Dear Met Society members:

See the e-mail below from Steve Thompson, CEO of RSNZ, regarding
RSNZ science journals. I will send a response on this before the
20th. If you have views or comments you wish recorded, please
mail me back with your thoughts.

Thanks,
Jim Renwick

------- Forwarded message follows -------
Send reply to: Steve Thompson <steve.thompson@...>
Date sent: Tue, 03 Sep 2002 09:16:48 +1200
From: Steve Thompson <steve.thompson@...>
To: Multiple recipients of memsocs-announce - Sent
by <steve.thompson@...>
Subject: The Royal Society's learned journals


To: Presidents of Constituent Societies
From: Steve Thompson, Chief Executive, Royal Society of new
Zealand
re: Publishing of the Society's seven learned journals
2 September, 2002


Good morning from Wellington,

May I ask your assistance in presenting a case to government in
consideration of the seven learned journals currently published
by the
Society. In essence, the Society would like to hear your views
on three
questions posed recently by MoRST:

1. Why do we need New Zealand based research journals?
2. What journals does New Zealand need? What is our competitive
advantage
in the international market?
3. What sort of quality, in terms of scientific impact, will the
journals
have?"

MoRST has asked the Society for a reply on these questions, and
we will
need to present a draft response to Council when it meets on
October 3.
There is some urgency, therefore, as papers for Council must be
assembled
for printing by September 20.

May I ask if you would be able to respond. You may not have time
to poll
all your members, but I am sure that you will be able to reflect
their
views quite clearly.

Below for your information are extracts from a recent briefing
we sent to
the Minister concerning price rises for the journals. The
briefing gives
some facts and figures about journal publishing.

Yours sincerely
Steve Thompson


PRICE INCREASES FOR THE NEW ZEALAND JOURNALS PUBLISHED BY THE
ROYAL SOCIETY
OF NEW ZEALAND

New subscription rates to take effect in 2003 have been
announced for the
New Zealand research journals published by the Society, together
with the
introduction of online publishing of the journals next year. All
seven
journals are presently available FREE until the end of this year
at
www.rsnz.org/publish/abstracts.php.

Proposed 2003 subscription prices, with old prices in brackets:

NZ/Aust (NZ$) Institution Print + online: $425 (old price $315)
online
only: $360
NZ/Aust (NZ$) Individual Print + online: $200 (147) online
only: $170
NZ/Aust (NZ$) RSNZ member Print + online: $140 (105) online
only: $120
Overseas (US$) Institution Print + online: $305 (old price $225)
online
only: $260
Overseas (US$) Individual Print + online: $135 ($100) online
only: $115

Also from 2003, all new submissions will incur a page charge of
$50 per
printed page, to a limit of $500 per paper.

In summary, this represents a:
· flat price increase of 15%, after 3 years of no increase
· 2 subscription options for individuals and institutions:
(1) online
only; (2) print plus online to cost 20% more than the online-
only version
· remove 25% "early bird" discount
· $50 page charge for every paper published (max. of $500)
· individual online subscription password controlled
· institutional online subscription unrestricted access
to all users
at same IP address

These rates are the first price rise in three years and also
allow for
online distribution making them accessible to everyone,
especially
researchers in large institutions or university departments with
access to
that institution's online journal.

Factors

1. The Society was asked to take on a publishing role from
DSIR in
1991, with partial assistance from government subsidy, which has
remained
unchanged at some $400,000 since that time. Since 1991,
inflation has
risen by over 30%. Meanwhile, journal prices have continued to
be squeezed
over the decade, as they were hit by libraries' and other
subscribers'
ability to pay. As a result, the Society has gradually reduced
its
publishing resources while at the same time has instigated
changes to
enhance the overall performance of the journals.

2. The New Zealand science journals specialize in results
from
regional research. Their specialist content is the very reason
for the
journals' existence. The journals provide a unique service to
the
publishing requirements of New Zealand researchers, but they
cannot match
the sales and citation performance of large international
journals with
appeal to researchers worldwide.

3. With the advent of online publication of the journals,
begun in
2002, research results will become available to a much larger
group of
users (all university staff and students, for example) for the
cost of one
institutional subscription, so they will become the
beneficiaries of that
research for little or no personal cost. The Society sees this
as part of a
trend developing world-wide, where costs of publishing will
likely be
regarded as part of the cost of research, while reader costs
will be
reduced - thereby allowing the material to be more widely
available.

4. The journals presently carry a $50 page charge unless
the
corresponding author is a subscriber when the paper is
published. This
charge will be retained at the same level (unchanged since 1991,
when the
charge was first introduced), but it will become compulsory for
all papers.
The proposed charge is still considerably below world standards,
which can
be 2-8 times that rate.

5. The Society understands concerns about students and
others without
access to funds to publish. Although we have announced a new
set of
charges, we do believe that a degree of discretion in hardship
cases might
be warranted - though we would be reliant on the integrity of
those making
such requests. However, the Society does not have an independent
source of
funds to subsidise the journals, and we are dependent on the
goodwill of
our funding providers, MoRST, subscribers and authors, to be
able to
continue to provide the journals on their behalf.

6. The Society is committed to continue providing high-
quality,
well-cited, national science journals with good and established
international reputations. After several years of suspension,
new Editorial
Boards have been established to assist in the process of
formulating
strategies for the successful future of each journal. With their
help, and
with the support of the New Zealand science community on whose
behalf the
journals are published, the Society is confident that the
journals will
remain as leading flagships for the dissemination of the results
of New
Zealand's scientific endeavours.


--------------------------------------
Dr. Steve Thompson, Chief Executive,
The Royal Society of New Zealand, PO Box 598, Wellington, NZ
e-mail: steve.thompson@... Ph: +64 4 472 7421 DDI: 470-
5757 Fax: 473
1841
The gateway to New Zealand science: http://www.rsnz.org


------- End of forwarded message -------+-----------------------
+------------------------------------------------------------+
Dr James Renwick, President
Meteorological Society of New Zealand (Inc.)
PO Box 6523, Te Aro, Wellington, New Zealand.
J.Renwick@... +64 4 386 0343(Ph) 2153(Fax)
http://metsoc.rsnz.org/