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by davidparks21
746 days ago
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I struggle with this question. The editor plays a valuable role and it's not hard to swallow the argument that editors make science better, they're the front line filter. Employing them full time is a core value that the current system provides. I'm wary (but not close minded) to the idea that volunteer orgs could scale to the top echelons of scientific publication, which require a lot of filtering. Perhaps if we look to the conference paper model where funding primarily comes from the conference? The conference brings benefits beyond publishing. In that model publishing equates to financial discount or free entrance to the conference, so it flips the equation. |
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I could be wrong, but I don't think PC chairs are paid, by anybody. Maybe they get free housing at the conference, but this is more of a consolation prize given the amount of work involved.
Certainly the rank and file PC members don't get anything. I was on one PC mailing list where one of the organizers accidentally let slip that (some) organizers get free housing, and there was a big uproar in the PC. None of us get anything like that.
So this is literally a system where the expert reviewers get nothing, and even the chairs in charge do it nearly for free. What part of this needs to cost money?
The peer review comes from the community. The exclusivity and filter comes from the community. Even the funding comes from the community, because community members pay to go to the conference.
What the publisher does is, as GP noted, mainly to host PDFs on a website and make sure they stay up. That costs something, but nothing like what the licensing fees for these services are (or the so-called "open access" fees that we now pay).