Authors: Rantanen, Tommi (2007).Download file: 'Opening academics: Opening access in the academic world' - Executive Summary Report, Helsinki University of Technology, Espoo, Finland.

Description

Scientific publishing has been dominated by a few larger publishers, who have been able to raise the journal prices faster than the inflation rate justifies. Especially in basic sciences journal prices have increased 60- 98% between 1995 and 2001 (Valsiner 2006).

The situation is referred as price crisis, because higher prices hinder journals’ accessibility (McCulloch 2006). The dominance is easy to maintain, since journal with quality articles attracts more article submissions and thereby the probability of good article submissions increase. In small study areas the dominance is exceptionally solid, because there aren’t enough quality studies. In scientific publishing it is vital to have conformance within journal, and the review process is an important foundation for creating scientific information. Traditional publishing has still some problems, some of which are process slowness, excessive uniformity, falling in to editorial expectations, and power political playing (Rantanen 2007). Worst issues cause delays in the accumulation of scientific information and hinder the effect of new ideas (Valsiner 2006). However, the reference value of top journals gives publishers’ power to neglect these issues.