The Prisoner’s Dilemma

Prisoner B Stays Prisoner B

Mum Squeals
Prisoner A Stays (Cooperate)
6 months each (Defect)
Prisoner A: 10
Mum years
(Cooperate)
Prisoner A Squeals Prisoner A: Scot- Prisoner B: Scot-
3 years each
(Defect) free free
Prisoner B: 10
years
Optimal results depend on number of games and
strategies adopted. In 1984, political scientist
David Axelrod computer-tested several strategies
for an indefinite number of games and found that
a tit-for-tat strategy optimized results, often
resulting in prisoners ultimately deciding to stay
silent together.
The University Press’ Dilemma
University Press University Press
B Publishes B Evaporates
(Cooperate) (Defect)
University Press A Both University A University B more
Publishes & B have less cash profitable
(Cooperate) on hand but can University Press A
publish faculty publishes
work University B
University Press A University A more faculty, butAat
University & loss
B
Evaporates profitable have more cash on
(Defect) University Press B hand but neither
publishes has a press to
University A publish faculty
faculty, but at loss work
 In the “Iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma,”
the rational solution over time suggests
cooperation
University Press B Publishes University Press B Evaporates
(Cooperate) (Defect)
University
Press A University A & B cash University B cash
Publishes
(Cooperate) University B publishing
Publishing opportunities opportunities

University A cash

University A publishing
opportunities
University University A cash University A & B cash
Press A
Evaporates University A publishing
(Defect) opportunities Publishing opportunities

University B cash

University B publishing
University Presses (UPs) are seen
as businesses not services
UPs have weak internal
constituencies
Students Interns
Faculty Advisory/Editorial Boards
Alumni None
UPs appear as subventions of
other faculty
Each UP eliminated from picture
potentially reduces number of not-
for-profit publishing venues
Each UP eliminated leaves private
publishers the field with their
troubling dynamic
UPs can offer indirect benefits
Student training and work/study
opportunities
Faculty gain editorial/advisory board
Publishing decision shaped by profit
obligations
Total Revenue (“top line”)
Operating Income (“bottom line”)
All units must deliver on revenue &
OI goals
Corporation Division Imprint
Book/Journal
Private publishers adopt strategies
to serve top-line and bottom-line
objectives
Twigging: creation of new subspecialty
More titles, fewer publishers
Decline of the specialized scholarly monograph
Increased cost of scholarly journals
Similar production costs, fewer potential
subscribers or buyers
Market flooding: more journals, series, and
books
Buyer spreading: fewer buyers per journal/book
Recent Positive
Trends Reduction Recent Negative Trends
in production costs •Reduced
(PPB & shipping) subscribers/buyers
from digital o Working paper sites
platforms o Institutional
repositories
•Increased submission
Mimicry
Twigging more journals
Bundling/Aggregating content: Project Muse, JSTOR,
Caliber
Textbooks: Yale UP (World Language Textbooks),
Cambridge UP
Reference: Oxford UP, Harvard UP, Princeton UP
Series: Columbia UP, Cornell UP
Working Papers: CIAO

Open Access
Grant funded: PhilPapers, The Modernism Lab,
MITOpenCourseWare
Volunteer: RePEc
“Yet if the only form of tradition, of handing
down, consisted in following the ways of the
immediate generation before us in a blind or
timid adherence to its successes, "tradition"
should positively be discouraged.”
--T.S. Eliot, “Tradition and the Individual Talent,” 1922

This process of Creative Destruction is the

essential fact about capitalism. It is what
capitalism consists in and what every
capitalist concern has got to live in. . . .
--Joseph Schumpeter, Capitalism, Socialism, and
Democracy, 1975
 Crisis in
Creative
Scholarly
Destruction
Forma
Complainer Complaint
Communicatio
Perpetrator
t
ns peer
Backlog; insufficient
Scholar Article Journal editor
review
Scholar/
Journal Article Oversubmission University
Editor
Journal Price inflation; Consolidation; Publisher/
Library
s Overproduction Faculty
Journal
Library Increased APC for OA journals Publisher
s
Journal Devaluation of digital-only
Publisher University
s publications
 Crisis in
Creative
Scholarly
Destruction
Complainer Format ComplaintCommunicatio
Perpetrator
Monograp ns
Dilution and
Scholar Publisher
h generalization
Monograp Library/STM
Publisher Not enough buyers
h Publishers
Library Reference Market flooding Publisher
Costs too high; over-
Student Textbook Publisher
revision
Students/Bookst
Publisher Textbook Used book attrition
ore
Publisher Databases Price containment Consortia
Crisis in Problems
Scholarly seeking
Communicatio
Complaint Format solutions
Solving
Backlogs
nsOversubmission Articles
Response to publish or perish
Insufficient Peer directives
Review
Economies of scale for a tightening
Consolidation Journals
market
Reduction in number of
Price Inflation Journals
subscribers/Twigging
Rescaling of true journal publishing
APC Inflation Journals
cost
Generalization Monograph Broader sales for publishers
Rerence Market
Reference Broader sales for publishers
Flooding
Excessive revision Textbooks Used book sales attrition
Scholarly
communication is
experiencing an
evolutionary
dynamic in
publisher finances,
workload
management,
government funding
limits and
expectations, etc.
“It’s publish or perish, and he hasn’t
None of these published.”
changes are new… --New Yorker, 1966
“Academic libraries make accessible…those records that have
contributed in the past and are contributing in the present to the
advancement of knowledge. They are not institutions whose purpose is
to preserve the output of printing presses.”
--Margit Kraft, Library Quarterly, July 1967

“Like so many papers given and half listened to at the annual

convention, PMLA’s contents, with rare exceptions, have become mere
signs of a certain kind of competency, opening the way to a job, a raise,
a promotion, tenure. To publish in PMLA is to gain prestige, a huge
potential audience, and a tiny actual one.”
--Richard Chadbourne, Rocky Mountain MLA, Dec. 1967

Why the push for publication?... For many, however, a more immediate
objective is to establish credit—often in the form of a long list of
publications. A thick “vita” helps in the continual struggle to secure
government grants and win academic promotion.”
--William Broad, BioScience, Sept. 1982
University presses and scholarly communication
have always featured a changing dynamic that
remains centered on the distribution of scholarly
work.
Publishing, digital or otherwise, is an evolutionary
phenomenon and therefore not only changing, but
layered.
Digital revolution has
altered how scholarly
information is gathered,
reviewed, and
disseminated.
Digital information
distribution is still built
on cognitive models
through which we
process information,
such as classification
and embedding.
In a digital environment,
the UPs role in scholarly
communication shifts
from availability
(“publication”) to
visibility, a.k.a.,
Democratization of
communication has shifted
balance from… Scholarly
Scholarly Communicati
Communication
on

Scholarly communication is no longer

just conferences and print distribution
to libraries
It is also…

Listservs Working paper/

Software- Prepress sites
enabled Wikis
presentations Blogs
E-books Webinars
E-journals Course
E-review sites management
Electronic software
reserves
CHANGE HAS ALSO COME TO THE COMMUNICATION OF SCHOLARLY
COMMUNICATION

Digital catalogs Talk E-vites

E-newsletters Search engine
Publisher blogs optimization
E-mail alerts & blasts Reader reviews
Vlogs & podcasts Related title pointers
Site links (e.g., author Press wikis
sites)
NOTE TYPES OF
INFORMATION ON
LEFT
BLOGS
VLOGS/YOUTUBE
SOCIAL NETWORKS/FACEBOOK
AUTHOR INTERVIEWS/PODCASTS
AUTHOR EVENTS
AUTHOR SITES/SOCIAL BOOKMARKS/TAG CLOUDS
WIKIS
 UNIVERSITY PRESSES & SCHOLARLY COMMUNICATION
What the role of a What the role of a
university press is in university press is not in
scholarly scholarly
communication… communication…
Evaluation
Solicitation, peer review, Inventor of new technologies
editorial development &
Simulation lab
refinement
Prediction market
Publication
Mark-up, composition, Data collection operation
design, deployment into Research center
print and digital Library
environments
Dissemination
Publicity, marketing, sales
distribution, backfiling,