Scholarly Communication: Your Research, Your Control

Introduction

The crisis in scholarly communication encompasses academic publishing dealings as well as other forms of information sharing among colleagues and students at the sword's point of copyright infringement lawsuits. It increasingly affects faculty members in academic institutions, as well as it limits their institutional libraries' ability to purchase journal subscriptions.

The crisis in scholarly communication encompasses academic publishing dealings as well as other forms of information sharing among colleagues and students at the sword's point of copyright infringement lawsuits. On the one hand, publishers attempt to tie faculty authors to tight contracts, preventing them from sharing electronic versions of their research; while on the other hand, prices of journal subscriptions keep rising much faster than inflation rate. This twofold crisis increasingly affects faculty members in academic institutions, as well as it limits their institutional libraries' ability to purchase journal subscriptions.

Arizona State University Libraries offers this web site as a guiding resource to our academic community for staying abreast of emerging trends which directly impact those involved in research, publication, and teaching. We present issues that need to be addressed within the academic community to prevent the nature of scholarly communication in the future from being directed by market forces. Libraries are in the forefront of this struggle on the future of scholarly communication, calling for adopting new business models based on the advent of new technologies.