University Publishing in a Digital Age

II. [...] : C. Many university presses have struggled to adapt to changing needs

University presses historically acted as an important arm for publishing the research outputs of universities, both on their own campuses and on behalf of the entire scholarly community. This is most true of the humanities and social science disciplines. As the printed products of presses have experienced waning demand, as more library acquisition resources are expended on scientific journal literature distributed by large commercial publishers, and as libraries have begun playing a greater role in providing tools and infrastructure for disseminating new forms of scholarship, presses (especially smaller ones and those with only monograph programs) are facing a growing set of more formidable challenges. In this section we would like to explore the mission of university presses, their relationships to their host institutions, some of the challenges that have led them into their current predicament, and how they are responding. We would also like to focus on the transition of press content to the electronic medium, as this transition offers a window of opportunity to revitalize monographs, the core product of many presses.

It is important to note that there is a great deal of diversity among the university presses, so it is somewhat dangerous to make broad generalizations. Some presses have taken a much more active approach to revitalizing their role in the university than others. Those with journal programs tend to be more financially sound than those without. Large presses generally are faring better than small presses. That said, we will attempt to highlight some of the common traits, challenges and opportunities faced by presses, or at least certain segments of presses. We would like to explore two topics in depth: 1) relationship to university mission, and 2) how presses are making the transition to electronic formats and media.

1. Many presses have become disconnected from their own university’s mission

Press directors broadly agree that they must balance competing goals in their mission to serve the global academic community of authors and readers. Two challenges stand out. First, presses must find the best way to be good stewards of scholarship on behalf of the community (public good), while also creating value for their parent institution (private good). The second challenge calls for presses to advance their businesses through commercial discipline – they are one of the few parts of the university expected to behave like a business with cost recovery and long-term sustainability strategies built from the marketplace – while at the same time serving the not-for-profit demands of the community (“give us state of the art credentialing, editing, production, dissemination, and author royalties, but keep your prices low”).

Over time, and in pursuit of the largest public service to the global academic community, presses have tended to grow disconnected from the administrations at their host institutions. This is due in part to the fact that they publish works from scholars mostly off their own campuses. The highest percentage of local authors published by a university press that we came across was 25-30 percent, but most were below 10 percent. Faculty members generally seek to publish their books with the most prestigious press in their field, regardless of affiliation. They actually often prefer to publish their books at presses other than their own, because institutional distance avoids any suggestion of favoritism and provides external validation.

The result is that the university press publishing is viewed, in the words of a provost, as “a general service function for higher education…each university that has a press is providing a platform for the community”. The 88 U.S. universities that operate presses do so on behalf of the entire system, and the 72 percent of universities surveyed that allow their presses to operate at a deficit do so at least partly for the common good[20].

Not surprisingly, provosts put limited resources and attention towards what they perceive to be a service to the broader community. Presses are a small budget item competing for attention with large cost centers that are more directly connected with the university’s local interests. One provost confessed that “the press has always been the next item on the list”. Many administrations have cut subsidies, moved press offices off campus, and not included presses in strategic planning for new initiatives that could have a publishing component. Provosts rarely meet with press directors – in some cases only a few times a year – even at institutions where the press director reports directly to the provost. One press director commented that, in his long tenure at one of the larger presses, he had never been given the opportunity to set goals with his superiors in the university administration, or participate in the university’s processes for setting priorities.

A couple provosts felt that presses are pursuing appropriate strategies. One said he was very pleased with the way the press at his university is performing, and that it is fulfilling its mission of publishing important scholarship and defending the monograph. Another provost endorsed the press’ focus on publishing works from external faculty, saying “I would hate to think [that the press is] peculiarly for your own faculty.” A third cautioned against changing too quickly, saying he “wants to make sure we don’t destroy something wonderful.”

And while most provosts acknowledged flaws in the current credentialing system, they found it difficult to envision or embrace a clear digital alternative that meets their needs in making hiring, promotion and tenure decisions. A provost told us “There will be an enduring value to print. Books will exist for decades to come. Presses can afford to be conservative because of this[21].” Another stated that “[There is] a slavish commitment to the [printed] book in the humanities” and “scholars are not pounding on the presses to make their scholarship available in electronic form.” (A recent Ithaka survey of faculty corroborated this view; it found that only about 25% expect eBooks to become very/extremely important to their research and teaching in the next five years[22]). One provost opined, “Am I supposed to give someone tenure based on what they’ve put on a blog?”

Even those provosts we consulted who are supportive of their presses worry about what may happen to their press after they retire. One provost of a university with a small press said, “the ax could fall on [the press] when I leave.” Another top administrator told us “I’m the only one defending the press. Who knows what will happen to the press when I retire? Then they’ll have to deal with reality.” He went on to say that his likely successor has no interest in scholarly publishing or in the press. Another provost we consulted said, “the business model that sustained university presses since World War II is falling apart. Our structure has not rewarded innovation.”

A couple provosts were excited about the potential for presses to be a key component of a new scholarly communications system, and that they might serve as the glue across campuses. Others, however, were skeptical that presses could be revitalized by digital technologies. This is in part because presses seem too inextricably linked with the traditional systems of monograph publishing on which they depend for tenure and credentialing decisions, and in part because many presses have not demonstrated an ability to change with the times, much less to act as leaders in pioneering a new system of scholarly communications. One provost said he is “not sure the press needs to be at the table” of scholarly innovation. They suggested that presses should simply continue doing what they have done in the past – indeed, some said they should be defensive bulwarks against the pressures of change.

The librarians with whom we spoke tended to be more extreme in expressing their views on presses than were the administrators. The general view we heard from librarians regarding presses is that time is running out; they are anachronisms – far behind in their understanding of what scholars need. They have not kept pace with scholarly communication because they have failed to respond to the challenge of electronic publishing. Finally, they are too small to matter.

Some quotes illustrate how strongly this view is held. One librarian commented that the “Life expectancy of university presses is relatively short. The mission and potential of the university press is not an urgent question for most administrations. It is not tied to what goes on here on campus. The problem is, the presses are not totally broken, but by the time it is clear that they are broken, it will be too late.” Another argued that “Most of the presses will die. They’ve clung to the past; they’re too traditional; they’re too afraid of big competitors.” A third stated that “Presses have become distant from their institutions. In many ways, they wanted this, understandably, so as not to become the ‘vanity publisher’ of their universities. But the result is that they have become marginalized…. If presses don’t begin to reinvent themselves, and think disruptively, they won’t be around. There needs to be a catalytic force for innovation or they won’t survive.”

The cost recovery model of presses has become one major constraint. One librarian commented that “presses are trapped in the cage of ‘What can I do to make money?’ and they have so few resources to climb out of that cage. They are like hamsters scrabbling along and pushing their little wheels.” They are caught in a “catch 22”, where they lack room for experimentation because their budgets are so tight, and thus cannot inspire interest in their administrators to fund anything new.

We also heard distinct notes of support and encouragement to develop collaborative solutions. One librarian perhaps summed this up best: “Presses have a huge potential but they are not taking advantage of that potential, and there is a narrow window to do something about it. Our faculty survey revealed how much respectability the university press imprint still carries, but how can presses ‘cash in on’ that prestige in the face of growing competition?” When asked what he would do if he ran a university press, he replied, “I would align the press with the strengths of the university, and I would work with all parts of the campus to create a research and dissemination platform for work that goes on here.”

Press directors are mostly aware of the problems described by provosts and librarians, but have struggled to formulate a new plan or lack the resources to implement one. They feel they are held to a different standard than all the cost centers on campus, that they are essentially penalized for pursuing a cost recovery model, which then becomes the basis for evaluating their performance. When they perform well (in financial terms), they are “rewarded” by having subsidies cut. When they run too large a deficit they are threatened with closure. Some have responded to these expectations by elevating cost-recovery in their selection criteria, publishing more trade books and shying away from the least marketable fields. This approach may improve their financial situation, while at the same time undermining the case for subsidies. Press directors acknowledge that they have not participated actively enough in the academic life of their campus, nor have they effectively demonstrated their worth to faculty and administrators. As a director said, “We don’t do a good job of telling our universities why we are important to them.” One director spoke of a “a feeling of divorce” from the university leadership, expressing what seems to be a common feeling among press leaders.

We also came across a number of press directors who are actively taking steps to reconnect with the academic leaders on campus, trying to align their publishing programs with the strengths of their parent institution, renewing their efforts to put content online, and experimenting with new products. We describe these efforts below in section 1. Even those that have not made as much progress showed excitement about pursuing new opportunities when prompted by our conversations. The presses still have much to offer, as we discuss in the section 3 below.

2. Many presses are struggling to make the transition to the electronic medium.

Journals were the first major form of scholarly publication to go online. Some university presses have made this transition: according to our survey, among the 18 presses that publish journals, 14 (78 percent) said that they publish journals electronically, and of these most said 100 percent of their titles are available online. However, some presses have struggled to keep journals when they went online, and many journals have moved to commercial platforms (see our discussion of this transition on page 11). Furthermore, although the electronic medium offers clear benefits for reference works (content can be continuously updated and searching is much more convenient), presses have put little of their subject-specific reference content online[23]. Looking to the future, there is a risk that other forms of content (books, new formats) will follow a similar pattern.

The search for models to distribute books online has proven difficult. As with many new technologies, early distribution models were not well suited to the needs of users, and, for the content providers, revenue from these sources remained minimal[24]. Many university presses jumped early on at the opportunity to produce eBooks but were disappointed by the results. According to our survey, 73 percent of presses said they publish at least some books electronically (primarily through licensing to aggregators such as NetLibrary and ebrary), but the average revenue contribution from these products is just over one-third of 1 percent[25]. Consequently, presses for the most part retrenched to what they have always done – produce print monographs – even as users have become ever more reliant on electronic resources. The director of a major library noted that “Scholars work piecemeal and they want everything online. Presses are still working almost exclusively cover to cover.”

In the past year there has been a resurgence of interest in electronic books, led by large and commercial presses and online retailers such as Amazon. Publishers have started to show through their actions that this format is important to them, and they want to control their assets. Oxford Scholarship Online (OSO) has demonstrated to the university press community that a large aggregation of quality monograph content, optimized for online scholarly use, generates strong usage and holds sufficient appeal to librarians to support a profitable business. Two of the largest commercial scholarly publishers, Springer and Elsevier, announced major electronic book products. Springer’s product provides access to 15,000 electronic books via its SpringerLink platform (with 3,000 added per year[26]), while Elsevier’s product is anticipated to include 4,000 titles when it launches in 2007[27]. Their strategy is to “journalize” the selling of monographs by licensing campus access for an annual fee, or selling perpetual access directly to libraries. Commercial trade publishers such as Random House and HarperCollins are developing full service solutions for controlling their content electronically (i.e. from producing digital content to selling it directly). Having invested in significant technological infrastructure, they are now beginning to offer services to prestigious smaller publishers, including some of the more trade-minded university presses. The goal of these commercial publishers appears to be to gain more control of their assets, amortize their technology development costs, and increase the value of their content by aggregating it with quality content from other publishers.

Leveraging its investment in digitizing books for its Search-inside-the-book program, Amazon has launched a new product called Amazon Upgrade, which allows customers who purchase a print copy of a book to access the electronic version for an extra fee. This provides immediate electronic access to the book’s content to the reader and incremental revenues to the publisher (and to Amazon)[28]. Amazon also sells electronic books via its subsidiary Mobipocket. Google, too, has been mulling business models for selling access to the book content that publishers have provided for inclusion in Google Book Search[29].

Without the resources to invest in their own solutions, small publishers are nevertheless trying to find the optimum way to control their assets, develop a customer base, and maximize both revenues and dissemination of their content. A number of the presses consulted for this study have put renewed energy into developing strategies for creating, storing, distributing, and monetizing electronic content[30]. New production workflows to create electronic editions are growing up within university presses. New digitization, storage, and reversioning services such as Bibliovault and codeMantra have been launched to support the development and maintenance of this electronic content. Experimentation with large commercial e-book aggregators such as Amazon, Google, and ebrary (now offering, in addition to its licensing model, a platform for publishers to sell directly to libraries) is growing across the university press sector. And of course the opportunities for licensing e-content continue to abound (e.g. Questia, Books 24/7, etc.).These represent big choices and tough decisions for publishers without the resources to invest in the preferred end-to-end solutions of their larger competitors. For smaller university presses, and for those that do not publish journals, these decisions are particularly challenging because they involve so much new terrain, and because there is so little time and capacity within the press to develop the complex skills that enable them to navigate that terrain. But, it must be noted, those skill sets and decisions are also a challenge to the bigger university presses – a worry that we heard throughout our interviews. A director of a medium/large press said that for several years he had preferred to sit back and watch commercial publishers experiment with eBook models, but he is now feeling more pressure from libraries and from his Board to take action.

One could make an argument for small presses to let commercial publishers risk their capital in experimenting with new technologies and business models until the market matures, especially since most of the content at stake (humanities monographs) has limited commercial appeal. We are concerned, however, that the commercial publishers are pursuing different objectives that may not lead to desirable outcomes for universities; for example, universities have an interest in exploring ways to use new technologies to reduce costs of publishing so that the monograph continues to be a viable format for new authors and those in less mainstream fields. Commercial publishers are focused instead on maximizing scale. Moreover, the “wait-and-see” approach allows large commercial firms a critical head start in building large scale platforms with the ability to attract and control scholarly content. It would not be in the community’s interests to see electronic monographs and new electronic formats follow the same path as journals.