A Comment on Journal Pricing

I would like to make some comments based on what I have read in this article Paying by the Pound for Journals. I do feel that the new digital pricing model called “value based pricing” as practiced by American Chemical Society Publications is not fair since it applies only to corporate and governmental agencies. Pricing for academic institutions is based on historical usage, size and Carnegie classification. Certainly prices of journals are high for customers in both the profit and not for profits areas. Under the value-based pricing model, the Society charges subscribers according to how many times articles are downloaded from a particular journal.


When an article is downloaded, we assume the researcher reads the article completely. But this is not the only way that journals are being used. Many scientists and engineers use journal primarily for current awareness. They only need to peruse through journals and read only titles and abstracts to keep abreast of developments in their field. Thus, measuring journal usage only by the number of downloads is likely not accurate.


I suggest that the American Chemical Society drop “value based pricing” for government and corporate customers and develop a new pricing algorithm comparable to that used for academics and not base it on downloads.