CONTENTS
MIT Premieres Digital Media & Learning Series
O’Reilly TOC Conference Focuses on Practical Digital Resources
Publishing’s Carbon Footprint
AAUP Presses at MLA 2008
Lobbying for the Humanities: Humanities Advocacy Day 2008
Mellon Foundation Supports Four More University Press Collaborations
Caravan Project Begins Second Year with $25,000 NACS Grant
Miscellany:
AAUP Welcomes Its First Introductory Members
Harvard Faculty Adopts Open Access Policy For Articles
Senate Hearings Held On Founding Fathers Papers
Annual Meeting Web Site Updated
Kosovo And The Former Yugoslavia Added To Books For Understanding
AAUP Book, Jacket, & Journal Show—Judging
Calendar: see Calendar on AAUPnet.org
Posted by: site admin @ 9:12 am
By Shaun Manning
Communications Coordinator, AAUP
Supported by a grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, MIT Press has recently published six titles exploring the effects and interrelationships of emerging digital technologies on youth and learning. The books, available as free chapter-by-chapter downloads at MIT’s web site and also as cloth and paper editions, offer a substantial new body of scholarship in the field of digital media and learning, and will be followed by a new quarterly journal in winter 2009.
The books, collectively known as the MacArthur Foundation Series on Digital Media and Learning, view the effects of digital technology on youth identity, social interaction, and formal and informal education, among other topics. In titles such as Digital Youth, Innovation, and the Unexpected, edited by Tara McPherson, authors often treat technology as context rather than subject to more effectively examine how digital tools are being used by the youth who take such things for granted, and discover what opportunities may exist to enhance learning. In addition to the obvious benefits and perils bestowed by the internet, MIT’s Digital Media and Learning books also look at the roles of video games, social networking, amateur audio and video production, and mobile phones in establishing problem-solving skills, media literacy, and activism among the youth population. “This engages all of us as publishers,” said Ellen W. Faran, director of the MIT Press, “because today’s young people are tomorrow’s authors and readers. If their immersion in digital media makes them see and learn differently, we need to adapt.”
Though these are not the first scholarly books on digital culture and its effect on young people, the simultaneous publication of six titles represents a significant addition to the body of research available. Because of the significant interest in the field and the rapid pace at which the technological context evolves, MIT will follow up the Digital Media and Learning Series with the quarterly International Journal of Learning and Media (IJLM), which is also supported by the MacArthur Foundation and produced in partnership with the Monterey Institute for Technology in Education. “This new area is an emerging field of inquiry, highly interdisciplinary and also cross-sector in nature, involving practitioners and innovators as well as academics,” Faran said. “The faster exchanges and collaborative opportunities of the journal environment—including an online community—will support making these connections.” In keeping with its subject matter, the peer-reviewed IJLM will make use of web publishing’s multimedia capabilities to offer video content and an interactive community.
Each of the six titles— Civic Life Online; Digital Media, Youth, and Credibility; Digital Youth, Innovation, and the Unexpected; The Ecology of Games; Learning Race and Ethnicity; and Youth, Identity, and Digital Media—can be downloaded for free as single-chapter PDFs at mitpress.mit.edu. It is also possible to purchase print editions of these books, which MIT offers for $32 in hardcover or $16 paperback. As with any publishing project that offers free, open access to its content online side by side with that same content for sale in a physical book, the effects on customer purchase behavior can be difficult to quantify. But in a series focusing on the digital world—so much so, in fact, that free open access was a condition of the MacArthur digital learning grant—it is only appropriate that the value of publishing research online takes center stage. Further, adopting a perspective supported by the findings of the National Academies Press’s research on digital publishing, MIT views the two formats as complimentary rather than competing. “Readers and users seem to appreciate both for different purposes at different times,” Faran observed. “So far our sales of the paperback editions of the Series books are modest, which seems to bear this out.”
The MIT series represents a part of a larger initiative on the part of the MacArthur Foundation, a project studying the implications of digital culture and learning on the education system, policy decisions, and young people themselves. Information on grants and access to ongoing research are available at http://digitallearning.macfound.org/.
Posted by: site admin @ 9:11 am
By Brenna McLaughlin
Electronic & Strategic Initiatives Director, AAUP
The first O’Reilly Tools of Change (TOC) Conference, held in June 2007, generated a huge buzz in the book publishing industry. Focused on the emergence of new publishing models from innovative technologies, the TOC conference brought together the visionaries of tech and of publishing. Manolis Kelaidis’s (Royal College of Art) demonstration of his synthesis of analog and digital—a paper book printed with conductive ink and bound with circuitry to allow for hyperlinked text—was certainly the high-water mark of excitement and energy.
In February 2008, O’Reilly hosted a second TOC Conference, one that generated far less buzz. One thing that became clear is that the publishing industry is moving on from visionary statements to the decidedly less sexy and more productive work of integrating new technologies and models into the cycle of scholarly communications. To some degree, not all the panels had yet caught up to this spirit of how-to (rather than what-if, how-cool, and try-me!), although there was interesting information to be gleaned from every panel.
Presentation slides from many sessions can be downloaded via the TOC web site (http://en.oreilly.com/toc2008/public/schedule/proceedings). Panels included an overview of the DRM mistakes of the music industry and discussion of how the publishing world might avoid the same; several looks at new digital marketing and distribution strategies, such as widgets and content designed for mobile devices; and examinations of how blogs and books are being integrated across authoring, reviewing, and marketing spheres.
One interesting tension was between the continued pressure to deliver free digital content (Tim O’Reilly’s keynote, “Free is More Complicated Than You Think”), and the suggested strategy of producing high-value, high-priced digital content (Scott Gray, O’Reilly School of Technology, “Adding Enough Value to Digital Content to Actually Make Money”). Obviously, the balance that can and will be struck between these two poles of digital content delivery will be different for various publishing sectors and content groups—it will be no news flash to AAUP members that infotainment and scholarly communications will always have different drivers. It is clear that how to best serve the authors and readers in each sector is still the most pressing challenge for publishers, one that will not be solved by the emergence of any one single technology or model.
Related upcoming conferences include the STM Book 2.02 Seminar (“Now it Gets Real: Making, Selling, Distributing, Discovering and Using E-Books”) and, for the eyes-on-the-horizon vision to the hands-on-the-day-to-day ideas, the AAUP Annual Meeting (“Preserving the Future”).
BISG and the Green Press Initiative Release Environmental Benchmarking Survey
By Brenna McLaughlin, Electronic and Strategic Initiatives Director, AAUP
In 2007, the Book Industry Study Group (BISG) set as one of its research goals the measurement of the U. S. book industry’s environmental impact. Partnering with the Green Press Initiative (GPI) and hiring the Borealis Centre for Environmental and Trade Research, BISG pursued this goal through the development, collection, and analysis of an Environmental Benchmarking Survey. On March 10, 2008, the final report was released, indicating the current carbon footprint of book publishing in the United States, as well as tracking efforts by many publishers and vendors to reduce the climate impact of our work.
The number? The U.S. book industry emits 12.4 million metric tons of carbon per year, or a net 8.85 pounds per book. Steps the industry is beginning to take to reduce this load include increasing the use of recycled or environmentally sustainable papers, reducing overproduction, and reducing office and plant energy use.
The Survey subcommittee and Borealis Centre had two main hurdles to cross in producing this survey and report. The first was simply to understand the extent of publishing activities that needed to be measured. Impacts of forest harvest and paper production were obvious, but then came the related question of how much the stored carbon in printed books offset this. The final calculation of the carbon footprint had to account for every step, from the obvious energy consumption of printing and binding to the less obvious amount of travel and transport involved in the industry, including the shipment of books from manufacturing to warehouse to store to customer, as well as staff business travel.
The second hurdle was obtaining the data from a wide array of industry players. Publishers, paper mills, printers, distributors, and retailers were all targeted, and a total of 104 firms participated in the survey. The survey report notes that a possible limitation was self-selection bias—that is, companies with environmental policies in place might have been more likely to respond to an attempt to benchmark the industry’s environmental impact. However, a significant share of key segments responded, including 45% publishing market share and 24.6% of printing market share.
AAUP members were invited to take part in the survey, and many did so. Several university and scholarly publishers, represented in the AAUP by the members of the Eco-subcommittee of the Design and Production Committee (once the Eco Task Force), have been at the forefront of environmentally sustainable publishing. Eighteen AAUP members are signatories to GPI’s Treatise on Responsible Paper Use.
The full BISG/GPI report, “Environmental Trends and Climate Impact: Findings from the U.S. Book Industry,” is available for sale at the BISG web site. Another useful tool for publishers who wish to pursue environmentally responsible practices has recently been released: In February 2008, the Association of American Publishers (AAP) issued a “Handbook on Paper and the Environment,” a practical guide to issues of sustainability. Sessions on “The Green Challenge” are planned to address these issues at the AAUP annual meeting in Montreal this June.
Posted by: site admin @ 9:10 am
By Linda McCall
Administrative Manager, AAUP
The 123rd Modern Language Association Annual Convention, which is the largest gathering of teachers and scholars in the humanities, took place December 27-30, 2007, in Chicago. Most of the 8,888 registered attendees at MLA 2007 visited the Exhibits Hall in the Hyatt Regency Chicago where the AAUP Presses Section was bustling with college-level educators and others eager to review the latest language and literature publications. Thirty-five member presses exhibited independently in spaces ranging from one-half of a booth to three continuous booths.
In addition to the 35 independent exhibitors, 22 member presses participated in the AAUP Cooperative Booth, where approximately 175 books and journals were on display. Best selling books included Other South: Faulkner, Coloniality, and the Mariategui Tradition (University of Pittsburgh Press), Routes and Roots: Navigating Caribbean and Pacific Island Literatures (University of Hawaii Press), and Reframing Latin America (University of Texas Press). Several authors with books on display in the cooperative exhibit stopped by, including Wenying Xu, author of Eating Identities: Reading Food in Asian American Literature (University of Hawaii Press), and John T. Shawcross, co-editor of Paradise Lost: A Poem Written in Ten Books: An Authoritative Text of the 1667 First Edition and Paradise Lost: A Poem Written in Ten Books: Essays on the 1667 First Edition (Duquesne University Press).
In order to give recognition to each participating press in the AAUP cooperative exhibit, all of the books and journals were grouped together by press. A special display was setup on behalf of Temple University Press, which was a participant in the cooperative exhibit as well as being one of the collaborators in The American Literatures Initiative (see Mellon article) with New York University Press, Fordham University Press, Rutgers University Press, and University of Virginia Press. Visitors to the AAUP cooperative exhibit who were interested in learning more about this collaboration were referred to the booths of the other four collaborating presses, which were exhibiting independently.
The MLA 2008 Convention and Exhibit is scheduled for December 27-30 in San Francisco. For more information on the 2008 Convention, visit the MLA web site.
Posted by: site admin @ 9:08 am
By Shaun Manning
Communications Coordinator, AAUP
The National Humanities Alliance (NHA) held its annual Humanities Advocacy Day program March 3 and 4, offering roundtable discussions and advocacy training on Monday before sending volunteer lobbyists to Capitol Hill. Meeting with congressional staff on Tuesday, the goal was to encourage senators and house representatives to support funding appropriations for the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC).
For people like me who are new to lobbying, the idea of approaching Congress for millions of dollars can seem daunting. NHA seeks to prepare its lobbyists with group discussions on issues important to the scholarly community, such as “Humanities and the Civic World,” “Digital Media,” and “Research and Scholarship,” generating additional talking points by highlighting common concerns among a variety of organizations. An afternoon policy brief addressed the specific legislative priorities we would be addressing Tuesday—a $177 million appropriation for NEH and $12 million for NHPRC. In the FY2009 budget that President Bush submitted to Congress, NEH is slated to receive $144.4 million, and NHPRC is zeroed out for the fourth year in a row. While the proposed NEH appropriation is slightly up from last year’s, in real terms it represents a cut because of higher mandated administration expenses.
The training itself, presented by Jessica Jones Irons, Executive Director of NHA, and Ember Farber, Legislative and Advocacy Assistant with the American Association of Museums, focused largely on the importance of lobbying, the significance of timing Humanities Advocacy day early in a busy season, and what to expect during a meeting with congressional staff. There was also some discussion as to what not to do, such as making vote-related or other threats and distributing staffers’ direct-dial numbers obtained from business cards. The session was useful in promoting a feeling of “ready-as-I’ll-ever-be”—which is very necessary in calming nerves—but to me there remained a sense of wondering whether this would all go to plan.
Fortunately, I found myself in a group with people who had done this before. Our team, representing New York-based organizations, was led by Steven Wheatley, Vice President of the American Council of Learned Societies, and Rosemary Feal, Executive Director of the Modern Language Association, with myself and University of Cologne researcher Eva Bosbach contributing to the discussions. Once the very short meetings—averaging about seven minutes—had begun, the conversations were very relaxed, on-point but not overly formal or intimidating.
Mr. Wheatley and Ms. Feal set out the importance of funding the NEH at a level higher than the president’s budget requested, indicating programs that would need to be cut if the Endowment were to only receive $144.4 million and showing the congressional staffers an alarming chart representing the sharp cuts to NEH since 1994. For my part, I mentioned projects by AAUP member presses, such as the Founding Fathers papers and other documentary editions, that are funded by NHPRC and that would thus be endangered if the program were to be eliminated.
It was, of course, also fortunate that the senators and representatives whose staff we met were all sympathetic to the humanities. Representatives Carolyn Maloney (D-14), Maurice Hinchey (R-22), and Jerrold Nadler (D-8) are all members of the Congressional Humanities Caucus, and Rep. Hinchey is also a member of the House Appropriations Committee. Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Charles Schumer have been similarly supportive, each signing a “Dear Colleague” letter in 2006 requesting additional funds for NEH.
Most of the staff we spoke with nevertheless expressed doubts about significant success for this year’s appropriations cycle, noting President Bush’s past resistance to raising funding above the levels set forth in his budget. Still, congressional support has been instrumental in keeping the NHPRC alive, as the historical publications program has received $5.5-7.5 million per year in FY06-08, years in which the president has sought to eliminate the program entirely. FY04 was the last year the NHPRC was fully funded at its authorized level of $10 million.
Whatever the level of appropriations the NEH and NHPRC ultimately receive, the lobbying efforts of universities, scholarly societies, and other cultural institutions coordinated by the National Humanities Alliance sends a clear and concerted message about the value of these programs. For congressional staff who may not be familiar with our goals, or for members of congress who do not intrinsically share our priorities, the opportunity for discussion on Humanities Advocacy Day gives us the chance to inform and, hopefully, to influence.
Online resources for humanities advocacy are available at http://www.humanitiesadvocacy.org/
More information on Humanities Advocacy Day, including photos from the 2008 event, can be found at http://www.nhalliance.org/
Posted by: site admin @ 9:07 am
By Shaun Manning
Communications Coordinator, AAUP
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded grants in support of four proposed collaborative projects in the underserved scholarly fields of Slavic Studies, American Literatures, South Asian Studies, and Ethnomusicology. The grants, which follow on the earlier announcements of funding for University of North Carolina Press and UNC Chapel Hill’s “Publishing the Long Civil Rights Movement” and University of Minnesota Press and the Institute for Advanced Study at UMN’s “Quadrant” program, represent the Mellon Foundation’s increasing efforts toward supporting collaborations to facilitate wider dissemination of scholarly research.
The AAUP member presses working together on the Slavic Studies project are University of Wisconsin Press, Northwestern University Press, and the University of Pittsburgh Press. The Mellon initiative will allow the three presses to publish and promote first monographs in Russian, East European, and Central Asian Studies by junior scholars, helping those scholars in developing their careers by supporting their development as authors and arranging for book tours. The project web site can be found at www.mellonslavicstudies.org.
New York University Press leads the American Studies Initiative collaboration with Fordham University Press, Rutgers University Press, Temple University Press, and the University of Virginia Press to publish emerging scholars’ first books in the English-language literatures of Central and North America and the Caribbean. For this project, a shared, centralized, external editorial service will be created to handle all editorial and production aspects of books published by the initiative. The American Literatures Initiative web site is www.americanliteratures.org.
“South Asian Studies across the Disciplines” will focus on giving scholars increased access to archival materials, exploring new methods and theories, and foster cross-discipline scholarship that is both broad and deep. The initiative, led by Columbia University Press in collaboration with University of California Press and University of Chicago Press, will build upon the strength of each university’s faculty, appointing Dipesh Chakrabarty (Chicago, history), Sheldon Pollock (Columbia, literature), and Sanjay Subrahmanyam (UCLA, history) as series editors. The aim is to publish six monographs per year, with each press responsible for two series editions.
Indiana University Press, Kent State University Press, and Temple University Press form the ethnomusicology collaboration, and the Mellon Foundation has awarded them a one-year planning grant to establish the best methods for publishing related scholarship online. The planning phase will also explore potential partnerships with information technology vendors to aid in presenting and distributing this scholarship.
In a related effort, the Mellon Foundation is also funding programs that seek to further advance the efforts of humanities scholars by tightening the relationships between universities and their presses. University of North Carolina Press has joined with UNC Chapel Hill for the print and digital publication project, “Publishing the Long Civil Rights Movement,” for which the team has been awarded a three-year Mellon grant.
University of Minnesota Press and the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Minnesota will also receive funding for their interdisciplinary research and publication project, “Quadrant,” which will create research residencies for scholars and endeavor to publish the fruits of such research. Quadrant will itself be composed of four collaborative groups, Design and Architecture, Environmental Sustainability, Global Cultures, and Health and Society.
Together these Mellon grants are helping university presses discover new and innovative ways to promote and disseminate scholarship, by creating an environment in which a greater variety of projects can see the light of day. By pooling resources, it is hoped that presses will be able to accept monographs by emerging scholars that would not have been viable before, and in turn the universities will benefit by these scholars’ increased profiles in the academic community.
Posted by: site admin @ 9:06 am
By Shaun Manning
Communications Coordinator, AAUP
Now entering its second year, the Caravan Project (http://www.caravanbooks.org/) has refined its methods and goals to help scholarly publishers deliver books in non-standard formats. Developed by Peter Osnos as a way to navigate the emerging digital culture, Caravan has made 62 titles from eleven presses available as downloadable ebooks and audio books, and also created large-print editions through print-on-demand. Recently, Caravan was awarded a $25,000 grant by the National Association of College Stores (NACS), which will allow for increased exposure in university bookstores.
Osnos describes Caravan as a “system of research and development” aimed at increasing serious non-fiction publishers’ options for producing and distributing content. AAUP members participating in the Caravan Project include Beacon Press, University of California Press, University of North Carolina Press, Yale University Press, and more. “Caravan is an effort to enable publishers to do books in all the ways that technology now permits and to support distribution of those books through all the available channels.” The goals, Osnos said, are twofold: “We want to help publishers to know how to do electronic books, and distributors to know how to sell them.” He acknowledged that while many university presses operate their own digital initiatives, Caravan provides the option of offering multiple electronic formats, including PDF, Microsoft Reader, and audio files that can play on any portable music player. Though the POD aspect of Caravan may seem out of place—a physical product in an otherwise digital operation—the experiment is paying off. Recently, one vendor ordered three hundred copies of a large print book through Caravan’s print-on-demand service, an order that might not have been possible to fill through traditional publishing systems.
With Caravan established as a service for university presses and other scholarly publishers, it is perhaps not surprising that it was awarded a grant from the National Association of College Stores (NAS) to promote its products in the academic environment. The groundwork for the grant was set when Osnos gave a presentation on Caravan at an NACS convention, and the association saw the potential benefits of this publishing program for its members. The NACS grant will allow college stores to sell Caravan’s digital products, thereby giving the stores a model on which to base other sales of digital content in the future.
The distribution piece of the Caravan Project has already undergone notable changes since its inception, based on early results. Caravan has moved toward a more comprehensive system of digital distribution by taking advantage of recently-launched initiatives from Ingram’s Digital Ventures, booksense.com, and Overdrive’s Content Reserves, which offers e-books and audio books to libraries and can be adapted for use at retail stores. “The most effective way we can sell these books, once we’ve created them, is through the growing universe of digital delivery systems,” Osnos said. In addition to taking advantage of these larger-scale distribution systems for booksellers, a partnership with Emusic.com, one of the largest vendors of digital music, will soon make Caravan titles available for download at the site’s recently-launched audio books section.
As patterns of user preference emerged, there were also some changes in the available formats. Caravan had been offering its audio books on CDs in addition to the downloadable mp3s. But Osnos said that audio books on CD were less popular than digital files. “What we’ve found is, for people who do want the CD, we can distribute an audio book as a download and allow the listener to create one CD, and that way you don’t have to ship a CD.” The digital rights management (DRM) code of the audio book digital files allows customers to produce a single disc for personal use.
According to Osnos, the possibilities created by Caravan represent a substantial shift in publishing, as new technologies will allow publishers to operate on a more “made to order” system. If books are printed on demand, or serially available in digital formats, the problem of excess inventory will be greatly reduced. The flexibility of digital media also allows Caravan to make participating publishers’ books available by chapter or section, an option that will prove useful to students and researchers. Though some of this may have been possible in the recent past, only in the last few years has research been available that has indicated the most effective methods of producing and distributing digital content. In addition, consumer interest in e-books is currently in an upward swing with the advent of Amazon’s Kindle and Sony’s E-Reader devices, and the popularity of audio books has soared with the ubiquitous use of mp3 players such as the Apple’s ipod. “In time digital books will become increasingly significant sources of revenue, as the public become more familiar with digital formats,” Osnos said.
Because Caravan is not itself a publisher or vendor, it does not set or suggest prices for the digital and POD books created through the initiative. But Osnos hopes that as publishers gain greater familiarity with these formats this will lead to audio and e-books bearing prices that are competitive with the standard editions. Currently, he noted, audio books can be fifty percent more expensive than a new release hardcover.
The Caravan Project is set to conclude in mid-2009, at which time the findings of the program’s research will be published in a final report, possibly as a multi-platform book. But the life of Caravan will continue in the implementation of its research into digital publishing and distribution systems. “By all means, we hope and expect publishers to use what we’ve all learned in their own multi-platform programs,” Osnos said.
Athabasca University Press and Abilene Christian University Press are the first presses to join AAUP under the Introductory Member category. Athabasca is an open access scholarly press focusing on Canada, the North American West, and the Circumpolar North. Abilene publishes scholarship on Christian themes and history, with a particular focus on the Churches of Christ perspective.
Introductory Members are not-for-profit scholarly publishers that intend to apply for AAUP membership in one of the other membership categories, but don’t yet meet publication or staffing requirements. Introductory Member presses may participate in most programs, but may not serve on boards and committees, list titles with Books for Understanding, or engage in certain other AAUP business. Presses may not stay in the introductory membership category for more than three years. For more information or for an application, please contact Susan Patton (spatton@aaupnet.org).
Posted by: site admin @ 9:04 am
Information on registration, programming, grants, and pre-meeting workshops are now available at the Annual Meeting website: http://aaupnet.org/programs/annualmeeting/
Several grants are available to offset costs of attending the Annual Meeting. Questia is sponsoring a grant for individuals from small to mid-size presses, and the Whiting Annual Newcomer Grant will be offered to eight individuals from member presses that have not previously attended the meeting. The Whiting Diversity Grant is available to minority staff with at least one year of experience at a member press, and the Richard Eckersley Memorial Grant will be awarded to one emerging university press designer. All grants carry a deadline of April 10. Information and applications are available on the website: http://aaupnet.org/programs/annualmeeting/2008/grants.html
The Senate Judiciary Committee held hearings February 7 on the progress made on various Founding Fathers documentary edition projects. The late-2007 omnibus appropriations act had directed that the US Archivist address concerns about the speed of completion of the documentary editing projects that receive federal funding, as well as digital access to the papers. Witnesses included Stan Katz and David McCullough. Read more from the National Coalition for History.
Several AAUP member presses are involved in the ongoing effort to publish the written records of the Founding Fathers and other important Americans, preserving these important historical records and providing scholars, students, and the general public with access to the thoughts, deliberations, and correspondence of George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and others.
Posted by: site admin @ 9:03 am
In light of Kosovo’s recent declaration of independence and the ongoing controversies surrounding its separation from Serbia, Books for Understanding has added a list of titles from member presses covering the countries of the former Yugoslavia: http://aaupnet.org/news/bfu/yugoslavia/list.html
Books for Understanding is a free, easy-to-use resource to help readers find books on current events. New bibliographies are compiled when a major news story breaks or public debate heats up.
The program highlights one of the highest values of university presses: to publish top research and scholarship in all fields regardless of immediate commercial potential. Often the most complete and illuminating background research and knowledge for a breaking news story is only available in scholarly books from presses committed to the public interest.
For the full range of Books for Understanding titles, please visit: http://www.booksforunderstanding.org
Posted by: site admin @ 9:02 am
The Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) at Harvard has adopted a policy under which each FAS member grants Harvard “permission to make available his or her scholarly articles and to exercise the copyright in those articles.” Harvard would exercise this grant of permission by depositing the articles in an open access repository, and would license use of articles in the repository to other
entities, including commercial ones, for use in, for example, coursepacks. Articles in the repository could be sold, by Harvard or its licensees, provided that they were not sold “for a profit.” Harvard would also apparently have the right to prepare or license the preparation of derivative works.
Under the policy we understand that Harvard FAS members who receive publishing contracts for articles they have written are now required to submit to the publisher an addendum for signature. The first provision in the addendum (which we received from a commercial journals publisher, who had in turn received it from a Harvard author whose article they wished to publish) says:
All of the terms and conditions of the Publication Agreement, including but not limited to all grants, agreements, representations and warranties, are subject to and qualified by a non-exclusive license previously granted by Author to Harvard University. Under that license, Harvard may make the Article available and may exercise all rights under copyright relating to the Article, and may authorize others to do the same, provided that the Article is not sold for a profit.
Books are excluded from the policy, as are articles written before the adoption of the policy, or for which the faculty member entered into a publishing agreement before the policy was adopted. Faculty members may also request that the policy be waived for particular articles.
Posted by: site admin @ 9:01 am
Judging of the 2008 Book, Jacket, and Journal Show was held on January 17-18 at the AAUP Office in New York City. Jurors selected a total of 44 books, 2 journals, and 31 jackets and covers.
The 2008 Book, Jacket, and Journal Show will premiere at the AAUP Annual Meeting in Montréal, June 26-29, 2008. The show will then travel around the country from September 2008 to May 2009.
Since 1965, the AAUP Book, Jacket, and Journal Show has fulfilled its mission to “honor and instruct”: honoring the design and production teams whose work furthers a long tradition of excellence in book design, and, through a traveling exhibit and acclaimed annual catalog of selected entries, visually teaching the tenets of good design. 
For the complete list and show details, go to: http://aaupnet.org/programs/marketing/designshow/winners2008.html
CONTENTS
How Going to the AAUP Meeting Paid Off
University of Pittsburgh Press Offers Open Access to Select Digital Backlist
Developing Professionals: The Iowa Press-English Honors Internship
Hot Demand for Cool Digital Content: Results from the National Academies Press Online Pricing Study
2007 Whiting Week-in-Residence Program
The Charleston Conference 2007
International Exchange: Guadalajara 2007
Miscellany:
Presidential Records Access
FOIA Legislation
NIH Open Access Policy Now Law
“Books for Understanding” Voting and Elections list updated
New “Books of Note” Features
News of the Caravan Project
AAUP Central Office Staff news
Calendar: see Calendar on AAUPnet.org
Posted by: site admin @ 3:50 pm
By Ann Wendland
Marketing and Sales Manager, University Press of Colorado
Why I chose not to go to AAUP 2007 (and got to go anyway)
Chances are, if you’re in sales and marketing, no-one from your department went to the AAUP meeting in 2007—less than half of the presses represented sent sales and marketing staff. Perhaps you felt that you just couldn’t allocate the time and money. That’s why I chose not to go.
Like yours, my schedule is maxed. A department of one, I’m responsible for every aspect of sales and marketing for the University Press of Colorado. A hundred good causes vie for every minute, and, worse, they tear apart every dollar. AAUP 2007 appeared in my draft budgets, but in the end I felt that I had to reallocate the money.
Questia, which awards three full-ride fellowships to the meeting for employees of small to midsize presses, gave me a grant, so I went after all.
To my surprise, I found that attendance would have paid for itself in directly related net sales within a month. The meeting also helped me free up time and will have long-term sales benefits. Colleagues offered information that contextualized my decisions and lent experience that helped me shape efforts in quickly changing parts of the field and areas in which I’m less knowledgeable.
Free time
Just before the meeting, I’d made a time-dictated change to advertising and exhibit planning that I wasn’t certain would benefit sales. I had been planning ads and exhibits on a book-by-book basis that required extensive research and laborious scheduling. This year, I dedicated 90% of ad and exhibit budgets to recurring venues—journals in which we would advertise regularly and exhibits in our niche subjects. Long-term agreements with ad reps, recurring deadlines, and templates for journal and program ads saved a lot of time, but I felt concerned about narrowing our focus.
]At AAUP 2007, speakers emphasized that in the current climate for university presses, publishing in niches and regularly touching base with target audiences in those niches is the best route to strong sales. The venues I’d chosen for ads and exhibits matched the lists that the director would highlight in the next strategic plan, so I set my concerns aside. Had I not attended, I might have continued to doubt my choice. Now, I can spin it as a shrewd marketing decision to brand the press through repetitive exposure and visual consistency. Really!
Other panelists also freed up time. I cheered (internally) when publicity panelists mentioned that we should just tuck materials into books because press kits get tossed. When colleagues shared their runs of review copies and galleys, which I’d assumed were higher than mine, it turned out that I could stand to trim. Time and money saved.
Free money
Ideas and information from AAUP 2007 gave a quick boost to our sales through bookstores and online vendors, helped me market the press back to member institutions (Colorado is a consortial press), and gave me key information that will support long-term projects.
The quickest boost came from conversations emphasizing the importance of promoting backlist. On returning home, I reviewed our sales with Barnes & Noble, alerting buyers to perennial sellers that B&N had dropped or sold an abnormally low percentage of. They immediately bought hundreds of books for a net sales boost of several thousand dollars. (It’s not much, but it would cover a conference and it took one day.) I worked with sales representatives to develop a backlist promotion offer for independent booksellers.
Several sessions reinforced the value of robust book pages online, especially at Amazon.com. At home, I confirmed that Amazon.com sales have grown since we improved our pages recently. I stepped up efforts, incorporating uploads of reviews and blurbs into regular routines and initiating participation in Amazon’s “Search Inside the Book.” I gave Dial-a-Book the OK to post excerpts on prominent sales sites and ensured that our books turn up in Google BookSearch. These projects might have languished if AAUP 2007 sessions hadn’t reinforced their importance.
For an easy basket, I adopted a speaker’s suggestion to include names of supporting institutions in ads, promoting our member universities to thousands of people. Board members can use that information when they advocate for increased subsidies. Time required: three minutes.
Two long-term priorities for the press—increasing foreign sales and gaining course adoptions through direct mail—require me to build certain knowledge and skills. Related sessions offered the expertise of some of the most successful presses in each area, allowing me to take advantage of what they’d learned over years.
Profitable Conversations
Sales results of serendipitous conversations at AAUP 2007 would be hard to quantify, except to say that the meeting crowds were studded with the very wholesalers and review editors that we allocate significant time and money to meet.
Writers from six book reviews attended. I enjoyed broader conversations with a couple of them than typically occur in publicity meetings. The sessions helped me make more of their reviews, too. Now, I’m quickly posting them online and using them in e-marketing. As suggested by Blackwell’s AAUP delegate, I emailed new Choice and Library Journal reviews to Blackwell and received an immediate response.
A spirit of collaboration drove the meeting: people shared detailed, useful information both in and out of sessions. At every turn, I found a happy chance to meet or reconnect with colleagues from other presses, wholesaler honchos, industry associates, AAUP staff, sales representatives, and consultants with coveted expertise.
In the hotel bar, consultant and former Oxford University Press U.S.A. director Laura Brown sat beside me and we chatted about library sales (a conversation with the co-author of the Ithaka Report on university presses and libraries that I certainly couldn’t have budgeted). Here’s my favorite of her suggestions: take a librarian out to lunch. She had lamented how few publishers talk one-on-one with librarians. The head acquisitions librarians of our public and university libraries were delighted to meet with me and each offered valuable information about recent and upcoming changes in buying methods.
See you next year?
Quick corrections and opportunities that came up at AAUP 2007 saved our press enough and earned enough to pay for the meeting. Long-term benefits of streamlined work and increases in sales will come from key information that people shared in sessions and casual conversations. If, like me, you chose not to go to the 2007 meeting (and if no-one handed you a free pass that made it impossible to resist), I hope I’ll see you in Montréal this June.
Up-to-date information on the 2008 AAUP Meeting can be found at http://aaupnet.org/programs/annualmeeting/
Posted by: site admin @ 3:44 pm
By Shaun Manning
Communications Coordinator, AAUP
Though debate over digital publishing and open access is still far from resolved, university presses are beginning to take bold steps in the hope of innovation. Perhaps out of necessity, and certainly driven by mission statements promoting the dissemination of scholarly research, academic publishers have taken the lead in exploring the implications of open access and the real and perceived differences between web-based and print publications.
Recently, the University of Pittsburgh Press has announced that it is working to make selected backlist titles available online, free of charge, through Pitt’s University Library System (ULS). The first of the Pitt Press collections to be made available online is the Latin American Series, with thirty-nine titles already presented for open access. Readers of the digital editions can click on any chapter or article from the table of contents, and then browse through the entire book. It is also possible to download individual pages as PDF documents, perform a full-text search of the book, and skip to any page using a drop-down menu.
A product of shared objectives between University of Pittsburgh’s press and libraries, this collaboration follows a trend of increasing cooperation between such custodians of research. “This pilot project emerged from a series of discussions which addressed areas of common concern regarding emerging technologies, the dissemination of scholarship, trends in both the sales and usage patterns of various forms of media, and the appropriate roles of both the library and the Press in the scholarly communication system,” said Peter Kracht, Editorial Director and Director of Electronic Publishing at University of Pittsburgh Press.
The partnership benefits the libraries by offering additional content for their electronic catalog, while providing the press with an opportunity to enter the digital arena with a more robust presence than it could otherwise achieve. ULS will be responsible for all costs associated with the program, and will also employ its technology assets and infrastructure toward digitizing the press’s backlist. “As a smaller university press, frankly Pittsburgh lacked the independent capacity to launch a major digital publishing initiative on our own. The Pitt library, which has long held substantial collections of public-domain materials in a number of subject areas, had already invested in the equipment and staff to provide a scanning as well as digital storage and search capabilities to access this material,” Kracht said. “It was not hard for both sides to see the advantages of cooperating on a initiative such as this.”
D-Scribe, ULS’s digital archive, already has a formidable database of open-access digital content. Drawing on resources from the University of Pittsburgh Library system, the university’s digital thesis program, and other cultural institutions, D-Scribe’s archive includes more than sixty collections of photography, archival documents, theses and dissertations, and electronic journals. But with the addition of the press’s Digital Editions, the University Library System may eventually acquire up to five hundred titles.
As with other digital publishing ventures that make commercially available material accessible for free online, University of Pittsburgh Press will be tracking the effects of the D-Scribe project on sales of printed books during this experimental phase. But this will only be one factor in determining how the initiative progresses. According to Kracht, the launch of UPP’s Digital Editions has been coordinated so as to highlight factors beyond sales and revenue, by selecting titles and a list that would be less vulnerable to cannibalization and to which the press has undisputed claims to the electronic rights. “
Inherent in this process is an exploration of the changing role of university presses and evaluating the options available to presses in a digital environment. “It may be that the lessons we learn suggest the need for some rethinking about the best ways to underwrite the dissemination of scholarship than the traditional consumer-pays-for-print-edition system,” Kracht said. He suggested that what may eventually emerge is a system by which print and digital media complement each other across markets, and this assertion has been supported by research into electronic publishing carried out by other member presses. Certainly, the benefits of having digital editions exist side by side with print publications would include increased access to scholarly research and the option of a format of presentation that is convenient for different users.
Like other university presses that have entered into digital publishing endeavors, the University of Pittsburgh Press has needed to make a series of decision as to format and access. Its publishing model is similar to University of Michigan’s digitalculturebooks site, in which the university’s press and library joined to create online versions of new media publications. (See “dcbooks Tests the Digital Waters,” The Exchange, Winter/Spring 2007). But unlike another project, put forth by the National Academies Press, Pittsburgh does not allow users to download the entire book or individual chapters as PDF documents. NAP charges a fee for this format and offers full-text browsing on the site for free, while Pitt maintains only the free browsing model.
Though the landscape of digital publishing is always shifting and the research of various organizations is constantly adjusting publisher strategies, Kracht sees online content as a necessary component of Pitt’s mission-based publishing program. “The combination of digital format with open access allows us to provide a genuine service to the international scholarly community by making this material readily available in the region and beyond.”
The University of Pittsburgh Press Digital Editions can be found at: http://digital.library.pitt.edu/p/pittpress/
The ULS Digital Library homepage is http://www.library.pitt.edu/
Posted by: site admin @ 3:40 pm
By Michael McCutcheon
The University of Iowa Press had considered developing an internship program for several years—thinking of what the Press wanted and could offer, planning the logistics of recruitment, and researching other internship programs on and off campus. Yet it wasn’t until the spring semester of 2005 that the idea took root.
Having been invited to give a talk about a career in publishing to the undergraduate students enrolled in the university’s English Honors Program, Holly Carver, the Press Director, met her counterpart, Mary Anne Rasmussen, the Director of the undergraduate English program. The two quickly found themselves on the same page regarding a formal internship program. “It’s the sort of thing everybody loves,” said Carver. In part, it provides the kind of hands-on experience for undergrads that leads to jobs, while pushing the university to further recognize the advantages of having a press.
The relationship between the press and the English Honors Program imparts prestige to the internship and ensures that the Press receives high-aptitude students. “Publishing has become more and more professionalized, it’s become much more of a career,” said Joe Parsons, Acquisitions Editor, University of Iowa Press. “We are reflecting that professionalization.”
Several of the students who attended Carver’s talk would later become some of the first interns in the program. “The point of the talk was to introduce English students to what they could do,” remembered Sarah Remington (‘06). “Holly spoke, and her words, I’ll never forget them, ‘Publishing is an excellent place for high performing introverts.’ That struck a chord…. The first feeling, in a long time, that there was a place for me in the professional world.”
Applying to become an intern at the Iowa Press is the same as applying for any other job. Prospective interns fill out a general application, and a few are then chosen for in-person interviews. The last hurdle is a difficult copyediting test. Once chosen, interns are asked to work 10-15 hours per week on top of their regular course-load. Students register for the internship each semester with the university’s registrar. Although they don’t receive course credit for the experience, the registration ensures that the experience shows up on their transcript, providing the student with an incentive to work for free. “I knew publishing was a competitive field—all those English majors that don’t go to grad school,” said Laura Avey (’06). “I wanted the experience before I tried to get the job.”
In Iowa’s program, intern tasks are standardized in the form of a checklist. The intern meets with the director and editors twice a year to go over the duties they’ve been given. These can include evaluating manuscripts, finding readers for a manuscript, filling out Library of Congress forms, writing rejection letters, and fact-checking, among other tasks. The program culminates in a final project that often tests the intern’s abilities—a book launch. “I hand off the project to each of the students,” says Parsons, “and they launch the book, running the agenda at the launch meeting. Some find that task very intimidating. They come into the meeting and get unanticipated questions.” But it is their chance to stand at the “head of a conference table and present the material to colleagues.”
Bringing along interns at this speed does require significant time from the staff. Asked what her duties are when it comes to the interns, Charlotte Wright, Managing Editor, responds, “I help interview and then choose the interns, work with them to set up their work schedules, introduce them to the primary reference books…teach them the various procedures necessary for the work that comes out of my office, check their completed projects, and make myself available to answer any questions they have about publishing.” The natural follow-up question was, “Is it worth it?” To which Wright’s reply was, “Definitely.”
The interns bring a number of intangibles that go beyond the completion of office tasks. Parsons remarked enthusiastically that, “the interns are enthusiastic, everything is new to them…. It forces us to think again about the jobs we do. It keeps the job fresh for us. In the process, we reconsider the way we do things.” Wright complemented this view with the observation that, “We get to meet the young, motivated individuals who are in all likelihood the future of university press publishing. Often, we are their first contact with the publishing world, so we have an incredible opportunity to influence their philosophy and work ethic.”
For the interns’ part, they enjoy the experience of working at the Press and being involved in the workflow. “I spoke with Joe every day and Charlotte almost every day,” Avey remarked. “Joe would come down to the kitchen and tell me about a manuscript, about his sales pitches to get an author to publish with Iowa…but it wasn’t all work. We would also talk about politics, local events, and sports.” Sarah Remington added that, when the internship was over, “I felt comfortable operating in a work environment. That was something I couldn’t learn from school. Something I could have only learned from [the Press]. Little things, like when to ‘cc’ people…what to say in a meeting, what things are helpful, how to ask colleagues to do something for you.”
So far, the program has been a success. Of the four interns to go through the Iowa program, “one is at Chicago, two are at Michigan, and one hasn’t graduated yet,” remarked Carver, “We’re batting 1.000.” And whether it is setting up informational meetings between interns and potential employers at the AAUP Annual Meeting, or other general lobbying on their behalf, the Iowa Press graduates top interns that find their way back into scholarly publishing.
“At Iowa, Joe, Holly, and Charlotte realized that even though we were ‘just interns,’ we were intelligent people who could handle difficult tasks,” said Avey, who now works at the University of Chicago Press. When asked about any tasks she didn’t like, she responded, “making copies. But alas, that is part of the point of having interns. I have a student now that I have make copies. I’ve learned to delegate.”
Posted by: site admin @ 3:35 pm
By Barbara Kline Pope
Executive Director, National Academies Press
Originally published in the Exchange, Summer 2003. Look for an article about NAP’s follow-up study of their digital publishing model in the Winter 2008 Exchange.
The National Academies Press (NAP) has been a leader in the electronic book publishing industry since launching its web site (www.nap.edu) in 1994. With annual sales revenue from all distribution channels of more than $7 million, NAP is one of the larger mid-size publishers within the university press community. NAP is the publisher for the National Academies: National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Engineering, Institute of Medicine, and National Research Council. The Press’s dual mission is to disseminate the works of the National Academies to the greatest possible extent while fully supporting the cost of its own operation without subsidy from its parent institution.
NAP posts the text of all of its titles on the web in page-by-page image format free for anyone to browse, search, and read. A couple of years ago, it became clear that many within the leadership of the National Academies felt that NAP should begin giving away PDF versions of their books in order to enhance the dissemination mission. The bulk of this group hypothesized that NAP would not suffer financially from this action. However, others worried about the fiscal viability of this new model, postulating that posting free PDFs might erode a significant amount of revenue from print sales. Neither side had any data to support its views.
It was at this juncture that NAP decided that measuring customer behavior toward electronic content was of utmost importance to the future. The Press also felt that a serious study of these issues might help other scholarly publishers more efficiently find their way through the maze of options for presenting books to their readers. So, NAP, in conjunction with the University of Maryland’s Smith School of Business, set forth a successful proposal for a study of potential digital publishing business models to the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The study focused on four research objectives: (1) to compare NAP’s offline and online customers on attitudes and behavior toward electronic content, (2) to measure the effectiveness of free online browsing and its impact on the purchase of printed and electronic formats, (3) to determine the optimal design and pricing of NAP’s e-content (specifically the PDF format), and (4) to study the demand for unbundled e-content (delivering electronic chapters of books). The study used a mix of survey-based descriptive research and experiment-based causal research in order to answer the research questions.
A unique online experiment that allowed NAP to measure actual purchase behavior rather than only gather purchase intentions via surveys formed the core of the research undertaken. During two months of intensive data gathering, customers were given experimental treatments as they interacted with NAP’s web site. For example, if a customer came to the site and placed a printed book in their shopping cart, they were presented with a pop-up box that explained that the particular book in question was available in PDF format. They then had the choice of sticking with their printed book, exchanging it for a PDF, or taking both versions. The prices of PDFs were randomized across the entire 500 books in the experiment from 0%-110% of the printed price. In our example, let’s say that the price of the printed book was $40 and the PDF was randomly assigned a zero price. If the customer jettisoned their printed book for a PDF, it was logged as a $40 loss.
In another segment of the experiment, NAP measured potential market expansion. If a customer was only browsing through the free content and then decided to purchase a PDF, that was logged as additional revenue. After the customers completed the experimental section of their Web experience, they were asked to complete a survey designed to get at why they did or did not purchase a PDF, about their perceptions of quality the of the PDF vs. print, and demographics.
The study illuminated the continued strength of demand for printed books. Even when customers were offered a PDF for free, more than half opted to pay for the printed book instead. On the other hand, slightly less than half took the free PDF rather than purchasing a book—behavior that could mean great losses in print revenue.
Comparing customers who order online with those who purchase books offline, the study revealed, not surprisingly, that NAP’s online customers are much more enthusiastic about e-content than customers who typically order via offline methods. Offline customers generally have poorer perceptions of the quality of e-content and most likely will need more experience with high-quality online content to change their perceptions.
Among online customers, the study showed that there exist specific segments of customers, some with strong preferences for print and some with equally strong predilection for PDF format. Surprisingly, the research showed that there is a segment of customers who are willing to pay a premium for access to downloadable and printable digital content.
In general, however, the NAP results indicate that customers are less willing to pay for e-content than for print—and they believe that PDFs should be cheaper than print. The study also illustrates that, as customers interact with e-content more—in terms of browsing and downloading content, and sampling PDFs—they are more likely to improve their perceptions of PDF and might be more likely to buy e-content.
The findings also indicate that unbundling content (selling books by the chapter) can result in higher market expansion than offering only the entire book. But, a strategy of bundling the PDF with print can fill demand for customers who view PDF and print as complements rather than direct substitutes. Capitalizing on these groups with attractive pricing strategies can help to mitigate losses. NAP’s customers tend to be quite price-inelastic in regard to chapter prices as compared to full PDF prices in the ranges of prices studied. In the case of the full PDF, once the assigned price was higher than zero, the study showed that demand did not change dramatically with price variations. NAP’s study also demonstrated that Internet speed has an impact on the purchase of the PDF format, but only in the case of the full PDF.
Overall, results suggested that the time is ripe for NAP and perhaps other scholarly book publishers to begin selling PDF format e-content to take advantage of customers’ demand for digital books. The National Academies Press has already begun.
The results and the full report from this study are available online at: http://aaupnet.org/resources/mellon/nap/index.html
by Shaun Manning
Communications Coordinator, AAUP
Participants in this year’s Whiting Week-in-Residence program often found themselves taking a “big picture” approach to professional development. The program, sponsored by the AAUP and the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation, allows mid- and upper-level staff of member presses to spend one week observing another press’s operations. While the 2007 residents traveled to larger university presses seeking a greater understanding of marketing, rights management, acquisitions, and production, in many cases they were treated to a more complete picture of the publishing process—a view which might not be possible during the course of one’s day-to-day responsibilities.
John P. Hussey, Sales Manager at University of Kentucky Press, visited Columbia University Press, where he worked with Marketing and Sales Director Brad Hebel. Hussey was interested in Columbia’s practice of consulting the marketing department early in the acquisition process. He also took notes on Columbia’s international sales initiatives and database structure, which led to ideas which he hopes can be implemented on a scale appropriate for Kentucky’s operations. “I’m not embarrassed to say that we should think of Columbia as a fantastic model for us to follow and as an ultimate end goal,” Hussey said. “Both in terms of productivity and inter-office relationships, Columbia exceeded any expectation I may have had.”
University Press of Florida also had the chance to share its marketing expertise, as Sales and Marketing Director Dennis Lloyd played host to Iowa’s Associate Marketing Manager, Allison Thomas. Thomas had the opportunity to sit in on marketing meetings, discuss business strategies, and speak with members of the design and production team to gain a greater understanding of the overall publishing process. “My main goal was to come away with a better understanding of the press as a whole entity and my role in it,” she said, “and because I was able to talk to the managers of different departments and attend so many meetings, I took away a very solid look at the bigger picture.” Thomas also enjoyed visiting her host press’s warehouse. “This was especially interesting because I haven’t been to our warehouse, the Chicago Distribution Center, yet,” she said.
Susan Petrie, Publicist for SUNY Press, visited University of Minnesota Press to learn more about “how a well-established publicity program functions.” Heather Skinner, Minnesota’s publicist, provided Petrie with examples of promotional materials and marketing plans that may be employed for various campaigns. Petrie also paid a brief visit to the Minnesota Historical Society Press, where she gained further advice on publicity strategies. “This week in residency came at a very valuable time for both me and for SUNY Press as we prepare to transition to a new director,” Petrie said. “I made an in-house presentation already to staff here, and there is a lot of enthusiasm to hone and improve our current systems.”
Alan G. Thomas, Editorial Director (Humanities and Sciences), and Gretchen Linder, Foreign Rights Manager, at University of Chicago Press hosted University of British Columbia Press’s Darcy Cullen. Cullen, an editor at UBC, reports that she was sent materials in advance of her residency, which “were not only informative but also served to make me feel welcome.” Though she was able to observe many aspects of the editorial acquisition process, Cullen was most intrigued by the thinking that goes into acquiring foreign-language books for translation. Related to this, Cullen also gained a more informed perspective on rights and permissions, including those related to translated works, collections, and monographs.
A focus on rights management also benefited Mollika Basu, former Acquisitions/Permissions Assistant at Wayne State University Press. Basu traveled to Temple University Press, where she shadowed Rights and Contracts Manager Matt Kull. Kull showed Basu Temple’s process for organizing and tracking rights and permissions, as well as the intense preparation necessary for a successful appearance at the Frankfurt Book Fair. Basu also learned about the costs and benefits of various e-publishing initiatives, and was able to meet with other members of the press to discuss overall workflow, database, and marketing issues.
Making the most of her week-in-residence, University of Washington Press’s Ashley Saleeba witnessed the inner workings of two university presses, a book packager, a compositor, and a letterpress printing and design shop. Co-hosted by Deb Wong at Duke University Press and Rich Hendel of University of North Carolina Press, Saleeba, Washington’s Senior Designer, spent two days at each university press while also making time to visit BW&A Books, Tseng Information Systems, and Horse and Buggy Press, all conveniently located in the Chapel Hill/Durham area. “My plan was to interview as many people as possible whose responsibilities mirrored or intersected my own,” Saleeba said. She was interested to see that Duke’s editorial and production teams were part of the same department, while the organization at UNC more closely mirrored her home press, with Production and Design separated into its own department. The two host presses, however, did show similarities that may inform the future of University of Washington Press. “I was surprised to learn that UNC, like Duke, reviews only one round of interior proofs,” Saleeba said. “Because both Duke and UNC are confident in this workflow, we are now considering eliminating first text proofs from our workflow, particularly for monographs. A change of this magnitude could mean a significant savings in time and shipping costs.”
The Week-in-Residence program is one of AAUP’s most successful professional development initiatives. Sharing knowledge between member presses has provided for new perspectives on how to best achieve the goals of small and larger scholarly publishers, and observing colleagues in action proves an exceptional experience for the program’s residents. Applications for the 2008 Whiting Week-in-Residence program will be available at http://aaupnet.org/programs/ in March.