Research councils' requirements could bankrupt academic journals

Journal publishers are concerned that a new proposal that requires all researchers who receivepublic research funding to post their results on publicly accessible electronic databases will lead to the financial collapse of many academic journals. The proposal is in a consultation document from the Research Councils UK, which represents theeight research councils in the United Kingdom, including the Medical Research Council. The document considers the dissemination of, and access to, research outputs in the form of journal articles and conference proceedings. The document says that ideas and knowledge derived from research funded with public money mustbe made available and accessible for public use, interrogation, and scrutiny, as widely, rapidly,and effectively as practicable. To achieve this, it proposes that research councils require any researcher awarded a grant from 1 October 2005 to deposit any resulting journal article or conference “in an appropriate e-print repository (either institutional or subject-based), wherever such a repository is available to …