7 ms·

That said, Elsevier really do take some risks to publish rather good publications. I've met with them in the past and they are very keen on technical authors.

by socmag 10y ago

That said, Elsevier really do take some risks to publish rather good publications. I've met with them in the past and they are very keen on technical authors. That was eight years ago, maybe things have changed but they still represent a certain quality in my mind. Them with Addison Wesley in the early 90's. Sorry to hear there are some issues though. Hopefully they will read the thread and make any necessary adjustments, the owners were very nice people.

j-pb 10y ago
Could you elaborate on the risks you think they take? To me taking publications that academia produces, getting them reviewed for free by academia, only to host a couple kilobyte file behind a 25$ paywall seems like a pretty risk free strategy. The only risk they take is being so outrageously greedy that people will get fed up at some point and stop working with them anymore.
- socmag 10y ago
  Being published by Elsevier has some "cachet". Maybe they capitalize on that, I'm not sure. Although I had the possibility of publishing with them I turned it down, only because at the time I was way too busy and already had a deal running with Charles River. But mostly because... way too busy. I guess it depends what you want from a book deal. Any book deals I have been approached for have never been for financial gain. More like, let's get this stuff out in a dignified way. Elsevier seemed to fit the bill. Is like I would go to Taschen for Art stuff. Revenue would not be the driving factor. Again, not saying I agree with some policies.
  - SubiculumCode 10y ago
    In academic book publishing, I tend to agree. These are low profit enterprises. Few copies get sold in all honesty. However, they are major leeches when it comes to journals.
  - KingMob 10y ago
    Maybe they have the cachet of "reasonable competence", but what has cachet are the journals themselves. Books are way less relevant than papers, and their publishers are even less relevant. E.g., nobody cares who publishes Science or Nature.
    - socmag 10y ago
      Yes you are probably right. They are stuck between a rock and a hard place in the modern world.
    - pmyteh 10y ago
      That depends a lot on the field. At the more philosophical end of my discipline (politics) a good book published by a first-or-second-tier publisher (one of the major university presses, plus the best of the commercial publishers) is a major career progression requirement. In my part (quantitative, mainly methodology) it's all done in journals and monographs are rare. It really does depend.
      - socmag 10y ago
        I get that in academia there is a standard publication path for thought and insight in the form of scientific papers. It's a cool thing. Scientific papers are not everyone's cup of tea though, and somewhat inaccessible (to publish for) for older people or those outside of academia. Surely there is a middle ground between "JavaScript for Dummies", "Studies in Global Illumination" and "Computation on the modular hypersphere" Actually, I'll be frank. Academic papers are designed to be inaccessible. Not all, but the majority. I've read plenty in Comp.Sci, and all I can say is that going out of their way to be obtuse seems like more than a fascination. I think it is called "Job Security" Heck for the longest time, academic papers were behind paywalls that were WAY more inaccessible than Elsevier. So there is that.
        pmyteh 10y ago
        It's a problem. The incentives are for getting published, not getting read. We are somewhat rewarded for producing accessible content in the form of teaching, but anything popular in writing (even if scholarly and read by millions) just isn't quite recognised. And that deliberate obscurity is a thing, though not a universal one. And that is evil.
  - socmag 10y ago
    Just to go on, the distribution of Elsevier and Taschen is pretty damn esoteric. I have never had a problem spending money on educational material that was way beyond what you can find in public libraries (Internet these days). Not really been following print for a while. I'd like to think they still maintain that standard despite current trends. Sad if that is not the case.
    - sedachv 10y ago
      > I have never had a problem spending money on educational material that was way beyond what you can find in public libraries (Internet these days). Cool story, rich bro. Taschen and Elsevier are actually very good publishers to compare, not because they are "esoteric," but because both many scientists and many artists benefit from public grants. Taschen does not actively work to keep work it publishes from public libraries. If Taschen acted like Elsevier, for example they would be suing photographers for having exhibitions featuring reprinted photographs in public museums. This is all of course besides the fact that limiting access to scientific knowledge for the purposes of rent-seeking is morally wrong and IMO should be criminal.
      - socmag 10y ago
        Alright, I'll buy that. The difference between Elsevier and Taschen is that people like us don't appreciate computer science as much as art. We expect to get everything for free online, not something I can hold in my hand. Meanwhile I'd love to own an original copy of an Escher and stick it on my wall. Other people pay good money every month to play world of Warcraft. I'm guessing amortized over time, more than Elsevier charges. What do you want? Free everything, fine. It's available. Original content that someone worked really hard for and has a stupendously limited audience, but is presented with style and panache. There is that too. At this point I don't know what I'm really suggesting. I can't say I like $25 paywalls. That isn't me, and I don't have the pocket change for it either. That said, I do appreciate "known good reliable sources". and am willing to pay a premium. I think "criminal" is probably a bit much. I'd like to understand the economics first. Nobody buys newspapers any more either. $.25c was criminal too, and look where the news is now. I'm thinking.
      - deleted 10y ago
- vacri 10y ago
  Being the 'middle-man' is not something that 'just happens'. Bringing manuscripts into blinded connection with appropriate reviewers in an orderly way is definitely a value add. It's not the risks they take (which was your question), but it's an example of some value that they add to the process which usually gets overlooked.
  - Ar-Curunir 10y ago
    Does this value-added justify their scummy practices? Other middle-men seem to get on fine without doing the bad things outlined in the article. And academia is already about networking; collaborations, at least in CS and Mathematics, are a big part of research, so finding the right set of reviewers shouldn't be too difficult for editors of a journal, given that these editors are probably well-placed people in the field.
    - vacri 10y ago
      I grew up as the son of a bookseller/publisher, who bootstrapped her own small business in the field. I just get tired of clueless people saying that publishers add nothing of value, when publishers add plenty. I'm not justifying Elsevier's scummy practices, but too many people just flatly state that they bring nothing to the table. It's both an insult to what publishers do bring, and something of an own-goal: if you want to replace a scummy operator, you have to understand what they bring to the table so that you can replace it with something better. It's identical to the people who scream about Apple and Google taking a 30% cut of app store sale - these people are clearly clueless about business and are shouting to the world their ignorance about what that 30% gets you. > And academia is already about networking; collaborations, at least in CS and Mathematics, are a big part of research Academia also has a lot of political backstabbing and competition for dwindling grant money. But Elsevier's role isn't finding collaborators - it's finding reviewers, which is a distinctly different thing. You also can't find blinded reviewers yourself or via known associates, because that takes away the blind.
      - Ar-Curunir 10y ago
        I'm not sure you understand what academic publishing involves. Academic journal editors are paid a pittance (few thousand pounds a year), and they are the ones who pick the reviewers. So the journal publisher is doing nothing to select the reviewers, and is not acting as a great middleman. The board of editors could do this job just fine without the journal publisher. Reviewers themselves get paid nothing at all. In CS, the journal publisher/ conference proceedings publisher does nothing to organize the editorial board or pick reviewers. For conferences, there are a couple of Program Committee chairs, and they pick the PC that then review papers and solicit external reviewers for help. Once again the publishers have no role to play. Electronic journals such as Discrete Analysis in mathematics are already doing a decent job of offering cheap open access to articles, and have a solid board of reviewers.
socmag 10y ago
Seriously why all the down votes. I'm saying this is a prestigious publication company with very low distribution. What would you do if your revenue didn't meet your principles? Maybe a Kickstarter? I'm pretty sure these guys are doing what they can. Why don't you ask them?
- Retra 10y ago
  Instead of charging for access, they could be charging for promotion. You could be paying them to review & analyze your work and essentially supplement it with materials that aid in understanding and sharing (and thus expand your work's ability to help and influence people.) They should be help, not adversaries. They could offer publication tools by subscription and knowledgeable advisers.
  - socmag 10y ago
    Alright, Elsevier... As I see it, the reason this article is on Hacker News in the first place is that the community as a whole appreciates your publications. If the paywall is causing some kind of riot it's actually just a projection that people care. So frankly an opportunity to fix and redeem. Nobody wants Elsevier under the bus. That is for damn sure. Really hope you are reading Elsevier. You are loved.
    - rrmm 10y ago
      I can think of a great many buses I'd like to see Elsevier under. Perhaps Google can do some sort of self-driving bus to automatically do it. Elsevier is a leech on academia and actively work against open access to papers. They run scam journals and try to strong arm university libraries into buying tons of journals they don't want to get the important ones they do.
    - inimino 10y ago
      This is why you are getting downvoted. Elsevier is hated, not loved. People see that Elsevier is locking away knowledge created by others, and aggressively working to restrict the flow of scientific knowledge. If the Internet and the free exchange of scientific information is good and helps mankind to progress, then Elsevier represents the forces of evil working against this, retarding human progress only to maintain their ability to squeeze money out of the academic system. Nobody is expecting Elsevier to change, but to be replaced and fade into richly deserved irrelevance.

by socmag 10y ago

j-pb 10y ago

Could you elaborate on the risks you think they take? To me taking publications that academia produces, getting them reviewed for free by academia, only to host a couple kilobyte file behind a 25$ paywall seems like a pretty risk free strategy. The only risk they take is being so outrageously greedy that people will get fed up at some point and stop working with them anymore.

socmag 10y ago
Being published by Elsevier has some "cachet". Maybe they capitalize on that, I'm not sure. Although I had the possibility of publishing with them I turned it down, only because at the time I was way too busy and already had a deal running with Charles River. But mostly because... way too busy. I guess it depends what you want from a book deal. Any book deals I have been approached for have never been for financial gain. More like, let's get this stuff out in a dignified way. Elsevier seemed to fit the bill. Is like I would go to Taschen for Art stuff. Revenue would not be the driving factor. Again, not saying I agree with some policies.
- SubiculumCode 10y ago
  In academic book publishing, I tend to agree. These are low profit enterprises. Few copies get sold in all honesty. However, they are major leeches when it comes to journals.
- KingMob 10y ago
  Maybe they have the cachet of "reasonable competence", but what has cachet are the journals themselves. Books are way less relevant than papers, and their publishers are even less relevant. E.g., nobody cares who publishes Science or Nature.
  - socmag 10y ago
    Yes you are probably right. They are stuck between a rock and a hard place in the modern world.
  - pmyteh 10y ago
    That depends a lot on the field. At the more philosophical end of my discipline (politics) a good book published by a first-or-second-tier publisher (one of the major university presses, plus the best of the commercial publishers) is a major career progression requirement. In my part (quantitative, mainly methodology) it's all done in journals and monographs are rare. It really does depend.
    - socmag 10y ago
      I get that in academia there is a standard publication path for thought and insight in the form of scientific papers. It's a cool thing. Scientific papers are not everyone's cup of tea though, and somewhat inaccessible (to publish for) for older people or those outside of academia. Surely there is a middle ground between "JavaScript for Dummies", "Studies in Global Illumination" and "Computation on the modular hypersphere" Actually, I'll be frank. Academic papers are designed to be inaccessible. Not all, but the majority. I've read plenty in Comp.Sci, and all I can say is that going out of their way to be obtuse seems like more than a fascination. I think it is called "Job Security" Heck for the longest time, academic papers were behind paywalls that were WAY more inaccessible than Elsevier. So there is that.
      - pmyteh 10y ago
        It's a problem. The incentives are for getting published, not getting read. We are somewhat rewarded for producing accessible content in the form of teaching, but anything popular in writing (even if scholarly and read by millions) just isn't quite recognised. And that deliberate obscurity is a thing, though not a universal one. And that is evil.
- socmag 10y ago
  Just to go on, the distribution of Elsevier and Taschen is pretty damn esoteric. I have never had a problem spending money on educational material that was way beyond what you can find in public libraries (Internet these days). Not really been following print for a while. I'd like to think they still maintain that standard despite current trends. Sad if that is not the case.
  - sedachv 10y ago
    > I have never had a problem spending money on educational material that was way beyond what you can find in public libraries (Internet these days). Cool story, rich bro. Taschen and Elsevier are actually very good publishers to compare, not because they are "esoteric," but because both many scientists and many artists benefit from public grants. Taschen does not actively work to keep work it publishes from public libraries. If Taschen acted like Elsevier, for example they would be suing photographers for having exhibitions featuring reprinted photographs in public museums. This is all of course besides the fact that limiting access to scientific knowledge for the purposes of rent-seeking is morally wrong and IMO should be criminal.
    - socmag 10y ago
      Alright, I'll buy that. The difference between Elsevier and Taschen is that people like us don't appreciate computer science as much as art. We expect to get everything for free online, not something I can hold in my hand. Meanwhile I'd love to own an original copy of an Escher and stick it on my wall. Other people pay good money every month to play world of Warcraft. I'm guessing amortized over time, more than Elsevier charges. What do you want? Free everything, fine. It's available. Original content that someone worked really hard for and has a stupendously limited audience, but is presented with style and panache. There is that too. At this point I don't know what I'm really suggesting. I can't say I like $25 paywalls. That isn't me, and I don't have the pocket change for it either. That said, I do appreciate "known good reliable sources". and am willing to pay a premium. I think "criminal" is probably a bit much. I'd like to understand the economics first. Nobody buys newspapers any more either. $.25c was criminal too, and look where the news is now. I'm thinking.
    - deleted 10y ago
vacri 10y ago
Being the 'middle-man' is not something that 'just happens'. Bringing manuscripts into blinded connection with appropriate reviewers in an orderly way is definitely a value add. It's not the risks they take (which was your question), but it's an example of some value that they add to the process which usually gets overlooked.
- Ar-Curunir 10y ago
  Does this value-added justify their scummy practices? Other middle-men seem to get on fine without doing the bad things outlined in the article. And academia is already about networking; collaborations, at least in CS and Mathematics, are a big part of research, so finding the right set of reviewers shouldn't be too difficult for editors of a journal, given that these editors are probably well-placed people in the field.
  - vacri 10y ago
    I grew up as the son of a bookseller/publisher, who bootstrapped her own small business in the field. I just get tired of clueless people saying that publishers add nothing of value, when publishers add plenty. I'm not justifying Elsevier's scummy practices, but too many people just flatly state that they bring nothing to the table. It's both an insult to what publishers do bring, and something of an own-goal: if you want to replace a scummy operator, you have to understand what they bring to the table so that you can replace it with something better. It's identical to the people who scream about Apple and Google taking a 30% cut of app store sale - these people are clearly clueless about business and are shouting to the world their ignorance about what that 30% gets you. > And academia is already about networking; collaborations, at least in CS and Mathematics, are a big part of research Academia also has a lot of political backstabbing and competition for dwindling grant money. But Elsevier's role isn't finding collaborators - it's finding reviewers, which is a distinctly different thing. You also can't find blinded reviewers yourself or via known associates, because that takes away the blind.
    - Ar-Curunir 10y ago
      I'm not sure you understand what academic publishing involves. Academic journal editors are paid a pittance (few thousand pounds a year), and they are the ones who pick the reviewers. So the journal publisher is doing nothing to select the reviewers, and is not acting as a great middleman. The board of editors could do this job just fine without the journal publisher. Reviewers themselves get paid nothing at all. In CS, the journal publisher/ conference proceedings publisher does nothing to organize the editorial board or pick reviewers. For conferences, there are a couple of Program Committee chairs, and they pick the PC that then review papers and solicit external reviewers for help. Once again the publishers have no role to play. Electronic journals such as Discrete Analysis in mathematics are already doing a decent job of offering cheap open access to articles, and have a solid board of reviewers.

socmag 10y ago

Seriously why all the down votes. I'm saying this is a prestigious publication company with very low distribution. What would you do if your revenue didn't meet your principles? Maybe a Kickstarter? I'm pretty sure these guys are doing what they can. Why don't you ask them?

Retra 10y ago
Instead of charging for access, they could be charging for promotion. You could be paying them to review & analyze your work and essentially supplement it with materials that aid in understanding and sharing (and thus expand your work's ability to help and influence people.) They should be help, not adversaries. They could offer publication tools by subscription and knowledgeable advisers.
- socmag 10y ago
  Alright, Elsevier... As I see it, the reason this article is on Hacker News in the first place is that the community as a whole appreciates your publications. If the paywall is causing some kind of riot it's actually just a projection that people care. So frankly an opportunity to fix and redeem. Nobody wants Elsevier under the bus. That is for damn sure. Really hope you are reading Elsevier. You are loved.
  - rrmm 10y ago
    I can think of a great many buses I'd like to see Elsevier under. Perhaps Google can do some sort of self-driving bus to automatically do it. Elsevier is a leech on academia and actively work against open access to papers. They run scam journals and try to strong arm university libraries into buying tons of journals they don't want to get the important ones they do.
  - inimino 10y ago
    This is why you are getting downvoted. Elsevier is hated, not loved. People see that Elsevier is locking away knowledge created by others, and aggressively working to restrict the flow of scientific knowledge. If the Internet and the free exchange of scientific information is good and helps mankind to progress, then Elsevier represents the forces of evil working against this, retarding human progress only to maintain their ability to squeeze money out of the academic system. Nobody is expecting Elsevier to change, but to be replaced and fade into richly deserved irrelevance.