Re:After the boycott (Score 2)

> perhaps someone should write to those scientists
> who do publish in the publications not meeting
> the demands, to make them aware of the issues.
> I don't think this boycott has the high profile
> in the scientific community we'd like.

Rob Kirby has a list comparing mathematics journal prices. (Although some of the data is somewhat ('97) old now.) In particular, there is an excellent comparison of the (estimated) costs involved of producing the Pacific Journal of Mathematics (published by UCI) and Inventiones Mathematicae (published by Springer-Verlag).

I think most people in the mathematics community are aware of the issues here. However, certainly in the UK, there are far more pressing factors that determine which journals one submits to. Firstly, there's the obvious implications for one's career and promotion prospects: a paper in Annals of Mathematics or Inventiones looks better on a C.V. than a paper in some random journal no-one's heard of. Secondly, in the UK each member of staff in every university department is assessed for the quality of its research output (this is the dreaded Research Assessment Exercise). The ranking of each department (on the slightly bizarre scale of 1,2,3a,3b,4,5,5*) determines the level of research income that the government will provide. The quality of research is primarily assessed by each member of staff submitting their 4 best published papers over the last 5 years to be peer-reviewed by the RAE panel. They obviously can't read every paper, and so it's important for each department to submit as many papers in as many prestigous journals as possible: too few and your department could be closed down! Each submitted paper has to be put into the correct category: peer-reviewed journal, refereed conference proceedings, non-peer-refereed proceedings, etc. What is interesting is that refereed electronic journals are counted separately to traditional refereed print journals. The RAE panel claims that the two will be treated equally, but given that the panels usually comprise of the more senior figures in the discipline (hence, older and more adverse to innovations like electronic journals), and given the huge sums of money involved, it's regarded as foolish to submit papers to purely electronic journals in case they are perceived as being of lower quality.

I - and many others - would much prefer to publish in electronic journals, or to journals which are published by the academic organisations, but the potential career and financial risks are just too great.