Editor—With reference to the editorial by Delamothe et al,1 last year my library paid €2.8m (£1.9m; $3.2m) for subscriptions to refereed journals. We could have saved this amount in a completely open access world, as all articles would be freely available on the internet.
Also, we had to pay for the refereeing, editing, and posting on the internet of the articles that my university published. It concerned 1413 articles. To the amount of €500 each, this makes €706 500. So for me there is no debate about the question in which world scholarly communication is cheaper. Moreover, the ultimate result is far more accessible in the open access world than in the subscription world.
The point is, however: how do we get from A to B? We cannot do away with the old journals before we have the new ones in place, with their impact factors and brands. In the meantime we have to pay in both worlds. The transfer is further impeded by the recent licensing contracts with the big commercial publishers. Any strategic ideas for this journey?
Competing interests: LJMW is the librarian of Wageningen University and Research Centre.
References
- 1.Delamothe T, Godlee F, Smith R. Scientific literature's open sesame? BMJ 2003;326: 945-6. (3 May.) [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]