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I am an academic, with about 25 scholarly publications, depending on how you count them (see http://www.miketaylor.org.uk/dino/pubs/ http://www.miketaylor.org.u

I am an academic, with about 25 scholarly publications, depending on how you count them (see http://www.miketaylor.org.uk/dino/pubs/ http://www.miketaylor.org.uk/dino/pubs/ for a list and for links to download them). I am here to tell you that we DO NOT GET PAID for writing papers (which, much more than books, are the primary medium of research in the sciences). Of the 25 listed papers, I got paid something for one of them, which was not really research but activism -- and I was paid by the acdvocacy group, not by a publisher. For some of the papers on the list, _I_ paid the _publisher_: this is not unusual. There is literally no downside for an academic author to have his or or her work made freely available to the world: only the considerable upside of greatly increased visibility and influence -- which is the true currency of academia.

whatshisface 8y ago
Which one of your papers was written for the advocacy group?
sgc 8y ago
As another academic author who works in vastly different field, I can confirm this is true in all disciplines I have had the opportunity to discuss with colleagues. It is common to pay a thousand and not uncommon to pay a few thousand to get something published, and the most that can be made from an academic book is in the same range. If I were to write for profit, it would be by writing a popularized version of a trending topic with far less academic value than a typical publication.
matt4077 8y ago
You do get paid for books, however. So you’re just so slightly missing the point.
- barry-cotter 8y ago
  Academics may get paid an advance for textbooks, some of which will earn out their advance, an even smaller portion of which will go to a second edition, an even smaller portion of which will make their author some serious money. For the overwhelming majority of books published by academics that are not textbooks fewer than 5,000 will ever be printed and that’s being really generous. They’re academic books, written for academic readers and the only people who make any money on them are the publishers.

whatshisface 8y ago

Which one of your papers was written for the advocacy group?

sgc 8y ago

As another academic author who works in vastly different field, I can confirm this is true in all disciplines I have had the opportunity to discuss with colleagues. It is common to pay a thousand and not uncommon to pay a few thousand to get something published, and the most that can be made from an academic book is in the same range. If I were to write for profit, it would be by writing a popularized version of a trending topic with far less academic value than a typical publication.

matt4077 8y ago

You do get paid for books, however. So you’re just so slightly missing the point.

barry-cotter 8y ago
Academics may get paid an advance for textbooks, some of which will earn out their advance, an even smaller portion of which will go to a second edition, an even smaller portion of which will make their author some serious money. For the overwhelming majority of books published by academics that are not textbooks fewer than 5,000 will ever be printed and that’s being really generous. They’re academic books, written for academic readers and the only people who make any money on them are the publishers.