (e.g. Nature, Science). Pricing models are usually based on content, user population size, and service fees. It is worth noting that publishers vary in their definition of how much content is included in a current subscription and whether they are letting institutions lease or own the content.

  Because the dollars spent for journal packages and online journal such as Science and Nature is substantial, so that you see the “full picture” of journal titles that cost $1,000+, we have created a separate, more complete set of tables. This data also includes summary information. Because the Stanford-specific pricing information is confidential and cannot be shared outside of Stanford, we are limiting access to users with current SUNet IDs. Users must also accept access conditions before being able to view the Stanford-only version of the data.

• Cancellations

  • Cancellations Projects: Past and Future
  • List of Cancelled Titles
  • Guiding Principles
  • Strategies for New Cancellation Projects

• Package Deals

  • Why We Are Not Signing Some Package Deals

• SULAIR Initiatives

  • Copyright and Fair Use web site
  • HighWire Press
    • DC Principles for Free Access to Science
  • LOCKSS: Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe
  • LOCKSS-DOCS: Exploring Distributed Access to Web-Based US Government Information
  • National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program Grant