This is more a collections/financial issue than a reference one, but questions may come up at the desk about BioMed Central. They are altering their pricing model, and the change could create quite a mess.
-Kevin
From LJAN:
>
> ****************TODAY'S NEWS*****************
> EVOLUTION IN OPEN ACCESS: BIOMED CENTRAL ALTERS ITS
> MEMBERSHIP MODEL
> Although it initially offered institutional memberships on
> a flat fee basis, open access publisher BioMed Central
> (BMC) has sent notice to its members and supporters that
> institutional memberships for 2005 will now be renewed
> calculated on an estimated "per article published" basis.
> Under BMC's open access model, access to all content,
> including databases, archives and peer-reviewed journals,
> is completely free for users. Costs are instead recouped
> through author processing charges (APCs). Under the BMC
> model currently in force, however, APCs for those who opt
> for "institutional memberships" are waived in exchange for
> the flat rate membership fee. That means researchers at
> member institutions can submit and publish freely all
> accepted articles with BMC. Currently, the BMC web site
> lists U.S. flat fees ranging from $1612 to $8000 depending
> on institution size.
>
> That model, however, produced "unfair side effects" earlier
> than anticipated, explained BioMed Central publisher Jan
> Velterop in a message to Yale Unviersity's Liblicense electronic
> discussion list. "While we started off with a flat
> membership fee, based on the number of potential
> researchers in a given institution," wrote Velterop, "some
> institutions generated far more articles than others." As
> such, for 2005, BioMed Central announced it would "link
> fees to the past record of publication as a proxy." Should
> researchers at a member institution publish 10 articles
> during their 2005 membership, their membership bill would
> be the number of articles (10) multiplied by the APC ($525)
> for a base fee of $5250. That figure could be adjusted
> downward by additional qualifying discounts. The new scheme
> will only apply for renewals. BioMed Central has grown
> steadily since its launch in 1999. It now numbers some 400
> institutional members, including a major deal in 2003 with
> the UK's Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) for all
> researchers in the United Kingdom (See LJ Academic Newswire
> 6/19/03). While exact figures were not released, the BMC
> web site notes that January 2004 saw "a record number" of
> submissions to BMC, more than double the number from
> January 2003.
>
> ----------------------------------------
> A FAILURE TO COMMUNICATE? LIBRARIANS TAKEN ABACK BY BIOMED
> CENTRAL CHANGE
> It was hardly a surprise that nascent open access publisher
> BioMed Central may (BMC) have needed to adjust its business
> model. What was surprising, however, notes Cornell
> University librarian Phil Davis, was that news of the
> change "broke" on Yale Univerity's Liblicense electronic discussion
> list. "There was no forewarning of the new pricing model to
> anyone," Davis told the LJ Academic Newswire. "I think [BMC
> publisher] Jan Velterop was not on the same page as the
> rest of his marketing group, and his postings created a
> flurry of policy actions from the company. I don't entirely
> blame Jan. I think BMC is trying to figure their model out
> as the go along. Unfortunately, it is undermining the
> credibility in their product." Velterop apologized to
> librarians on Liblicense for any confusion over the change.
> But this week, librarians expressed frustration about a
> possible communication breakdown with BMC, as well as
> deeper concerns over the BMC change itself. "One of the
> chief problems with the current or traditional subscription
> model is that authors are completely desensitized to the
> cost of publishing," Davis explained. With the BMC change
> for 2005, "moving to an institutional membership is no
> different in that we will keep the author removed from the
> price...it is potentially a suicidal model in terms of our
> budget."
>
> "Many of us are upset," added Tom Williams, professor and
> Director of the Biomedical Libraries at the University of
> South Alabama College of Medicine. Williams told the LJ
> Academic Newswire he was "horrified" when he saw the change
> on Liblicense, and called his BMC representative, who told
> him the planned change had in fact been in place
> previously. Williams, however, insists he and his fellow
> librarians were caught unaware. "We signed only a few
> months ago, and there was never any mention of moving to
> per-article changes, not ever was this made clear to us."
> Williams' library currently pays roughly $1300 for BMC
> membership as part of a consortium deal that includes
> roughly 20 medical libraries throughout the South. "That's
> quite reasonable," he notes. "Under that model I can save
> my people money. But what [BMC] is doing now is
> transferring the cost of publication from scholars to the
> library." While Williams says the BMC product is a good
> one, the recent change has left him somewhat dubious of
> BMC's business. "It looks like they used us," he said. "We
> marketed this for them. We told all our researchers these
> journals were out there and you can publish in them. Now it
> looks like this was a sweetheart deal so we would do the
> marketing for them, increase people submitting to them. Now
> that they've gotten the business, the deal changes."
> Williams said that the BMC change could "absolutely" impact
> his institution's decision to renew BMC membership for
> 2005. "We couldn't afford it," he said flatly. "If our
> faculty published 100 articles that would be over $50,000."