The general scheme is the following: we scientists write scientific papers and peer-review them without being specifically paid for that, since it is an essential part of our academic duty already covered by our salary. After our papers have been checked, improved and accepted by our peers, publishers are in charge of their publication. To do so they require we transfer our copyright to them for free, and, if we refuse, our papers are not published. Then they sell them, at the price they fix, to our research institutions, with subscription contracts kept secret since they own the intellectual property rights. This secretive process reaps massive profits for the publishers. Last year the largest one, Elsevier, made 39% profit, and it keeps increasing by more than 3% each year. Elsevier revenue is more than the budget of CNRS, the largest research institution in Europe and the first in the world for the number of published peer-reviewed papers (cf. Scimago institutions rankings 2013). Moreover, publishers are also controlling bibliometry that is very often used to evaluate research, with a considerable impact on our careers. This system is prevalent worldwide, and all research institutions, including those belonging to industry, suffer from this oligopolistic situation. We scientists need to recover the control and ownership of our results in order to make them available and usable to anyone and to any institution, for the sake of the advancement of knowledge. Which model do we propose? First, journals should be owned by their editorial boards in charge of the peer-review. Second, authors should keep their copyright, and make their papers available to anyone under a Creative Commons CC-BY license. Third, funding agencies should no longer pay subscriptions and article processing charges directly to publishers. They should instead finance open access publishing platforms, developed with open source software, that would offer all needed services for editing and publishing a large number of journals, selected for the quality of their peer-reviewing. In this framework publishers would keep their business going as service providers to the publishing platforms, but no more as content owners of our journals, of our papers and of the data they contain, as it is the case today. Such open access publishing platforms already exist (e.g., scielo.org [scielo.org] in Brazil or revues.org [revues.org] in France), but the key effort should go to their generalization. We need to develop and promote new commons of scientific information, publicly owned and freely used by researchers, companies and citizens. This should be the path to follow for a long-term investment by the European Commission.

1. The
Future
of
Scien2fic
Publishing
Marie
Farge
LMD-­‐CNRS,
Ecole
Normale
Supérieure,
Paris
Paris,
October
30th
2014

2. What is scientific publishing?
Scien'fic
research
is
a
collabora've
ac'vity,
in
both
space
and
'me,
that
advances
through
discussions,
seminars,
conferences
and
peer-­‐reviewed
ar'cles
Publishing
means
making
scien'fic
results
publicly
available
(1)
€
⇒
This
guarantees
valida'on,
reproduc'on,
transmission
and
conserva'on
of
scien'fic
results
for
the
advancement
of
knowledge
(1)
To
whom?
How?
Who
pays?

3. To whom are articles available ?
Only
to
scien'sts
working
in
ins'tu'ons
and
countries
rich
enough
to
afford
the
very
costly
subscrip'ons
and
ar'cle
processing
charges
imposed
by
publishers
but
scien'sts
in
developing
countries,
companies,
highschool
teachers
and
all
ci'zens
who
finance
public
research
cannot
access
scien'fic
papers
Principle
of
intellectual
commons
:
Ideas
are
not
of
the
same
nature
as
material
objects.
Ideas
are
only
fruiEul
if
they
are
exchanged,
discussed,
cri'cised,
improved,
reproduced
and
explained.
When
you
share
your
ideas
you
don’t
lose
them.
Ideas
are
not
merchandise
but
intellectual
commons
!

4. Most prolific publication of scientific papers
hBp://www.worldmapper.org/
hBp://www.scimagoir.com/

5. How are peer-reviewed articles produced ?
Scien'sts
write
papers,
prepare
them
in
final
format,
referee
papers
and
are
editors
of
scien'fic
journals
this
is
paid
by
taxpayers
ALer
papers
have
been
accepted
by
referees
and
editors,
publishers
put
them
online,
insure
their
visibility,
occasionally
print
them
and
sell
them
Librarians
negociate
subscrip'on
contracts,
pay
them,
control
access
to
the
journals
and
curate
the
collec'ons
Dessins
L’Obs

6. Scientists give their copyright for free!
Publishers
require
scien'sts
to
give
them
their
copyright
for
free
Publishers
own
the
intellectual
property,
of
the
text,
figures
and
data
contained
in
the
papers
(for
more
than
100
years),
they
are
thus
able
to
sell
ar'cles
at
the
prices
and
condi'ons
they
set,
with
confiden'al
contracts
€
⇒
Publishers
also
own
scien'fic
journals,
plus
all
deriva've
products,
such
as
databases,
plus
the
bibliometric
sta's'cs
used
to
evaluate
research
projects
30-­‐40%
profit
!
and
scien'sts’
careers
Dessins
L’Obs

7. Three publishers control publishing
Three
transna'onal
commercial
corpora'ons
dominate
market
:
Reed-­‐Elsevier,
Springer-­‐Kluwer
and
Wiley-­‐Blackwell
7.6
Billions
€
Reed-­‐Elsevier
revenue
in
2013
hBp://www.reedelsevier.com
2.5
Billions
€
CNRS
budget
in
2012
hBp://www.dgdr.cnrs.fr
>>
Financial
results
of
Reed-­‐Elsevier
for
peer-­‐reviewed
journals
in
2013
Revenue:
2.7
Billions
€
Profit:
0.8
Billions
€
Profit
margin:
39%
(+6%
compared
to
2012)
Those
publishers
impose
their
model
for
Open
Access
journals,
where
authors
should
pay
them
costly
ar'cle
processing
charges

8. How could scientists take back control?
1
Authors
should
keep
their
copyright
and
make
their
papers
available
in
open
access
under
a
Crea've
Commons
licenses
CC-­‐BY
2
Journals
should
be
owned
by
their
editorial
board
in
charge
of
the
peer-­‐reviewing,
while
editors
and
referees
will
con'nue
to
do
this
for
free
3
Funding
agencies
should
no
longer
pay,
subscrip'ons
and
ar'cle
processing
charges,
directly
to
publishers
as
long
as
market
is
oligolis'c
with
confiden'ality
clauses

9. Scientists need publishing platforms
1
Funding
agencies
should
provide
to
the
scien'fic
community
publishing
plaEorms,
developed
in
open
source
soLware,
for
edi'ng
and
publishing
peer-­‐reviewed
journals
with
the
help
of
librarians
and
publishers
as
subcontractors
2
Publishing
plaEorms
would
offer
to
anyone
freely
usable
scien'fic
papers,
in
open
access
under
CC-­‐BY
licenses,
without
authors
having
to
pay
to
publish
3
Funding
agencies
would
thus
control
the
quality
of
peer-­‐reviewing,
by
selec'ng
the
journals
having
good
prac'ces
and
reputable
editors

10. Publishing platforms already exist
Created
in
1999
it
publishes
448
journals
in
Open
Access
financed
by
public
agencies:
CNRS,
EHESS,
BSN,
Aix-­‐Marseille
and
Avignon
universi'es
Created
in
1999
it
publishes
1661
journals
in
Open
Access
financed
by
public
agencies:
FAPESP,
CNPq,
BIREME
and
Spain
+
+

11. In conclusion
Scien=fic
publishing
today
:
Investments
for
wri'ng
and
peer-­‐reviewing
scien'fic
papers
are
public,
but
ownership
of
scien'fic
journals
and
profits
from
subscrip'ons
are
private
Publishers
should
become
compe'ng
service
providers
to
the
publicly
funded
and
publicly
owned
publishing
plaEorms,
but
no
longer
intellectual
content
owners
Scien=fic
publishing
tomorrow
:
Scien'fic
papers
will
be
available
for
free
in
open
access,
and
their
content
usable,
to
anyone
and
to
any
ins'tu'on,
for
the
sake
of
the
advancement
of
knowledge
€
⇒

12. For more information
hBp://wavelets.ens.fr
Click
on
Publica=ons
Paper
n°312
:
Avis
sur
les
relaSons
entre
les
chercheurs
et
les
maisons
d'édiSon
scienSfique,
Comité
d'Ethique
du
CNRS,
2011
Paper
n°
307
:
Oh!
Une
idée,
c’est
si
rare!
WissenschaLskolleg
zu
Berlin,
2011
hBp://wavelets.ens.fr/OAC_ENS_2014
2nd
Open
Access
Colloquium,
ENS
Paris,
2-­‐3
July
2014
hBp://wavelets.ens.fr/BOYCOTT_ELSEVIER
Ar'cles,
declara'ons,
blogs,
conferences,
videos,
interviews,
mails
related
to
the
movement
The
Cost
of
Knowledge
that
launched
a
boycol
of
Elsevier
in
2012
followed
by
14830
scien'sts
worldwide