Re: Applied Categorical Structures and other overpriced journals

[Michael Barr <barr@math.mcgill.ca>]

I did not know that Elsevier had changed it policies in that regard.  I
did know that if you asked they would send you a different copyright
transfer form asking only for a permission to print, but you had to know
to ask for it and my last publication in PAA was a dozen years ago.  And a
colleague of mine got a "lawyer's letter" from some journal demanding that
he remove a paper from his own web site.

Although I am glad (I suppose) to hear that they have yielded on this
point, my basic objection remains.

Michael

On Sat, 9 Jun 2007, John Baez wrote:

> Michael Barr wrote:
>
> >After thinking about it, I cannot restrain myself from responding to
> >Ross's message that the procedings of CT07 will be published by Applied
> >Categorical Structures.  [...]
>
> Indeed!  It's a pity that the proceedings of the main international
> conference on category theory is going to be buried in this journal.
>
> Why not publish it in TAC?
>
> >ACS is published by Kluwer (now a subsidary of Springer).  Kluwer is one
> >of the "gang of five"  publishers that are sucking all the life (not to
> >mention money) out of mathematical publication.  The journal is not
> >subscribed to by McGill nor by any other university in Montreal.  I would
> >actually be surprised if any university in Canada or more than a small
> >handful in the US subscribe.  It is no wonder since they charge, as far as
> >I can tell, in the neighbourhood of $3 a page so that the annual
> >subscription of nearly 100 pages costs nearly $3000.  The author of a
> >paper published there is legally enjoined from posting it on his own web
> >site.
>
> Is that still true?  If so, that's terrible.  Even most Reed-Elsevier
> journals allow you to keep your papers on your own website - and more
> importantly, on the mathematics arXiv.
>
> However, Reed-Elsevier only officially accepted these practices recently.
> Before that, it worked like this: if you demanded the right to keep your
> paper on the arXiv, they'd give in and let you do it.  I think they were
> trying to avoid public battles, to keep from looking bad.
>
> So, if anybody feels compelled to publish in a Springer/Kluwer/Reed-Elsevier
> journal for some reason, they should simply refuse to give away the
> complete electronic rights to their papers.  If necessary, amend the copyright
> form to say you have the right to keep your article on your website and
> the arXiv.  Journals are unlikely to turn away papers for this reason
> after they've already been accepted for publication.
>
> You can read the copyright transfer forms for some math journals here:
>
> http://front.math.ucdavis.edu/journals#copyright
>
> and many more here:
>
> http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo.php
>
> Unfortunately, the information about Springer seems a bit contradictory.
>
> Best,
> jb
>
>
>
>