Re: "Open Access" at Cambridge University Press

[Phillip Bigelow <bigelowp@juno.com>]

> http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displaySpecialPage?pageId=45
> 
>       Cambridge University Press Journals launch Open Access

<snippy-dippy-doo>
 
>       All Cambridge asks in order to provide this service is
>       that the author, or their institution or funding body,
>       pays a fee to cover costs associated with the
>       publication process, from peer-review of the submitted
>       manuscript, through the copy-editing and typesetting,
>       to online-hosting of the definitive version of the
>       published article. The charge that will be applied for
>       each article is £1500 / $2700.


What a scam!

If the author DOESN'T want to pay for the "Open Access" option, the
author STILL gets their manuscript published for free.  The cost of
peer-review, copy-editing and typesetting are all absorbed by Cambridge
University Press.

Furthermore, most manuscripts are now submitted electronically. 
Therefore, the cost to Cambridge University Press to transfer the article
into PDF format is essentially zero.  A dude does some pointing and
clicking with a mouse for about 3 minutes, and the PDF is ready.

So, in essence, the $2700 fee for the "Open Access" option is to offset
the cost of the storage space for the author's PDF???  Oh I don't think
so.

<pb>
--
"If you are traveling into the future in a time machine, and you pass a
person from the future who is traveling into the past, it's probably a
good idea to avoid eye contact." - Jack Handey