Elsevier

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This article is about the publisher. For the Dutch language magazine, see Elsevier (magazine). For the Dutch painter, see Arnout Elsevier.
Elsevier
Industry publishing
Founded 1880; 135 years ago (1880)
Headquarters Amsterdam, Netherlands (headquarters)
Revenue £2.48 billion (2014)[1]
€ 1,090 million (pre-tax)[citation needed]
Parent RELX Group
Website www.elsevier.com

Elsevier B.V. (Dutch pronunciation: [ˈɛlzəviːr]) is an academic publishing company that publishes medical and scientific literature. It is a part of the RELX Group[2] (known until 2015 as Reed Elsevier). Based in Amsterdam, the company has operations in the United Kingdom, United States, Mexico, Brazil, Spain, and elsewhere.

Leading products include journals such as The Lancet and Cell, books such as Gray's Anatomy, the ScienceDirect collection of electronic journals, the Trends and Current Opinion series of journals, and the online citation database Scopus.

Elsevier annually publishes approximately 350,000 articles a year in 2,000 journals.[1] Its archives contain over 13 million documents.[3] Total yearly downloads amount to 750 million.[4]

In 2014, Elsevier reported a profit margin of approximately 37% on revenues of £2.48 billion.[1] Elsevier's high profit margins and copyright practices have subjected it to much criticism by researchers.[5]

History[edit]

Elsevier took its name from the Dutch publishing house Elzevir, which, however, had no connection with the present company.[6] The Elzevir family operated as booksellers and publishers in the Netherlands. Its founder, Lodewijk Elzevir (1542–1617), lived in Leiden and established the business in 1580.

Elsevier was founded in 1880 and is the oldest and largest company dating from that time.[6]

In 1947, Elsevier began publishing its first English-language journal, Biochimica et Biophysica Acta.[7]

In 2013, Elsevier acquired Mendeley, a UK company making software for managing and sharing research papers. The New Yorker described Elsevier's reasons for buying Mendeley as two-fold: to acquire its user data, and to "destroy or coöpt an open-science icon that threatens its business model."[8]

In December 2013, Elsevier announced a collaboration with University College, London, the UCL Big Data Institute.[9] Elsevier's investment is "substantial" and thought to be more than £10 million.[10]

Company figures[edit]

Elsevier employs more than 7,000 people in over 70 offices across 24 countries. The company publishes 2,000 journals and 20,000 books. It is headed by Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Ron Mobed.[11] In 2003 its publishing accounted for 25% of the world market in science, technology, and medical publishing.[6]

In 2006, Elsevier accounted for 28% of the revenues of the Reed Elsevier group (₤1.5 billion of ₤5.4B billion). In operating profits, it represented a bigger fraction of 44% (₤395 million of ₤880 million).[12] Adjusted operating profits rose by 10% from 2005 to 2006.[13]

Elsevier's operating divisions[edit]

Elsevier has two distinct operating divisions: Science & Technology and Health Sciences. Products and services of both include electronic and print versions of journals, textbooks and reference works and cover the health, life, physical and social sciences.

Science & Technology[edit]

The target markets are academic and government research institutions, corporate research labs, booksellers, librarians, scientific researchers, authors, and editors.

Flagship products and services include: VirtualE, ScienceDirect, Scopus, Scirus, EMBASE, Engineering Village, Compendex, Cell, SciVal, Pure, Analytical Services.

There are the following subsidiary imprints, many of them previously independent publishing companies: Academic Press, Butterworth-Heinemann, CMP, Digital Press, Elsevier, Gulf Professional Publishing, Morgan Kaufmann, Newnes, Pergamon Press, Pergamon Flexible Learning, Syngress Publishing, William Andrew.

ScienceDirect is Elsevier's platform for online electronic access to its journals and over 6,000 e-books, reference works, book series, and handbooks. The articles are grouped in four main sections: Physical Sciences and Engineering, Life Sciences, Health Sciences, and Social Sciences and Humanities. For most articles on the website, abstracts are freely available; access to the full text of the article (in PDF, and also HTML for newer publications) often requires a subscription or pay-per-view purchase.

Health Sciences[edit]

The target market is physicians, nurses, allied health professionals, medical and nursing students and schools, medical researchers, pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, and research establishments. It publishes in 13 languages including English, German, French Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Polish, Japanese, Hindi and Chinese.

Flagship publications include: The Consult series (FirstCONSULT, PathCONSULT, NursingCONSULT, MDConsult, StudentCONSULT), Virtual Clinical Excursions, and major reference works such as Gray's Anatomy, Nelson Pediatrics, Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary, Netter's Atlas of Human Anatomy, and online versions of many journals[14] including The Lancet.

There are the following subsidiary imprints, previously independent publishing companies: Saunders, Mosby, Churchill Livingstone, Butterworth-Heinemann, Hanley & Belfus, Bailliere-Tindall, Urban & Fischer, Masson.

Criticism and controversies[edit]

See also: Reed Elsevier § Controversy

In addition to issues indicated in this section, Elsevier's parent company (Reed Elsevier) has been criticised for its links to the weapons industry.

Pricing[edit]

In recent years the subscription rates charged by the company for its journals have been criticised; some very large journals (those with more than 5000 articles) charge subscription prices as high as $14,000, far above average,[15] and many British universities pay more than a million pounds to Elsevier annually.[16] The company has been criticised not only by advocates of a switch to the open-access publication model, but also by universities whose library budgets make it difficult for them to afford current journal prices. For example, a resolution by Stanford University's senate singled out Elsevier's journals as among those which might be "disproportionately expensive compared to their educational and research value" and which librarians should consider dropping, and encouraged its faculty "not to contribute articles or editorial or review efforts to publishers and journals that engage in exploitive or exorbitant pricing".[17] Similar guidelines and criticism of Elsevier's pricing policies have been passed by the University of California, Harvard University and Duke University.[18] The elevated pricing of field journals in economics, most of which are published by Elsevier, was one of the motivations that moved the American Economic Association to launch the American Economic Journal in 2009.[19]

Resignation of editorial boards[edit]

In November 1999 the entire editorial board (50 persons) of the Journal of Logic Programming (founded in 1984 by Alan Robinson) collectively resigned after 16 months of unsuccessful negotiations with Elsevier Press about the price of library subscriptions.[20] The personnel created a new journal, Theory and Practice of Logic Programming, with Cambridge University Press at a much lower price,[20] while Elsevier continued publication with a new editorial board and a slightly different name (the Journal of Logic and Algebraic Programming).

In 2002, dissatisfaction at Elsevier's pricing policies caused the European Economic Association to terminate an agreement with Elsevier designating Elsevier's European Economic Review as the official journal of the association. The EEA launched a new journal, the Journal of the European Economic Association.[21]

At the end of 2003, the entire editorial board of the Journal of Algorithms resigned to start ACM Transactions on Algorithms with a different, lower priced publisher,[22] at the suggestion of Journal of Algorithms founder Donald Knuth.[23] The Journal of Algorithms continued under Elsevier with a new editorial board until October 2009, when it was discontinued.[24]

The same happened in 2005 to the International Journal of Solids and Structures, whose editors resigned to start the Journal of Mechanics of Materials and Structures. However, a new editorial board was quickly established and the journal continues in apparently unaltered form with editors D.A. Hills (Oxford University) and Stelios Kyriakides (University of Texas at Austin).[25][26]

On August 10, 2006, the entire editorial board of the distinguished mathematical journal Topology handed in their resignation, again because of stalled negotiations with Elsevier to lower the subscription price.[27] This board then launched the new Journal of Topology at a far lower price, under the auspices of the London Mathematical Society.[28] After this mass resignation, Topology remained in circulation under a new editorial board until 2009, when the last issue was published. The journal was discontinued in 2012.[29][30]

The French École Normale Supérieure has stopped having Elsevier publish the journal Annales Scientifiques de l'École Normale Supérieure[31] (as of 2008).[32]

In May 2015 Stephen Leeder was removed from his role as editor of the Medical Journal of Australia after its publisher decided to outsource the journal's production to Elsevier.As a consequence all but one of the journal's editorial advisory committee members co-signed a letter of resignation.[33]

Action against academics posting their own articles online[edit]

Digimarc, a company representing Elsevier, recently told the University of Calgary to remove articles published by faculty authors on university web pages; although such self-archiving of academic articles may be legal under the fair dealing provisions in Canadian copyright law, the university complied. Harvard University and the University of California, Irvine also received takedown notices for self-archived academic articles, a first for Harvard, according to Peter Suber.[34][35]

Months after its acquisition of Academia.edu rival Mendeley, Elsevier sent thousands of takedown notices to Academia.edu, a practice that has since ceased following widespread complaint by academics, according to Academia.edu founder and chief executive Richard Price.[36][37]

Chaos, Solitons & Fractals[edit]

There was speculation[38] that the editor-in-chief of Elsevier journal Chaos, Solitons & Fractals, Mohamed El Naschie, misused his power to publish his own work without appropriate peer review. The journal had published 322 papers with El Naschie as author since 1993. The last issue of December 2008 featured five of his papers.[39] The controversy was covered extensively in blogs.[40][41] The publisher announced in January 2009 that El Naschie had retired as editor-in-chief.[42] As of November 2011 the co-Editors-in-Chief of the journal were Maurice Courbage and Paolo Grigolini.[43] In June 2011 El Naschie sued the journal Nature for libel, claiming that his reputation had been damaged by their November 2008 article about his retirement, which included statements that Nature had been unable to verify his claimed affiliations with certain international institutions.[44] The suit came to trial in November 2011 and was dismissed in July 2012, with the judge ruling that the article was "substantially true", contained "honest comment" and was "the product of responsible journalism". The judgement noted that El Naschie, who represented himself in court, had failed to provide any documentary evidence that his papers had been peer-reviewed.[45] Judge Victoria Sharp also found "reasonable and serious grounds" for suspecting that El Naschie used a range of false names to defend his editorial practice in communications with Nature, and described this behavior as "curious" and "bizarre". [46]

[edit]

Main article: Australasian Journal of Bone & Joint Medicine

At a 2009 court case in Australia where Merck & Co. was being sued by a user of Vioxx, the plaintiff alleged that Merck had paid Elsevier to publish the Australasian Journal of Bone and Joint Medicine, which had the appearance of being a peer-reviewed academic journal but in fact contained only articles favourable to Merck drugs.[47][48][49][50] Merck has described the journal as a "complimentary publication", denied claims that articles within it were ghost written by Merck, and stated that the articles were all reprinted from peer-reviewed medical journals.[51] In May 2009, Elsevier Health Sciences CEO Hansen released a statement regarding Australia-based sponsored journals, conceding that these were "sponsored article compilation publications, on behalf of pharmaceutical clients, that were made to look like journals and lacked the proper disclosures." The statement acknowledged that this "was an unacceptable practice."[52] The Scientist reported that, according to an Elsevier spokesperson, six sponsored publications "were put out by their Australia office and bore the Excerpta Medica imprint from 2000 to 2005", namely the Australasian Journal of Bone and Joint Medicine (Australas. J. Bone Joint Med.), the Australasian Journal of General Practice (Australas. J. Gen. Pract.), the Australasian Journal of Neurology (Australas. J. Neurol.), the Australasian Journal of Cardiology (Australas. J. Cardiol.), the Australasian Journal of Clinical Pharmacy (Australas. J. Clin. Pharm.), and the Australasian Journal of Cardiovascular Medicine (Australas. J. Cardiovasc. Med.).[53] Excerpta Medica was a "strategic medical communications agency" run by Elsevier, according to the imprint's web page.[54] On October 7, 2010, Excerpta Medica was acquired by Adelphi Worldwide.[55]

Shill review offer[edit]

According to the BBC "The firm [Elsevier] offered a $25 Amazon voucher to academics who contributed to the textbook Clinical Psychology if they would go on Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble (a large US books retailer) and give it five stars." Elsevier said that "encouraging interested parties to post book reviews isn't outside the norm in scholarly publishing, nor is it wrong to offer to nominally compensate people for their time. But in all instances the request should be unbiased, with no incentives for a positive review, and that's where this particular e-mail went too far", and that it was a mistake by a marketing employee.[56]

Who's Afraid of Peer Review[edit]

Main article: Who's Afraid of Peer Review?

One of Elsevier's journals was caught in the sting set-up by John Bohannon, published in Science, called Who's Afraid of Peer Review?[57] The journal Drug Invention Today accepted an obviously bogus paper made-up by Bohannon that should have been rejected by any good peer review system.[58] Instead Drug Invention Today was among many open access journals that accepted the fake paper for publication. As of 2014, this journal had been transferred to a different publisher.[59]

"The Cost of Knowledge" boycott[edit]

Main article: The Cost of Knowledge

In 2003 various university librarians began coordinating with each other to complain about Elsevier's "big deal" journal bundling packages, in which the company offered a group of journal subscriptions to libraries at a certain rate but in which librarians claimed that there was no economical option to subscribe to only popular journals at rate comparable to the bundled rate.[60] Librarians continued to discuss among themselves implications of the pricing schemes and felt pressured into buying something without having other options.[61]

On January 21, 2012, the mathematician Timothy Gowers publicly announced he would boycott Elsevier, noting that others in the field have been doing so privately. The three reasons for the boycott are high subscription prices for individual journals, bundling subscriptions to journals of different value and importance, and Elsevier's support for SOPA, PIPA, and the Research Works Act.[62][63][64]

Following this, a petition advocating non-cooperation with Elsevier (that is, not submitting papers to Elsevier journals, not to refereeing articles in Elsevier journals, and not participating in journal editorial boards), appeared on the site "The Cost of Knowledge". By February 2012 this petition was signed by over 5,000 academics.[62][63] As of January 2013 it was signed by over 13,000 researchers.[65]

Elsevier disputed the claims, arguing that their prices are below the industry average, and stating that bundling is only one of several different options available to buy access to Elsevier journals.[62] The company also claimed that its profit margins are "simply a consequence of the firm's efficient operation".[64]

On February 27, 2012, Elsevier issued a statement on its website that declared that it has withdrawn support from the Research Works Act.[66] Although the Cost of Knowledge movement was not mentioned, the statement indicated the hope that the move would "help create a less heated and more productive climate" for ongoing discussions with research funders. Hours after Elsevier's statement, the sponsors of the bill, Representatives Darrell Issa and Carolyn Maloney, issued a joint statement saying that they would not push the bill in Congress.[67]

Selling open access articles[edit]

In 2014 Elsevier was found to sell some articles which should have been open access, but that had been put behind a paywall.[68] A different case occurred in 2015, when Elsevier charged for downloading an open access article from a journal published by John Wiley & Sons. However, it was not clear whether Elsevier was in violation of the license under which the article was made available on their website.[69]

Imprints[edit]

Imprints are brand names in publishing. Elsevier uses its imprints to market to different consumer segments. Many of them have previously been the company names of publishers that were purchased by Reed Elsevier.

See also[edit]

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Portal icon Companies portal
Portal icon Books portal

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c Reller, Tom (March 2015). "2014 RELX Group Annual Report" (PDF). RELX Group Annual Report. RELX Group. Retrieved March 2015. 
  2. ^ Reller, Tom. "RELX Group homepage". 
  3. ^ Reller, Tom. "Science Direct". 
  4. ^ Reller, Tom. "2014 RELX Annual Report" (PDF). RELX Group Annual Report. RELX Group. Retrieved http://www.relx.com/investorcentre/reports%202007/Documents/2014/relxgroup_ar_2014.pdf.  Check date values in: |access-date= (help)
  5. ^ Lin, Thomas (13 February 2012). "Mathematicians Organize Boycott of a Publisher". The New York Times. 
  6. ^ a b c Groen 2007, p. 217.
  7. ^ "Reed Elsevier Timeline". www.ulib.niu.edu. Retrieved 2015-09-13. 
  8. ^ "When the Rebel Alliance Sells Out", David Dobbs, The New Yorker, April 12, 2013
  9. ^ "University College London and Elsevier launch UCL Big Data Institute | Elsevier Connect". Elsevier.com. Retrieved 2013-12-26. 
  10. ^ "Reed Elsevier announces knowledge partnership with University College, London". The Independent. 18 December 2013. Retrieved 29 September 2014. (subscription required (help)). 
  11. ^ "Elsevier at a glance". Elsevier.
  12. ^ "Reed Elsevier | Annual Report and Financial Statements 2006". Investis.com. Retrieved 2013-12-26. 
  13. ^ "Reed Elsevier | Annual Report and Financial Statements 2006". Investis.com. Retrieved 2013-12-26. 
  14. ^ Health Advance. Elsevier.
  15. ^ Monbiot, George (29 August 2011). "Academic publishers make Murdoch look like a socialist". Guardian. 
  16. ^ "Elsevier journals — some facts". Gowers's Weblog. 2014-04-24. Retrieved 2014-07-27. 
  17. ^ Faculty Senate minutes February 19 meeting Stanford Report, Feb. 25, 2004
  18. ^ "Fac Sen addresses costly journals". The Stanford Daily. 2004-02-20. 
  19. ^ David Glenn. "American Economic Association Plans 4 New Journals". The Chronicle of Higher Education. January 25, 2008. Available online at Chronicle.com
  20. ^ a b Joan Birman. "Scientific publishing: a mathematician’s viewpoint". Notices of the AMS. Vol. 47, No. 7, August 2000
  21. ^ EffeDesign. "The EEA's journal: a brief history". Eeassoc.org. Retrieved 2013-12-26. 
  22. ^ "Changes at the Journal of Algorithms" (PDF). Retrieved 2013-12-26. 
  23. ^ Donald Knuth (2003-10-25). "Letter to the editorial board of the Journal of Algorithms" (PDF). Retrieved 2008-02-18. 
  24. ^ "Journal of Algorithms page at ScienceDirect". Sciencedirect.com. Retrieved 2013-12-26. 
  25. ^ "Journal declarations of independence". Open Access Directory. Simmons College. Retrieved 23 May 2012. 
  26. ^ Kyriakides, Stelios; Hills, David A. (1 January 2006). "Editorial". International Journal of Solids and Structures 43 (1): 1. doi:10.1016/j.ijsolstr.2005.11.001. Charles R. Steele succeeded Herrmann as editor in chief in 1985 and served in that capacity until June 2005. During his 20-year tenure the journal grew both in size and in reputation, becoming one of the premier journals in the field. We have accepted an invitation to serve as editors of the journal as of October 1, 2005, being cognizant of the immense contributions, leadership, and high standards exercised by our two predecessors on the way to making IJSS the forum it is today. 
  27. ^ "Resignation letter from the editors of Topology" (PDF). 2006-08-10. Retrieved 2008-02-18. 
  28. ^ Journal of Topology[dead link] (pub. London Mathematical Society)
  29. ^ "Topology". elsevier.com. Retrieved 2015-03-13. 
  30. ^ "Topology page at ScienceDirect". Sciencedirect.com. Retrieved 2013-12-26. 
  31. ^ John Baez: What We Can Do About Science Journals August 13, 2007
  32. ^ "Publisher's description of Annales Scientifiques de l'École Normale Supérieure". Elsevier. Retrieved 2008-02-18. 
  33. ^ "Medical journal editor sacked and editorial committee resigns". Retrieved 2015-05-18. 
  34. ^ Peterson, Andrea (December 19, 2013). "How one publisher is stopping academics from sharing their research". The Washington Post. Retrieved 6 January 2015. 
  35. ^ Masnick, Mike (December 20, 2013). "Elsevier Ramps Up Its War On Access To Knowledge". Techdirt. Retrieved 6 January 2015. 
  36. ^ Parr, Chris (June 12, 2014). "Sharing is a way of life for millions on Academia.edu". Times Higher Education. Retrieved 14 September 2015. 
  37. ^ Howard, Jennifer (December 6, 2013). "Posting Your Latest Article? You Might Have to Take It Down". The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved 14 September 2015. 
  38. ^ "Self-publishing editor set to retire". doi:10.1038/456432a. 
  39. ^ Chaos, Solitons & Fractals 38(5), pp. 1229–1534 (December 2008)
  40. ^ "The Scholarly Kitchen". 
  41. ^ "El Naschie Watch Blog". 
  42. ^ "Publisher’s note". Chaos, Solitons & Fractals 39: v–. 2009. Bibcode:2009CSF....39D...5.. doi:10.1016/S0960-0779(09)00060-5. 
  43. ^ "Chaos, Solitons and Fractals". November 2011. 
  44. ^ Ghosh, Pallab (2011-11-11). "Nature journal libel case begins". BBC News. Retrieved November 11, 2011. 
  45. ^ "Nature libel verdict 'a victory for free speech'",The Guardian 6 July 2012
  46. ^ Aron, Jacob (6 July 2012). "Nature Publishing Group wins libel trial". New Scientist (2873). Retrieved 14 July 2012. 
  47. ^ Rout, Milanda (9 April 2009). "Doctors signed Merck's Vioxx studies". The Australian. Retrieved 2009-05-04. 
  48. ^ Grant, Bob (30 April 2009). "Merck published fake journal". The Scientist. Retrieved 2009-05-04. 
  49. ^ Hagan, Kate (23 April 2009). "Merck accused of 'ghost writing' medical article". The Age. Retrieved 2009-05-04. 
  50. ^ Ben Goldacre, "The danger of drugs … and data", The Guardian, 9 May 2009
  51. ^ "Merck Responds to Questions about the Australasian Journal of Bone and Joint Medicine Journal" (PDF) (Press release). Merck & Co. 30 April 2009. 
  52. ^ "Statement from Michael Hansen, CEO Of Elsevier's Health Sciences Division, regarding Australia based sponsored journal practices between 2000 and 2005" (Press release). Elsevier. 
  53. ^ Grant, Bob (7 May 2009). "Elsevier published 6 fake journals". The Scientist. 
  54. ^ ""Excerpta Medica", official webpage". Elsevier. 
  55. ^ ""Excerpta Medica Joins Adelphi Worldwide", press release". Elsevier. 
  56. ^ Finlo Rohrer, "The perils of five-star reviews", BBC News Magazine, June 25, 2009. Available online at News.bbc.co.uk
  57. ^ Bohannon, John (2013). "Who's Afraid of Peer Review?". Science 342 (6154): 60–65. doi:10.1126/science.342.6154.60. PMID 24092725. 
  58. ^ Claire Shaw. "Hundreds of open access journals accept fake science paper". Theguardian.com. Retrieved 2013-12-26. 
  59. ^ "Drug Invention Today". sciencedirect.com. 
  60. ^ Groen 2007, p. 177.
  61. ^ Groen 2007, p. 180.
  62. ^ a b c Flood, Alison (2 February 2012). "Scientists sign petition to boycott academic publisher Elsevier". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 16 February 2012. 
  63. ^ a b Fischman, Josh (30 January 2012). "Elsevier Publishing Boycott Gathers Steam Among Academics". The Chronicle of Higher Education. Archived from the original on 16 February 2012. 
  64. ^ a b "Scientific publishing: The price of information". The Economist. 2012-02-04. Archived from the original on 16 February 2012. 
  65. ^ "thecostofknowledge.com". Retrieved 12 January 2013. 
  66. ^ "Elsevier Backs Down as Boycott Grows". Retrieved 25 August 2014. 
  67. ^ "Sponsors and Supporters Back Away from Research Works Act". Retrieved 25 August 2014. 
  68. ^ Jump, Paul (2014-03-27). "Elsevier: bumps on road to open access". Times Higher Education. Retrieved 2015-03-09. 
  69. ^ Vollmer, Timothy (2015-03-13). "Are commercial publishers wrongly selling access to openly licensed scholarly articles?". Creative Commons News. Retrieved 2015-03-14. 

Sources[edit]

  • Groen, Frances K. (2007). Access to medical knowledge : libraries, digitization, and the public good. Lanham, Mar.: Scarecrow Press. p. 217. ISBN 978-0-8108-52723. 

External links[edit]

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