3 ms·

Just pointing out that Elsevier is ancient in business terms, it's origins as a publisher goes back to the mid 16th century and the modern version of the compan

Just pointing out that Elsevier is ancient in business terms, it's origins as a publisher goes back to the mid 16th century and the modern version of the company is from around the 19th century. I'd be surprised if the company isn't around when I die. In addition to publishing, they (RELX) is one of the biggest companies you've never heard of. They provide information systems to governments all over the world and span multiple market segments. I guarantee you're in a dozen of their databases right now. And that your local, state, and federal taxes all funnel into their pockets in one form or another. Along with some of the money you pay for various insurances throughout the year. When you buy a house, rent an apartment, get a job, or basically have any major event in your life, they get paid.

gwern 6y ago
> Just pointing out that Elsevier is ancient in business terms, it's origins as a publisher goes back to the mid 16th century and the modern version of the company is from around the 19th century. The 16th century publisher has nothing whatsoever to do with the current one, which shamelessly pirated and stole everything to plagiarize the prestige (so its ideas of business ethics go right back to its founding). Apparently, it worked.
njharman 6y ago
It's not so much as they aren't an established company it's that that their business model has been broken/bypassed by technology. They've been reduced to being a middle-man that obstructs value rather than providing it. The only part of biz model left is "prestige" (very fickle), "customer lock in / inertia" (which is already going away re: OA), and lobbying government to prop up/expand their monopoly (ever extending/expanding copyrights, which is the one thing that doesn't seem they will ever lose on cause ever other bypassed dinosaur broke ass business model publisher spends tons on it).
- Gibbon1 6y ago
  Tends to be ignored but the process of extracting a profit has costs. Both internal costs and external costs. Sometimes the external costs imposed exceed the profit extracted by a large amount.
- mywittyname 6y ago
  I disagree. It seems like you only know Elsevier as a publisher of journals, but that's only about 1/3 of their overall business. They (RELX) provide a lot of useful services to companies and governments. About half their revenue and profits come from Risk and Legal services, which are not things you hear about in the news. They offer services for police, airlines, legal firms, insurance companies, accounting firms Hell, they have an analytics tool for agricultural businesses. They also have enough money to throw around in these spaces to prevent any startups from getting large enough to be a threat.
  - CRConrad 6y ago
    1) So they can keep doing business in those other areas. 2) Large universities are not little startups to be easily intimidated.
slavik81 6y ago
The life expectancy of long-lived companies is shorter than you might expect: > Based on detailed survival analysis, we show that the mortality of publicly traded companies manifests an approximately constant hazard rate over long periods of observation. This regularity indicates that mortality rates are independent of a company's age. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2015.0120 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2015.0120

gwern 6y ago

> Just pointing out that Elsevier is ancient in business terms, it's origins as a publisher goes back to the mid 16th century and the modern version of the company is from around the 19th century. The 16th century publisher has nothing whatsoever to do with the current one, which shamelessly pirated and stole everything to plagiarize the prestige (so its ideas of business ethics go right back to its founding). Apparently, it worked.

njharman 6y ago

It's not so much as they aren't an established company it's that that their business model has been broken/bypassed by technology. They've been reduced to being a middle-man that obstructs value rather than providing it. The only part of biz model left is "prestige" (very fickle), "customer lock in / inertia" (which is already going away re: OA), and lobbying government to prop up/expand their monopoly (ever extending/expanding copyrights, which is the one thing that doesn't seem they will ever lose on cause ever other bypassed dinosaur broke ass business model publisher spends tons on it).

Gibbon1 6y ago
Tends to be ignored but the process of extracting a profit has costs. Both internal costs and external costs. Sometimes the external costs imposed exceed the profit extracted by a large amount.
mywittyname 6y ago
I disagree. It seems like you only know Elsevier as a publisher of journals, but that's only about 1/3 of their overall business. They (RELX) provide a lot of useful services to companies and governments. About half their revenue and profits come from Risk and Legal services, which are not things you hear about in the news. They offer services for police, airlines, legal firms, insurance companies, accounting firms Hell, they have an analytics tool for agricultural businesses. They also have enough money to throw around in these spaces to prevent any startups from getting large enough to be a threat.
- CRConrad 6y ago
  1) So they can keep doing business in those other areas. 2) Large universities are not little startups to be easily intimidated.

slavik81 6y ago

The life expectancy of long-lived companies is shorter than you might expect: > Based on detailed survival analysis, we show that the mortality of publicly traded companies manifests an approximately constant hazard rate over long periods of observation. This regularity indicates that mortality rates are independent of a company's age. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2015.0120 https://doi.org/10.1098/rsif.2015.0120