Walt at Random

Update May 22, 2015:

• The book is now available and will continue to be available until the next phase is complete (maybe mid-September 2015)
• Donations will now be responded to with an email that includes two links: one to a Dropbox file for the ebook (which is just under 8MB–Word’s save-as-PDF creates hyperlinked contents but yields big PDFs) and one to a private Lulu page where you can purchase the 6×9″ paperback version (186+xvi pages) for $7 plus shipping.

The full set of 29 subject discussions that extend this summer’s Library Technology Report issue “The State of Open Access Journals: Idealism and Opportunism” has been posted, and will appear on Fridays from now through September 11, 2015. (Oops: The actual title is Open Access Journals: Idealism and Opportunism.)Later this week, or possibly next week, I’ll be creating a PDF ebook that combines all of the posts with the following refinements:

• Since it’s a single book, I’ll eliminate redundant explanations from chapters 2-29, leaving only text that’s significant for the particular chapter.
• Each “book chapter” already has a second figure, not in the blog posts, showing stacked bars for each year with the number of free, paid and unknown-status articles.
• I’ll be adding a paragraph to the Fees section for each chapter offering the following information, all based on 2014 numbers: maximum potential revenue from APCs, assuming there were no waivers or discounts; the average charge per article in APC-charging journals; the average charge per article for all articles in the subject area; and–one that requires a little more work–the median APC based on article count for articles involving fees–that is, the dollar amount at which half of the articles in APC-charging journals in 2014 cost that much or more and half cost that much or less. That median number is in some ways the most telling number for fee levels; it ranges from $105 to $2,177 (and no, medicine is not the highest, although it’s by far the highest total revenue amount, the only one in the nine-figure range).

The PDF will have hotlinks for the table of contents and table of figures and tables. Current working title is The OA Landscape 2011-2014: An Interim Subject View

Later–once I’ve finished migrating to a new computer and put together the draft text for the July Cites & Insights–I’ll start working on a much more ambitious book that complements the Library Technology Report rather than extending it. That effort will involve rethinking some of the grades, moving much of the analysis so that it’s based on 2014 rather than 2013, attempting to integrate at least 200 or so 2014 titles and possibly some portion of the “non-English” titles, revisiting grades for some items, backfilling some numbers…and maybe even using a May 2015 DOAJ download as the foundation, rather than sticking with the May 2014 one. Best guess is that this effort will take most of the summer; my target is to have it ready by September 14, 2015 or before. (While I’m still a young man, before I turn a decrepit 70…) [Then, I’ll start working on ways to fund and/or justify an entirely new in-depth 2016 study of the OA landscape 2011-2015.]

Getting the PDF of An Interim Subject View

This PDF will not be available via Lulu, and indeed, won’t actually be for sale directly at all. It will, however, be used as an enticement for those of you who either care about this OA research or care about Cites & Insights to step up to the plate.

To wit:

I’m soliciting donations of $25 or more to Cites & Insights. You can donate from the home page or–for that matter–right here:

The button below opens a secure link to PayPal so that you can donate money to Cites & Insights, using PayPal or a credit card.