The Dangers of the “author Pays” Model in Mathematical Publishing

Open access publishing is widely touted as making scientific knowledge quickly and freely available to scholars around the world, particularly in poor and developing countries. There is considerable validity to this argument. It also feels good and noble to participate in the global drive towards the free spread of knowledge. The problem is that the “author pays” model for open access publishing, usually put forward as the solution to the lack of free access, is, in many respects, a cure that is worse than the disease, particularly for mathematics. The first issue here concerns editorial integrity. When the financial bottom line of a journal depends directly on the number of articles published, the pressure to accept and publish papers faster and in greater quantities can easily compromise the integrity of the editorial and peer review process, even at good journals. Recently, “author pays” open access journals, which charge significant author fees (often a few thousand dollars per article) and promise fast refereeing and publication speeds, have significantly proliferated. In my observations, most of such mathematical journals are essentially “paper mills” and “vanity outlets”, publishing low quality research with pro forma peer review. Hardly a week goes by that I don’t receive another e-mail from such a journal inviting me to submit a paper there or to join their editorial board. This is not a healthy development. The “author pays” model, even if implemented with rigorous editorial standards, still significantly blurs the line between reputable journals and “vanity press” outlets. The bigger problem concerns the effect of the “author pays” system on the open and egalitarian nature of mathematical research. While being able to access mathematical papers is crucial for conducting research, being able to publish the results of one’s research is even more important. Are we doing any great favors to mathematicians in developing countries by “pricing them out” of being able to publish their work? What about graduate students? Retirees? Unaffiliated researchers? And what about the majority of the faculty members in the U.S. mathematics departments who are not supported by NSF grants? Even those of us, like myself, who currently receive NSF support, do not have grants which contain a substantial publication fee component. Even if publication fees become a standard budget item of NSF grants, the grant sizes are not likely to increase rather, the budget portions will be decreased for other activities. The research enterprise is organized rather differently in mathematics and in experimental sciences. For the latter, it is relatively rare for graduate students to publish solo author papers, since most publications are based on research conducted at large labs (and most papers have many co-authors, starting with the lab director). These labs are usually supported by large external grants that can easily cover significant publication fees, even if they are $1000 or more per paper. By contrast, in mathematics, research is still mostly conducted by individuals working alone