A class action suit against academic publishers I’m the new chair of the publication committee for the American Sociological Association, whose operating budget is heavily subsidized by Sage in return for Sage profiting off our journals, & we must confront this www.highereddive.com/news/6-major... - ThreadSky

wrigleyfield.bsky.social • 131 days ago

A class action suit against academic publishers

I’m the new chair of the publication committee for the American Sociological Association, whose operating budget is heavily subsidized by Sage in return for Sage profiting off our journals, & we must confront this

https://www.highereddive.com/news/6-major-academic-publishers-face-antitrust-lawsuit/727106/

Comments

kresnajati.bsky.social•131 days ago

Pseudo science does really exist in scientific journals.

futurehorizondesign.net.au•130 days ago

This is great news.

glebaron.bsky.social•131 days ago

How big a budget do you need to throw up a web server and start pumping out articles?

panikadoc.bsky.social•131 days ago

Now we gotta do MDPI

weedenkim.bsky.social•131 days ago

I noticed the "lapsed member" survey didn't ask whether ASA's position on open science, position on open access publishing, or internal governance structure were influential in leaver's decision. Many Q's about cost.

IOW, ASA doesn't have good handle on breadth of issues creating dissatisfaction.

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

Did they have a free response section?

weedenkim.bsky.social•131 days ago

Yes.

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

Man, I’d love to see those results.

prasino.bsky.social•131 days ago

Start looking for a new funding model.

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

That seems right. One basic thing we could do would be to learn from the professional orgs that have moved away from the for-profit model (including a much smaller org we interact with, whose publication committee I’m also on, the Population Association of America)

philipncohen.com•131 days ago

Is there any indication ASA will ever confront this? Last I checked this seemed structurally impossible but would love to be wrong

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

I think it is very close to structurally impossible, particularly after the most recently passed referendum (whose history I don’t understand but which certainly has the consequence of making it impossible for members to clearly express an opinion on organizational direction).

But in principle,

jonathanhorowi1.bsky.social•131 days ago

I would personally like to have a referendum on a policy issue: That all research should be free, and that Elsevier executives should be sent to re-education camps. This should be the official stated position of the ASA, and ASA should be lobbying for it.

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

The steps involved would be for the issue (or any other organizational issue) to become so polarized w/in the discipline that ppl running for council (directly or indirectly by running for one of the core leadership positions like ASA President) had to articulate a specific position in the election

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

There are many dynamics preventing this, including that people who become disaffected by ASA simply stop participating, that almost no one thinks of themselves as choosing an organizational leader (vs intellectual figurehead) when they vote, & that there is a large constituency for programs w Sage $

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

So one question is to what degree disciplinary conversation, partly organized w/in ASA & partly out of it, can change the second & third of those (much more important than the first). I’m not particularly hopeful, but I am slightly hopeful, thus accepting this position. (I also find it interesting)

philipncohen.com•131 days ago

I agree. Most people running, and voting, are not thinking about ASA policy at all, and if they were, what we call "operational science policy" would be pretty far down the list. Will be interesting to see how it goes. Also, Sage contract pays for open bar reception for pubcom! (Or used to)

rmcarpiano.medsky.social•131 days ago

Good pts. Another reason I found the mgt. of journals during my editorship frustrating. General poor funding of journals aside, here's one I raised bc I never got the logic: Why doesn't ASA contract with 1 copyediting service for all its journals? Eds. have to find their own; Big cost inefficiency.

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

Oh wow, that’s wild! I didn’t realize that.

nicholaspagnucco.bsky.social•131 days ago

Not a fully fair question, but I had a complicated summer and wasn't paying attention: What did the referendum state?

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

It’s fine, I should’ve said!

ASA members can now only pass referenda related to broad political topics, not organizational matters

Last year’s ASA Council, led by Prudence Carter, put this forward & it was passed by a majority of membership w very little discussion (which there’s little forum for)

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

(I wrote to the listservs of several sections I'm a member of about it, usually without receiving replies, & also exchanged some emails with Prudence Carter. And there was a small discussion on Twitter and Mastodon. Otherwise, I saw no discussion. Very bad for anyone who cares abt open science, eg)

philipncohen.com•131 days ago

In terms of organizational rules, I think the only way to change the publishing model would be for council to pass a policy requiring the executive to change the policy. Even then the staff might find a way to block it, but I think that's the only way. E.g., "Don't renew with Sage, find an OA model"

rmcarpiano.medsky.social•131 days ago

Seems to me many people heavily vote for names/friends. I don't think many know what most committees really (are supposed to) do. The whole nominations process always seemed murky to me to in my 25 years of membership and never really represented the breadth of areas of the field--just a handful.

wrigleyfield.bsky.social•131 days ago

I always read the statements and very, very few (in any of my professional orgs) articulate any platform or goal whatsoever. Usually platitudes about giving back. If it’s PAA, there is an obligatory line about it having been the candidate’s intellectual home since the start of their career

profmattdecarlo.bsky.social•129 days ago

Thanks for doing the hard work making change from the inside

robscott3.bsky.social•131 days ago

Long overdue. This is not a small, struggling, publishing house. This is a conglomerate.

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