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Aggregating withGeoscienceWorld (GSW)

What’s in it for us?

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[1] Awareness.

Awareness – visibility of participating societies

The easier you can find a publication, the more it will used.

Wider use = increased stature.

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[2] Maximize publishing advantage for authors. Highly cited authors publish in journals that are

widely cited. Authors favor publications with easy (online)

submission process. GSW will encourage authors to publish

regionally focused papers with smaller societies. Why? Because the aggregate gains them national and international circulation.

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[3] Keep societies competitive.

Libraries subscribe to most-used journals. On the basis of usage or impact factor, most

societies’ competitors are journals published by multi-million if not billion dollar commercial publishers.

A society cannot afford to ignore the benefits of co-operation.

Small societies that do not aggregate could become extinct.

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[4] Increase readership/circulation.

Societies are likely to reach new markets as GSW users discover “new” journals through searches, reference linking and easy access.

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[5] Maintain readership/circulation.

It will be easier for a library to make a case for a single online collection of journals than 30-100 individual subscriptions.

A society-based aggregate is insurance against being picked off one by one.

Aggregate cuts costs to libraries

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[6] Maintains readership/circulation.

Societies will risk losing the print subscriptions whether they participate or not.

Libraries may not pick up individual online journals if they drop print versions.

GSW offers way to maintain presence in libraries if print subscriptions are dropped.

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[7] Preservation and use of past literature.

Readily accessible publications will be used. Aggregate avoids the probability of not bothering

to check old refs because they have been moved off-site.

For example: SEG. Entire journal put online. Downloads of the earliest articles were observed.

Especially true when GSW can put pre-2000 articles online (the Legacy Collection).

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[8] Greater Accessibility to a Wider Audience.

Most journal subscribers are academic libraries in advanced degree-granting institutions.

A cooperative effort like GSW may have the content diversity and resources to develop a pricing scheme to market to industry, public libraries, developing countries, etc. creating subscriber diversity.

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[9] Enable small societies to go electronic.

Experience, procedures, and economies of scale will benefit and assist a small society to publish electronically.

There may be direct financial support for digitizing archives.

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[10] Decrease costs to libraries.

Economies of scale and resource sharing from publishers (societies) dedicated to disseminating the geological sciences by making their publications available at lowest costs possible.

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[11] Decrease cost of keeping up with technology. Members and subscribers will soon want more than

current publishing systems. Electronic publishing will become increasingly complex.

Unlikely that most societies could continue to manage or afford the file preparation, software, and hardware expenses.

Joining an aggregation of journals holds the most promise.

Sharing production costs, whether print or electronic, makes management and financial sense.

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[12] Library Consortia.

Processing an institutional paper subscription order is relatively inexpensive and quick. But there are a growing number of library consortia.

Electronic subscriptions for these will involve contracts, which likely will differ between consortia.

Society will need more legal help to process these subscription orders.

For single journals this does not make economic sense. A small society with few titles is apt to lose out to publishers offering journal titles in bulk lots. A society participating in GSW would benefit from being part of a larger group.

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[13] Marketing.

It is difficult to market a scientific journal today, especially internationally, with the hope of increasing subscriptions.

Aggregating a society's journal with other, related journals is the first mechanism that has the potential to increase circulation.

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[14] Less Developed Countries.

Most journals, whether print or electronic, are too expensive for many institutions in less developed countries.

Societies find it hard to develop subscription arrangements that reflect ability to pay.

A larger or cooperative group would have the resources to develop and market a business plan for the less well-off markets.

Electronic format could eliminate printing and mailing costs

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[15] GSW is Non-profit.

A commercial aggregator relies on significantly higher library subscription prices.

Not in the tradition of societies providing scientific papers of dedicated (unpaid) authors.

Society-based aggregate can allow societies to continue making publications available at lower cost.

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[16] GSW is a Co-operative.

Even with a "customer relations department" a society, particularly a small one, has relatively little leverage for change over a commercial vendor.

GSW participants will have more clout in determining their distribution.

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[17] Covering Journal Costs.

Some commercial arrangements require the society to support the journal from sources other than electronic subscription revenues, or rely on the continued sale of paper copies.

In some cases the commercial aggregator is an additional publishing expense with no returned revenue.

Clearly if the future of publications for a small society is electronic-only, the society would be hard pressed to continue to deliver hard copy.

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[18] GSW is a Discipline Aggregate.

Many commercial aggregates contained a large number of journals, but few are science- or Earth-science related.

An Earth science publication adrift in a sea of unrelated journals may not in itself bad, but it would mean the grouping would be marketed generically rather than specifically.

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[19] GSW is Non-exclusive.

A society can make its electronic publications available through existing or new channels.

While the financial aspects of multiple distributors are yet to be fully anticipated, at the minimum it means that various societies could continue to make their online publications available to members and institutional subscribers who do not subscribe to GSW.

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[20] Inclusion of Non-journal Material. Long term, GSW would like to include books,

field guides, maps, databases etc. All of a society's published material available

digitally from the same source. The richness of the material available from GSW

would increase the attractiveness of subscribing This in turn would make each society’s

publications more visible.

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[21] Inclusion of Non-English Languages Publications. GSW plans to include non-English pubs. asap. Some have English abstracts, already. With

translation software, articles will soon be translated as needed.

English publications will be translatable through the same software.

Richness of the material available from GSW would increase the attractiveness of GSW.

This would make each society’s publications circulated more widely than ever imagined.

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[22] Secure a Broader Earth Science Voice. Unlike the physics community, the Earth

sciences tend to be less cohesive and consequently less visible, scientifically and politically.

Visible co-operation may change that to benefit all Earth science societies.

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[23] Better Integration of Earth Science Literature. Literature searching will be easier, faster,

and ought to be more complete.

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[24] Less research duplication.

A researcher may find there is already an answer to their question.