Open Access Monographs:
Enabling better scholarship in
Humanities and Social Sciences.
Rupert Gatti
http://www.openbookpublishers.com/
Scholarly monograph
The scholarly monograph is important for HSS disciplines
for a number of reasons:
1. Primary route for the dissemination of new research
2. Important as a structure for the creation of new
research.
– Academics use the process of writing a book as a vehicle to
conduct and organise research
3. Published book is used as a measure for the “quality” of
research and researcher.
– Post publication reviews/awards
– Publisher reputation/brand
Open Access is a better model
In this seminar I will argue that the Legacy
Publishing Model is failing
in the role of disseminating knowledge
in the role of encouraging new research
in the role of a measure of quality
and that for both researchers and research
institutions Open Access is a better model.
Legacy Publishing Model
•
•
•
•
•
Primary output: Printed volume
Price: $80-100
Sales: 200-400
Customers: Libraries
Sales revenue: $20-40k per title
– Distributors net revenue $10-20k
– Publishers net revenue $10-20k
Business Model: Success
(more books published over last 10 years ago)
Dissemination Model: Failure
(no readers, no innovation)
Implications of Failure
• HSS disciplines fighting for recognition and
funding in comparison of STM
– EU on point of scrapping HSS funding for Horizon
2020. Ended up allowing it to apply within bigger
themes.
– Japanese Govt instructing universities to close HSS
faculties and convert to “areas that better meet
society’s needs”
• How can we justify use of public monies when,
with sales of 200-400, effectively nobody has
access to our best research
OBPs Open Access Model
• Objectives:
– Maximise readership
– Maximise engagement/re-use
– Digital & innovative publications allowing new
research possibilities
• Business Model: Breakeven (non-profit)
– Minimise costs
– Develop alternative revenue sources
OBP Online Readers
by year and platform
ClassicsLibrary (GA sessions)
Unglueit (Downloads)
250000
Internet Archive (Views)
200000
Wikimedia (Daily views)
WorldReader (Opens)
150000
OpenEdition (Book views)
100000
Free Downloads
OBP html reader (GA
sessions)
50000
OBP pdf reader (GA
sessions)
0
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015 (to
Aug)
GoogleBooks (Book Visits)
Average online readers, per title,
per month (over last 12 months)
by year of publication
1000
900
800
700
600
500
400
300
200
100
0
2009
2010
2011
Mean (426)
2012
2013
Median (281)
2014
2015
OBP Online Readers
by country, last 12 months
other 186
countries
France
Netherlands
Australia
Kenya
Canada
Germany
India Greece
United
Kingdom
United States
Locations of online readers of
Oral Literature in Africa
on OBP site, over last 12 months.
1%
1%
1%
1%
8%
1%
1%
22%
2%
2%
3%
3%
3%
4%
12%
4%
4%
8%
6%
6%
8%
Kenya
United States
Indonesia
India
Nigeria
Netherlands
South Africa
Philippines
United Kingdom
Germany
Ghana
Tanzania
Spain
Bangladesh
Zambia
Zimbabwe
Algeria
Ethiopia
Canada
Uganda
other 107 countries
OA: Better dissemination
• OBP titles: approx. 50k online readers over 10
years
– Two orders of magnitude more readers than sales
in legacy model
• Broader geographic reach
• Broader reader demographic
• Re-use – allowing others to identify and
redistribute to new markets
OA: Enabling better research
• Linking research directly to primary sources
– Archives
– Repositories
– Databases
• Embed multimedia content
– Audio
– Video
• Social Editing
– Pre-publication
– Post-publication
• Re-use
– Alternative analysis of same material
– Datamining & new research techniques
Examples
A Musicology of Performance by Dorottya Fabian
Storytelling in Northern Zambia by Robert Cancel
In the Land of the Romanovs by Anthony Cross
From Dust to Digital edited by Maja Kominko
What Works in Conservation? Edited by William
Suhterland et al.
OA: Dissemination Strategies for
Institutions and Individuals
Open Access introduces the possibility of an
independent dissemination strategy by a
Research Centre or a Researcher
• Research Centre – base institutional unit for
academic research, e.g.
– University Faculty or Department
– Externally funded research centre
RC: Objectives
Objectives will be different for every RC, but
some may include:
•
•
•
•
•
Conduct high quality research
Attract high quality researchers
Provide resources required for research
Address specific issues or audiences
Financial sustainability
Audience
Who are the audiences RCs seek to engage with?
– Other researchers
– Students and lecturers in research area
– Research funders
• Public funding councils
• Private enterprise
– Potential students (attract good students undergrad/phd – attract
funding through fees – overseas students)
– Policy makers
– Alumni
– Other ‘users’ of research
• Industry
• personal
– Geographic reach
Legacy Model - Indirect Dissemination
• Leave the dissemination strategy to the researcher
– don’t take copyright from author
– don’t tell author where to publish
• Researcher delegates dissemination to publisher
– Objectives of individual researcher may differ from the RC
– Signs over copyright, exclusive publishing clause etc
• Exclusive publishing clause:
– means RC cannot proactively develop independent
dissemination strategy
Research Centre
Infrastructure
Research Students Funding
Researchers
What is
published,
and where
Exclusivity
Publishers
Audience
Impact of indirect control
• With legacy model control over dissemination
by researchers can only be through the
employment contract with the researcher.
• Is it surprising that we have such reliance on
citation metrics and specific journal/publisher
destinations in performance appraisal?
OA allows direct dissemination
• CC BY licence and non-exclusive publishing
agreement means that research centres are
free to develop their own dissemination
strategy without interfering with either the
researchers rights or publisher restrictions.
• Similarly individual researchers have more
flexibility over their own dissemination
strategies.
Research Centre
Infrastructure
Research Students Funding
Dissemination
Research
Centre
dissemination
strategy
Researchers
X
Exclusivity
Researcher
dissemination
strategy
Publishers
Audience
Direct dissemination
• Allows researchers to develop innovative
research techniques and processes
• Different audiences require different
information, in different formats
• Ways to interact with audiences differ
• RC ‘brand’ can be developed
• RC can use research for objectives that may
not directly align with the researcher
Dissemination as infrastructure of RC
What do you want your dissemination
infrastructure to achieve?
– Provide flexibility for improved and innovative
activities be researchers
– Provide improved teaching resources for lecturers
– Provide RC with better ways to interact with
external audiences
– Develop the ‘brand’ or awareness of the RC
Business Models
1. Identify Objectives
2. Identify Costs – and opportunity costs
3. Identify Revenue sources
OBPs Open Access Model
• Objectives:
– Maximise readership
– Maximise engagement/re-use
– Digital & innovative publications allowing new
research possibilities
• Business Model: Breakeven (non-profit)
– Minimise costs
– Develop alternative revenue sources
OBP Costs ($190k)
18 titles published
Distribution,
Overheads,
$1,015
$1,471
Cost of sales,
$1,657
Title setup,
$6,369
OBP Revenue ($198k)
OBP grants,
$15,708
Library
Membership,
$30,986
Title grants,
$68,396
Sales revenue,
$82,873
OBP Revenue Sources
• 40% from booksales
– Of which 2/3 paperback sales, 1/5 hardback sales
• 60% non-booksales
– Really important for OBP,
– and likely to be for new initiatives
Lesson: non-sales financial support for new OA
initiatives are really important
OBP Case studies: RC Book Series
• Case study 1:
RC has an existing legacy publishing house, wishes
to convert to OA
Solution: OBP Distribution only
RC keep existing process in place
OBP: Takes “camera ready files”
Creates multiple digital editions
Distributes print/digital/open access editions
through our existing infrastructure
Case Study 2:
Conclusion
The Legacy Publishing Model is failing HSS scholars
and scholarship.
Open Access publishing models provide alternatives
which are
effective,
cost efficient, and
sustainable.
rupert.gatti@openbookpublishers.com