Transcript Challenges to the role of publishers

Challenges to the role of
publishers
Mary Waltham
Publishing Consultant,
Princeton,USA
www.MaryWaltham.com
May 16th
STM meeting Amsterdam
Why does online publishing
change everything?
Always on
It’s a two way interactive medium
It can link all content published online
It’s searchable
It’s scaleable
It can make available more than print
It’s global
www.marywaltham.com
www.marywaltham.com
Central issues for us all
Publishing for readers or authors?
Free access to research articles reduces
the transaction value
Aggregation and linkage of content
All research fields are becoming more
INTER-disciplinary
Application of multi-media technology to
research presentation is widespread
Interoperability - standards
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What has changed already?
Costs - print+online vs online only
Pricing strategies - site licenses,
individuals, pay-per-view
Usage print vs online
Partnerships and alliances
Role and types of intermediaries
Copyright and online postings
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What has changed already?
More open access to information
markets
Government involvement
“Alternative publishing”
Importance and value of online
communities
Speed …..of innovation/change
 of publication…………..
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How fast can we publish?
Conventional
Courier
e-mail
attachment
Electronic
journal –
published by
issue
Electronic
journal –
published by
article
2
Pre-print
article
published at
time of
acceptance
2
Pre-print
article
published at
time of
submission
2
Transmission
of
manuscript
to Editor
10
4
2
2
Peer Reviewreceipt to
accept
63-93
51-81
47-77
47-77
47-77
47-77
0
Journal issue
packaging
30-120
30-120
30-120
30-120
0
0
0
Journal
Production
20-80
20-80
20-80
20-80
4
0
0
Delivery to
subscriber
5
5
5
1
1
1
1
Total days
128-308
107-287
104-284
100-280
54-84
50-80
3
(Based on Kling and McKim 1997)
What has stayed the same?
Information overload
Authors want…
Readers want…
Filtration
Brand
Quality content
Commercial support
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What is changing?
Business models



author fees
site licenses,
subs,PPV
sponsorship +
advertising
Products
Aggregation +
integration of
content types
Journal of record
Insurrection
More free access to
information

High Wire + 0.5
million articles =37%
The role of
publishers...
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Changing the role of scholarly
publishers
What do your customers want and how do
you know?
Where do you add value to the process?
Which sales channels and markets will you
cover - and which will you choose not to?
What new products are you uniquely poised
to create and develop?
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What do your customers want
and how do you know?
Research within your market but
beware and distinguish carefully:

what users ‘say’ they want
how they behave when online
What are online customers UNABLE to
do ~ what can publishers do for them?
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Where do you add value to the
process?
Crisp analysis of where and what level of
resources expended to ‘improve’ publications



copy-editing
‘dead’ links
site that is easy to use
Is where you “add value” where it yields the
greatest value to customers?
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Which sales channels and markets
will you cover - and which will you
choose not to?
Expanded accessibility online
Where is growth possible and
achievable?
What investment will it require?
Can you make sound arrangements for
expert support?
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What new products are you uniquely
poised to create and develop?
Do all customers want the same product?
What do they want it for?
What about different versions at different
price points?
How/does your content connect with
education?
New approaches may (only) appeal to
small emerging markets

mainstream customers vs emergent demand
~ “rational but disastrous”
www.marywaltham.com
Thank you!
email:[email protected]
Please contact me if you would
like a copy of my “talking notes”
from today
“ A new Company has no baggage…..it can rethink everything from
scratch and tune every decision to the new realities of communications
and computing. But in a big company, the whole infrastructure and culture
acts like gravity, pulling you back to where you started from. You can
never reach escape velocity”
By: Vinod Khosla – venture capitalist
“In fact I cannot think of a single new industry- not just new product,
new industry- that was created by an existing major company in an
allied business. So, the economist Schumpeter’s creative destruction
doesn’t occur as much from within companies as from new entrants,
generally start-up companies.
The same is true in higher education. Two very substantial
educational markets have opened in the (US in the) past 20/30 years:
skills training for industry, and degree training for adult students….some
of the most innovative adult education is delivered by institutions that
you may never have heard of. Why? Because they were desperately
strapped for funds and their survival depended on innovating: going
after markets, creating markets, where the traditional successful
institutions wouldn’t deign to go.”
From: ‘Venturing’ by Hank Riggs, President, Keck Graduate Institute, Claremont,
California
Major Interregional Internet
Routes, 2002