Tech Elephants & the State of Change at SSP 36

Photograph by William Albert Allard

With each new software release, what's possible grows. With each new company that comes online, or new resource or material that's created, what's imaginable expands. This is simply the state of play; Heraclitus' river is now grade-5 whitewater.

For those who grew up under Moore's law, not only are more things possible; they're inevitable. Whatever you see, briefly, as missing or desirable in any device, service, product, or feature set will be corrected or added to the next build, because if you've seen it, someone is already working on it and since they will naturally have faster and faster processors and more and more code at their disposal, the problem will fall.

It's a funny thing to grow up like that, or at least it's funny to those that didn't grow up like that; the outlooks and world views to come out of such an evidently or presumptively self-ameliorating iterative environment are fundamentally different from those outlooks that came before.

NASA saw the change/s and adapted to them early on. (This I have on the very good and entirely irresponsible, second-hand hearsay authority of a mother of a precocious college graduate who was snatched up to work in NASA labs in Texas a decade or so ago.) Older design engineers used to take lead in design-direction decisions on their teams because they were the most knowledgeable. They knew what worked and what didn't work, what would and what would not, and could guide the younger engineers as they 'came online' out of dream-filled days of school, learned those hard lessons, and caught up with reality. Later, as the pace of change increased, they saw that increasingly younger engineers -- who didn't know any better -- were able to try things that hadn't worked a few years ago, or even a few months ago, and get those things to work, delivering different results faster in rapid iterations. Silicon Valley and other tech centers saw this trend too, back in the late nineties, and regularly "poached" young elephants from computer labs.

It's always tempting to suggest that younger folks are smarter (especially for the less than superannuated among us); but perhaps it's worth while too to consider the case in less debatable terms, that they are less knowledgeable of the river that flowed before; ignorance isn't just bliss, but at times of rapid change, it is alternately enabling. Or to put it another way, when you step into rapids, regardless of your comfort level or experience with whitewater, you're going to go for a ride; it's your experience with the rapidity of the rapids, if you will, that determines whether the trip will be a happy and productive one for you or for your doctor.

Growth

In Erik Brynjolfsson's TED talk on the future of innovation The Key to Growth? Race with the Machines, (TED, February, 2013) he shares stats from the second industrial revolution a hundred and twenty years ago. He notes that the real advances in productivity did not happen when the factories electrified; in fact, it took another thirty years for workflows and processes to be reimagined, based on the flexibility of those new eFactories, for the greatest growth to be realized. That's time enough, as Brynjolfsson points out, for a human generation to turn.

In comparison with our age, he underscored that simply applying new technology wasn't what brought the greatest returns. Redefining who we were and what we set about to accomplish in light of the capabilities of the new technology is, and while we have seen great advances thus far, in our age of the computer, we will see more still if, when, and as we shift from the external focus of applied technology to this more existential and categorical focus of redefining the enterprise itself; i.e., not just replacing traditional processes and products with computers and digitally-built alternatives but in a sense "teaming" with the new technology to imagine what it is capable of in order to define new systems that aspire to do more and entirely new things than did the systems that were in place before.

The State of Change

Rick Joyce of Perseus Books delivered a rousing Keynote address to start the 36th annual meeting of the SSP last week in Boston. He shared many adventures in new marketing approaches at Perseus and its imprints (e.g., Basic Books), including the first ever Publishing Hackathon, from May of last year, and a thoughtful review of future implications of mobile-publishing and content delivery; e.g., work/s regarding famous landmarks delivered or offered to visitors as they pass by. The talk was rich with suggestions for scholarly presses -- such as finding new ways to leverage the inherent value in and expertise of our scholars/authors -- and as soon as slides/video are available, all scholarly publishers should check them out.

via niemanlab.org

Throughout Joyce stressed the growing need for publishers to stretch their definitions of their roles from producers of products such as books and eBooks to deliverers of value and wonder in new forms -- a sentiment that resonated well with the now famously leaked NYT's Innovation report from earlier in the year. Now, if we take a step back and consider the innovation discourse of just a few years ago, back when people were discussing mobile cheese and talking mice (can you imagine?), the argument was more externally focused. The cheese, she is moved; let's go find the cheese. Then, for a time, we heard messages about the pace of change and how the pace of change was accelerating; everything was about keeping up and reacting faster: be nimble, pivot to avoid disaster.

These suggestions that we're hearing today, from Joyce and the Innovation team at NYT and elsewhere, are more organizationally and internally focused (less cheesy). They foreground the need to rethink and radically restructure what we're doing not just how we're doing it (e.g., developing new software programs to deliver our own B2B services, finding new ways to leverage the expertise of our authors). I'd say that this shift in the focus of these strategic suggestions (from how can we react to a sudden change, to considering what else we can do entirely -- taking change as a given) places us somewhere down Brynjolfsson's productivity curve; we may not be running with machines, quite yet, but some of us are choosing up teams.

The 36th annual meeting of the SSP in sum

It's true to say that the SSP 36th annual meeting was, as it usually is, packed with new technology and creative uses of new platforms and practices, but from Rick Joyce's shared vision for new marketing and new programming, to Delta Think's tutorial on contextual inquiry-bassed product development, and on to the closing sessions on new product releases and on augmented reality via Google Glass and via other devices yet to be imagined, it was clearly more than that; it was a proving ground, heralding things to come not only for presses but from presses in the next digitally expansive era that's beginning to open up for us upstream.

Morag and others will of course tell you that there is absolutely no reasonable possibility for successful, meaningful change in the models for publishing, not yet, and they're as right as can be, in retrospect; an elephant never forgets the waters that it has stepped in. But as Joyce and others suggest, the opportunity to change, for the moment, is only the greater for it. 

Who re-Moved My Chains - the way change has changed, taking change as read

Photograph by William Albert Allard

Winston the elephant was still just a baby, so he hadn't yet learned. Long exercises each morning at the hands of the elephant trainers were exhausting and strange, but they never tired him out enough to stop him from trying to escape. The ground in camp was brown and bear, and all they had to eat was soggy grass that came in dirty buckets. He pulled on his chains every afternoon, working to get free. He longed to run in the meadows across the river from the circus camp. The grass and leaves there were rich and deep and looked so delicious!!!

     Gaspar and the other adult elephants watched Winston with patient sympathy. Burdened with perfect memories of every pull, every failed attempt and all the wasted energy, in every afternoon, through the weeks and months of their first years in camp, they knew. Winston wasn't strong enough to break the chains around his leg. In time, he'd learn.

© 2014 Peta.

     In the afternoons, the elephants were chained along the edge of camp, facing the river and the jungle beyond where it was said that packs of elephants roamed free. Small chains held even the largest of elephants in line, because of their perfect memories of the truth of the way things work: when a chain is around your leg, you cannot break free. Many weeks passed, many long afternoons of wild, youthful commotion and elephantine sighs: Winston pulling on his chains to exhaustion; the adult elephants watching with slightly less and less patience at having their quiet afternoons rendered unquiet.

     Morag was an old bull elephant next in line on the other side of Gaspar. He didn't like the constant disruption of Winston and his pulling. Several times Winston had upturned their buckets of dinner, leaving half of the herd to go hungry. He complained loudly to Gaspar that this nonsense must stop. Gaspar tried to argue that the matter would run its course in time, once Winston learned; but siding with Morag, the other elephants in line weren't satisfied to wait. Gaspar realized that it was time.

     "The chains are too strong, Winston."
     "Why don't you break them?!" Winston asked. "You are huge!"
     "Elephants can't break the chains that hold us."
     "You knock me aside with your leg, when you are not looking."
     "I'm sorry for that, Winston."
     "But, you must be strong enough to break your chains."
     "No, like you, we've tried. We could not."
     "But, try now."
     "There would be no point; we know what will happen when we pull on the chains."
     "Try just once; show me!"
     "No, Winston."
     Winston thought on this. He knew there would be no budging an elephant when it came to his memory. He'd have to think of something.
     "What if you and I pull on the chains together? Have you tried that?"
     Gaspar grunted somewhat angrily. He didn't like frustration in the ranks and could feel Morag growing surly next to him.
     "We can't break the chains, Winston. Others have tried that. I've heard many stories..."
     "But have you tried that? Have you tried pulling on the chains? ...with another elephant?"
     Gaspar had to admit the truth. "No, I haven't."
     Winston put his foot on top of the chain on Gaspar's leg.
     "We can pull together then."
     "Gaspar..."
     "Just once more. Try once more. Then, I'll stop."
     Morag trumpeted loudly and knocked Gaspar sharply in the ribs.
     "No, Winston! Stop this!" Gaspar said. "It's time for the elephants to sleep."
     "But..."
     "We must give the others peace, Winston!"
     Winston began to complain again, but Gaspar quickly pulled him in closely with his trunk and disciplined him sternly in hushed tones. He released him again.
     Gaspar's counsel seemed to work, as Winston looked defeated at the ground, kicking it several times and scraping it with his trunk.
     "Now go to sleep, Winston. Tomorrow will be a new day."
     Winston circled some, eyeing Gaspar, but then lay down his head and finally gave up.
     "Al last," Morag said, triumphantly.
     "We will have our afternoons of quiet returned to us!" the other elephants trumpeted.
     "Yes," Winston said. "I told you all, it would run its course. We can all get some sleep now."
     The elephants fell in line, one after the other, and slept content that quiet would return to the edge of camp, in the days, weeks, and months to follow.

via funpic.hu

     But in the morning, all woke a strange and unfathomable sight. As news spread of not one but two sets of broken chains at the end of the line, they saw silhouettes of two elephants in the sunrise's light, one large and one not so large, running in the meadow across the river, heading for the jungle beyond. How did camp elephants get all the way over there? the adult elephants thought, that never happens. Morag and others were even more confused by what they found at their own feet. They had never seen that before and didn't know quite what to make of it.
     Soon the trainers would awake, they decided. They'd know what to do.

...

Scholarly Publishing 2.0: The Wrath of Khan

Scholarly presses and u presses in particular have at least two great (macro) strategies open to them to change the game in their favor. One, I'll call the Wrath of Khan strategy (discussed herein), and the other is exploring beneficial network effects and that thing called scale of partnering on non-core infrastructural needs and services and on delivering core and neo-core D2C products and services (elsewhere discussed, though touched on herein). Both strategies are enabled by the web, but herein, we'll just consider the Wrath of Khan strategy in broad strokes (not examine its wiring).

The Wrath of Khan Strategy

Pretty simple: in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (the first one), Kirk defeats Khan in a final battle between two space ships. How? Kirk, or really Spock, realizes that Khan is stuck in the past; his reality is defined by his "life on Earth" and ancient history where battles ranged across a physical landscape -- defined in terms of longitude and latitude, 2D. Space is 3D. In fact, from any point in space, your options are global. Yes, not unlike the web. Kirk wins by "turning around, vertically," rising up and then dropping back down -- which is far more detail than you need, but you get the point; or, you get enough of the point to smile politely, mumble "Geek," and let me continue to say: The future and the web enables 3D publishing products and services for u presses. To which, you might say: Why do I say this and what does that mean, Geek? For starters, we can consider OA.

(c) Paramount Pictures

OA & 3D

Recently, "access" to research/scholarly written output has been a hot topic in scholarly communications; specifically, Open Access or OA. Discussions around OA often center on the "pay wall" and on which side of the pay wall things reside. Two dimensions. Binary opposition; physical landscape of u presses to date: "pay-per-view" to the left of them and "OA" to the right of them. ...Rode the one hundred. OA is about "access," as is implied in the name, and yet access isn't "understanding." Therefore, OA would leave positioning on "understanding" wide open to u presses, and delivering understanding is, for my money and for most people's money, far more valuable than simply granting access (and is largely what publishers do, when they make thinking into a book; so, it's a core competency). However, if you think of summarizing and abstracting or distilling out the essence of arguments (and/or applying them to current events), i.e., derivative, tangential, inspired-by works for new age groups, new occasions, and new markets or modes & nodes of access, as resting above or below primary works of scholarship (the outputs from research), you can see these transformative acts as opening up a 3D space in which to operate and develop new products or create new value far above and far beyond scholarship. The research is foundational; but, if you take it as what is given or as a leaping off point, what can be made of it from there? Or, what else can researchers be tasked to do with their thinking for us as a society?

The 800-kg. Stakeholder in the Room

Am I the only one that has found the "OA" moniker just a little awkward? Maybe after explaining it to friends and having them say: "You mean 'public.'" "Yeah, isn't that just 'public access,' like public media; free for everyone in the country or online: smart-stuff produced by noble, dedicated people for the general good?" Yes, I've had to admit on many occasions that we've had a word for this kind of thing, for decades, and it's public access -- like public access tv of old, but different. Really different. Yet, we don't seem to call it that, and we don't tend to hear the public interest much represented in these discussions, beyond our imagining that everyone is better off if scholars have access to scholarship for their work, and if students have access to it too for their work, without paying for it ...and the public should have access too. Is this the best we can do for the public? Given all our access to the best minds and current thinking in the world? If serving them and raising their understanding were the goals, is access the best that any of us can do?

Speaking for John Q. Public

I am an evil capitalist, by training and inclination; but, speaking for John Q. Public, I could see wanting a little more. Were I JQP, I'd want works that are built on top of (3D) this research and these nuanced intra-dsciplinary arguments, to teach our kids and lead intelligent debate in the public sphere -- actively -- not just on a shelf, and not just in classrooms and academic conferences, and not just for those who are motivated to access and take part (i.e., the 'converted'). For my money, I'd want media that undertakes and completes the higher-order communications objective or raising "understanding" in the country and the world (www) by direct actions and interventions of publishers and editors; that complicates and disseminates what they are given. More plainly put, I'd want content generated for me and mine: where I want it and in forms that I want to access when I feel like accessing it.

I just downloaded an info-graphic from NPR, related to a video I saw, elsewhere on NPR, for a band they talked about on Morning Edition three weeks ago that I'm currently streaming in a podcast from my phone in my pocket.

25 years ago, that's an ambulatory schizophrenic talking. Now, what we "see" synthesized on or download/stream from NPR is taken in stride. What comes next?

If u presses are allowed to continue to stretch beyond traditional academic functions of effecting scholar-to-scholar communications and minting coins for tenure accounting, to the higher-order cultural global value of advancing public understanding directly, actively (as engaged participant agents; i.e., co-creators and engaging readers to be the same), they may continue to discover and build new forms, new models, and vistas for that thing called publishing that used to require glue and sutures.

E.g.,

More media - maybe presses working together can field a networked online news magazine, blog, or other digital 'source' that applies the best thinking and the best writing by the best minds to current events. There's an app in that.

More popular - maybe the web is license to make scholarly research and conclusions OA; but then, maybe it's also mandate to do more besides to create new, expanded, premium/trade derivative titles/value.

More public - maybe there's room for something transformative, synthetic, and diversely engaging like NPR/PBS (i.e., public programming). SPOILER ALERT: Take multimedia mixed with digital delivery, evolve it, and whether paid for or free or both, we may see emergent roles née editors functioning not unlike producers. ...if we're fortunate.

More funding - to the enabling crowds of scholars and libraries add: everybody in the country. Network effects apply to funding global/public projects. "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or the one." (That's Spock and/or Kirk, depending on which reel and/or timeline you're in.) Maybe public-centric programming and/or centralized functions of any kind will win the hearts and pocketbooks of more hearts and pocketbooks. Centralized, concentrated presence in space often results in increased [critical] mass and with it an enhanced attractive force of gravity.

More SALES - u presses have unique products and unique, premium markets of consumers, yet they rely on third-party strategies, leaving customers to navigate the wilds of maddeningly crowded third-party vendor sites to find their content, and worse: abandoning the best behavioral, conversational, and market-intelligence gathering (data resulting from said navigating) and chances to engage and collaborate with the world of interested consumers to said third-parties. They could capitalize more on and deliver more value to consumers based on what they have to offer with a networked D2C all u press site.

The 3D and Wrath of Khan analogy and attendant e.g.s are only delivered mildly tongue in cheek; they are in earnest framed around freemium and premium thinking that the u press network should feel leave to "go digital" not only in form but also in function, and such new functions could be at the title/book/project level or at the institutional level of the u press/u press network itself, to continue to invigorate and to explore the multiple ways the united federation of u presses can generate and receive value in society. ...to boldly go where no one has gone before.

A collective presence on the web furthers such new revenue and new value generating interests and building one or more virtual networks to effect such a presence (or presences) is a smuggled presumption herein. In other words, and to be clear, having a unified u press presence on the web will be beneficial to all presses and align with both enhanced sales and content development goals. As far as funding the societal enterprise of making the most of university-based textual ideation transfer goes, this certainly applies: We don't need a university press; we need all of them. However, such a centralized presence or space (the final frontier) does more: as an umbrella, it will allow presses to "get vertical" to create new, living value for the public and for scholars, on top of the world-class scholarship that they already deliver, it will explode the sales and marketing potential for their rare and wonderful products and services therefrom derived (in ways Joe Esposito regularly brilliantly describes and more), and throughout it will enable u presses's own "research" and development of this expanding new space between authors and readers, to continue to refine, experiment with, and improve the ways in which we access and reach ideas and the ways in which these ideas reach us to the greater benefit of our collective understanding.

University Presses have the world by the tail - twice: outside-the-books thinking

I'm going to put you in business. I'm not going to tell you what that business is, or what you sell, but, I'll describe some moving parts, and ask you how you like your chances.

It's a not-for-profit business (NFP), but one that engages with customers in open, global retail space to generate revenues in multiple streams; so, market returns are important and good for business: good^2. Your business is well established, not a new concept. You work in media. Your customers are uniformly well-heeled, all earning fine salaries, some extraordinary salaries, they go to live theater, attend museum openings, visit art galleries, they hold respected places in society, they consume mass quantities of media like yours, and they are required to work with your offerings and your competitors' offerings, under penalty of death (publish or perish), for the rest of their professional careers. How do you like your chances?

Before you answer, let me add that some of your expenses and infrastructure will be paid for/provided by a nearby laurelled institution (a university), and, because you're a NFP, you will be held exempt from paying taxes. How do you like your chances now?

Wait: In addition to this customer pool, thanks to your NFP status, you can fund raise to support operations. How do you like your chances now?

The answer to everything in business is, of course, That depends... It depends on what you're selling and if anyone is willing to pay you for it. But, before you get your 'depends' on, you have to stop and take stock of the moving parts described above: that this is a freakishly favorably stacked deck. No entrepreneur gets a play like this, to that kind of customer base, with that kind of support. Most would say, it really doesn't matter what your product is (or are), with a stable bid for the rapt attention of folks like these, you can't miss.

VANS

I've said before that folks contemplating the future of the university press network, branding, and revenues "slash" sustainability should have a look at Vans, in the period described in the Harvard Business Review case study, VANS: Skating on Air. And I'll say it again here:

...Folks contemplating the future of the university press network, branding, and revenues "slash" sustainability should have a look at Vans, in the period described in the Harvard Business Review case study, VANS: Skating on Air.



In brief, it describes Vans' decisions to produce the skateboard movie, Dogtown and Z-Boys, to sponsor myriad extreme sporting events, and develop a line of video games. None of which are shoes. Vans is a shoe company. The answer, for Vans to continue to grow, however, lay outside the shoes.

Monetizing on scholarly content alone is fraught and fragile these days. If a publisher is a book company, with "book" understood broadly as all content the company produces, then maybe it's time to think outside the books.

SSP = recommended for 2014

Reflecting on all that I am thankful for from 2013, I’d say that getting a chance to attend the annual meeting of the Society for Scholarly Publishing (SSP), meeting all the folks I met, and learning all that the SSP is about – and learning all that attending the SSP’s annual meeting entails for an individual scholarly pub professional – is near the very top of the list. Attending the SSP changed my worldview and enhanced my understanding of the industry.

The SSP comprises leading industry consultants from around the world, heads and key staff of libraries, executives from all the major commercial presses, directors and staff of university and other not-for-profit presses, as well as professionals from third-party vendors (B2B providers). Having diverse populations from the communications ecosystem so well represented makes the SSP meeting a richly flavorful melting pot; not only are expert panel sessions informed and thought provoking, but all conversations in the halls, around exhibits, and in receptions are charged with brains and knowledge of multiple perspectives.

Moreover, in keeping with the principles of the founding members, the SSP is compellingly democratic; each professional, regardless of the “rank” of the individual or the focus of the individual’s firm, is able to and indeed expected to contribute to the SSP, to serve on the board of directors, and to participate in keeping up the high standards of networking and the sharing and development of best-practices in scholarly communication. (Deadline this Friday, 12/6.) This democracy of membership emulates (and accelerates) the cross-pollination and cross-strata flow of ideas that is in keeping with today’s best practices for competitive idea generation in successful firms.

My experience in attending this year’s meeting may have given me a uniquely swift and thorough view into what the SSP is all about: I won one of several Student Travel Grants offered by the SSP, and as a first-time attendee, I was paired with a “Meeting Mentor.” I was also grouped with other first-time attendees, for peer-to-peer networking, and as a group we were all under the further wing of the First-time Attendee Coordinator. My Meeting Mentor was Heather Staines, VP of the Stanford-born startup SIPX, past board member of the SSP, and long-time industry pro. My fellow first-time attendees and grant winners were similarly diverse professionals from library sciences and publishing programs across the country and overseas (I was the only MBA in the mix and the first one to participate in the program, thus far.) Our First-time Attendee Coordinator was none other than Will Wakeling, Dean of University Libraries, Northeastern University, founding member of the SSP, and industry/meeting icon.

The SSP meeting is huge, the orgs in attendance cover the globe (and all the walks of life above-mentioned); it might take several years to learn where the ropes are, let alone learn how to use them. Having a meeting mentor and first-time attendee coordinator accelerated the process for all of us and, for me, having a Meeting Mentor so versed and experienced as Heather Staines and a First-time Attendee Coordinator so knowledgeable and widely respected as Will Wakeling meant that I got to chat with international professionals at every level of the ecosystem, meet nearly all the past presidents of the SSP (and a host of the Chefs from the Scholarly Kitchen), and learn about the founding principles and history of the organization.

The sessions and conversations I had at the meeting were amazing; each more informative and eye opening than the last, and I could go on at dizzying length (as is my apparent wont) about the best-practices I learned of and the ideas I came away with – many of which have informed new initiatives I’ve begun since – and I will no doubt post some thoughts born of those takeaways. However, this post is about what I am truly grateful for from this experience, and that is getting to learn what the SSP is about: the people I met.

In the SSP logo, it says: “innovative people advancing scholarly communication.” I can say that the emphasis there is on “innovative people.” I met a dynamic, driven, and welcoming worldly horde of people. I’ve been to a number of meetings and attended some “schooling” here and there. In the first few minutes of the SSP, I met dozens of folks from a host of organizations and backgrounds, all of whom I look forward to seeing again and continuing to learn from, as we advance in our careers.

CENTRAL TAKEWAY/LEARNING:

The wealth and diversity of backgrounds and perspectives (commercial execs, consultants, vendors-as-members!, librarians en masse, and not-for-profits), the democratic nature of the organization (a focus on you as an individual professional), and the generous disposition of the members (founders, Presidents, attendees, mentors, and colleagues) are what distinguishes the SSP at heart; these elements make the SSP exceptionally welcoming and engaging and make discussions at the meeting uniquely generative of new thinking and opportunities.

THANKSGIVING:

I am thankful for getting to meet all my fellow grant recipients, and for getting to meet so many of the best and brightest in scholarly communications (the many chefs, heads, and execs). I owe special thanks to Heather and Will and other SSP stalwarts who all took such a personal interest in our experience – I can’t thank you enough! On that broader front, I would be remiss if I didn’t back up and say thank you to the SSP itself for giving me the opportunity to attend this year’s meeting and to everyone I met who made the experience so rewarding.

Given my experience, I would be further remiss if I did not say to all my fellow colleagues in scholarly communication, whom I have not met yet (and likely already talked your ear off in this regard) and who are planning professional development activities for the coming year: I’m renewing my membership in the SSP and making plans for Boston. I recommend, whole-heartedly, that all seeking new ways to advance scholarly communication do the same and join the polyglot discussions at the SSP next year. When you do, I look forward to meeting you there!

Scholars and Skate Punks: If the Vans Fit...

When refocusing these posts to include b-school coursework and case studies, I mentioned that scholarly press and especially u presses should read the HBR business case Vans: Skating on Air (Harvard Business School, 2002).

Vans (the company) is a great example of the lateral thinking many companies use to develop new businesses (plural) and several-fold new revenue, from a single core expertise/product/brand; the HBR case is a great study of how a discrete brand can be leveraged and expanded to stage a major turnaround and spur new products, new revenue, and new businesses.

Yes, I'm equating scholars with surfers and skate punks. They will be flattered.

And, yes, I'm suggesting u presses have something to learn from what was once a one-model, mono-coastal, skate shoe company, Vans.

THE CASE: A few things will leap out on any reading:

1. Vans was built on the simple model of delivering skate and surf gear for hardcore skaters and surfers: a handful of products for a small, dedicated market. Though Vans moved out to new markets and new models, they maintained that key, strategic commitment (to the best extreme athletes).

2. By the time of the case, Vans grew to finance a major movie (Dogtown and Z-Boys), narrated by Sean Penn, to sponsor extreme sporting events (triple crown of surfing) and other alternative events (concerts), to open their own skate parks, and begin developing video games.

3. A truly tiny percentage of total domestic revenue came from sales of its key product (extreme sports apparel) to its core demographic (extreme athletes), in specialty skate shops: 10%. Most of its apparel revenue came from sales of less-than-professional versions sold to kids in the suburbs, and large amounts of revenue come from the above various "cultural" events or side products.

4. Most importantly, as may be news to some, Vans had been dying. It staged a 540 degree turnaround, fueled mainly by the extensions into new areas beyond the skate shoe market; e.g., the triple-crown sporting events, music concerts.

Vans leveraged its brand (operational license in extreme sports and with the youth market the followed them) to move into new areas, and in turn these new areas led to growth that allowed Vans to stay in business -- and even to grow to serve its original core market better than ever. The wealth and health of all the other business (e.g., skate parks, extreme sporting events, concerts, a record label, film production, video game development) allowed Vans to over-serve the hardcore surfing and skating markets and to sponsor star athletes as they reach new heights in their discipline -- a market so specialized that serving it alone would not generate enough revenue to support the effort.

THE COMPARISON: For years (100+), scholarly publishers have sold books; they grew beyond books (once) to offer journals. Now, with new initiatives like UPPC and Project Muse, u presses are repackaging and delivering these core products differently; but, these initiatives aren't new businesses, just new modes of delivery.

More businesses could be grown alongside the development and delivery of scholarly content, ones that leverage the historic strength/s of u presses and serve new needs not only among the "extreme" market base of academics, but also among those who would be fans and amateurs of culture.

E.g., would it be an unacceptable stretch for presses to publish blogs for scholars and dedicated readers to access (dedicated to a discipline or subject); i.e., not a press blog -- of which there are many (one for each press) -- but a disciplinary or topical blog published by a u press -- of which there are none ...yet.

Much, much more importantly...

What new businesses could u presses build that would be as distant from yet supportive of scholarship as skate parks, surfing tournaments, and a record label are from and of a simple skate shoe?

THE POINT: The point of this extreme comparison is not to make a recommendation/s -- we'll save that for another post or two -- the point is to note that in many industries, especially where growth and increasing revenue are needed, considerable lateral thinking and experimentation is put forth to build new business units, entirely new business units, and these new units are often what keep the company and the brand alive.

Scholarly publishers are doing great things to monetize content; but, even if it were enough to support scholarship -- which it currently is not -- why stop there? Why not explore growth into new arenas?

The SWOT that Roared — The 3 Strategic Business Units of a Scholarly Book Publisher

An academic press has three main customer-facing business centers—where goods or services are traded with an external party for a return. 1. Acquisitions (acquiring rights to authored content — B2C), 2. Channel Sales and Licensing (deriving revenue from authored content through third parties — B2B), and 3. Direct-to-consumer Sales (deriving revenue from authored content and rights to authored content through direct sales to an end user; e.g., author events, conferences, via “mail order,” fax, telephone, and on the web — B2C). These 3 Strategic Business Units (SBUs) are unique; they have different answers to fundamental questions such as: What do they sell? To whom? And how do they sell it?

It’s important to hold units with separate customers, markets, and approaches to markets apart (at least sometimes in our thinking). Each will have separate Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT). Each will have separate Points of Difference (PODs) and Points of Parity (POPs) with its competitors in its category. Each will have its own changing landscape — meaning that the SWOT, POPs, and PODs are changing in different ways and at different rates for each. Most importantly: Large SBUs will eclipse the needs of smaller SBUs — resulting in lost opportunities for the org.

Since new opportunities and threats emerge at “times of their own choosing,” successful orgs continually review SWOT, POPs, and PODs for each unit to defend against and capitalize on threats and opportunities before (and/or in step with) the competition.

Acquisitions – SWOT Events

The Acquisitions SBU trades developmental, publishing, and/or distribution services for rights to authored content. Customers are authors and other publishing houses (e.g., co-publishing, translation, and distribution agreements). A salient change in the Acquisitions landscape is the explosion of alternatives. Authors can publish in a huge number of new journals — mostly at commercial houses; they can publish in an increasing number of OA platforms; and, they can publish themselves through Social Media (SM) platforms, or directly with prior channel partners (E.g., Amazon). This explosion changes the game, it isn’t going away, it is growing and certain competitors (Amazon and SM) are accelerating in their offerings of alternative publishing solutions.

Acquisitions SBUs need to position against these alternatives as competitively distinct and as “a better choice,” for at least some segment of the market. In the past, Scholarly Publishers only had to position against Commercial Houses. PODs were clear and, more importantly, they were static. Now, with the changing landscape, houses must protect against both the explosion of alternatives and the future.

A publishing program itself (the titles under contract and those that have gone before) is its own best representative—followed by a publisher’s presence at conferences, in the world (author events and traditional media), and on the web. The website is key “storefront” for the Acquisitions SBU to tout its publishing services and past accomplishments. The “online bookstore” is a display of both of its marketing efforts (on behalf of its authors) and the breadth of past, current, and future titles. The blog is a vital new tool for drawing attention to all of the above with past and potential Acquisitions customers (would-be authors).

Acquisitions – Consortia Solutions

In the university press ranks, we have examples of whole presses merging to form consortia publishing houses: sharing resources and markets to achieve economies of scale. e.g., U.P.N.E. and Colorado University Press.

More recently, and more intriguingly, ad hoc collaborative publishing projects (Mellon-funded) have also been explored between several groups of autonomous houses. Examples include: South Asia Across the Disciplines, First Peoples, Early American Places, and the American Literatures Initiative. Herein, a new series of book projects was fielded by a group of houses working together to form an ad hoc virtual consortium.

In each of the Mellon-funded projects, houses committed to working on one series, in an underserved area of the humanities—specifically, in areas where the houses weren’t receiving enough projects separately to field a list on their own. In effect, they took on a new list and partnered on marketing and design. Acquisitions were carried out separately.

These Mellon-funded virtual consortia have benefited scholarship greatly; the series would likely not have been started without the seed money form Mellon and collaborative support from partner presses. In the end, these underserved areas of the Humanities were given world-class publishing support. But, did the houses benefit?

Partner houses were able to take on something they wouldn’t have been able to take on otherwise, but it brought with it many new challenges and did not lighten their existing editorial load. One wonders if “a little bit from column A and a little bit from column B” might also be worth a try.

Could existing segments of Acquisitions programs at a number of houses, all serving the same market segment (discipline) but at a less-than-dominant position, partner to present themselves to that market segment in similar fashion, to achieve a greater presence and greater returns (while in fact lightening their fiscal load)?

Channel Sales and Licensing – SWOT Events

The Channel Sales and Licensing SBU brokers relationships with vendors, aggregators, agents, distributors, other publishers (e.g., electronic publishing, reprints, and course packs) for the ongoing distribution of finished content or rights and permission to use content through their platforms, channels, and services in exchange for a reduced rate (discount), royalty, fee, or permission to add fees to later sales. A major change here is the collapse of the vendors and channel partners market for print sales. The number of individual book stores has dropped significantly, and major players have consolidated. Additionally, total sales of books across the sector have dropped, just as journals subscriptions collapsed in years prior.

Channel Sales and Licensing must do its best to expand remaining network and replace lost channels. As above, presence at trade shows (sales conferences), use of the Publisher’s website, “online bookstore,” and blog are all key communication tools. However, the decreasing number of vendors calls for more than communications can offer.

Channel Sales and Licensing – Consortia Solutions

Several consortia solutions have been fielded here to respond to changes in the Channel Sales and Licensing SBU landscape, primarily in the licensing and aggregation space. Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) was an early-moving third-party solution that stepped in to provide the stone for the stone soup of centralized rights and permissions clearance for presses and authors alike. In similar fashion, JHUP stepped in to build Project Muse for scholarly presses, aggregating journals content into topical “bundles” for libraries to buy under a subscription model — simplifying acquisitions and payments for libraries and returning lost revenue from many years of declining journal subscriptions to publishers. UPCC is a new consortia-based solution, built by JHUP and others, to provide similar aggregation and ease to the sale of electronic university-press-based book content to libraries (and hopefully lost revenue from many years of declining book sales to publishers). No attempt has been made to reclaim lost channel sales, from the collapse in the number of book stores (online and brick and mortar), with a consortia solution, as of yet.

The Tiniest of SBUs: Direct-to-consumer Sales – SWOT Events

Direct-to-consumer Sales include sales of print and electronic copies of books and rights (translations and course packs) to individual end users. These sales at author events, conferences, via “mail order,” fax, and telephone (later email and Skype), wouldn’t really have been profitably isolated and considered as an SBU, traditionally speaking, as most all events were ad hoc: intermittent, short-lived and limited to a tiny minority of the org’s offerings. With the advent of the web, however, presses put out their full-list sales shingles for all print and electronic copies and all rights 24/7—all around the world.

This is a fascinating development.

A) Since the offerings are comprehensive and supported by ongoing operations, it must be considered a sustaining unit of the org and can’t be left out of strategic thinking. So, the move represents the birth of a new SBU! (That is a sizable development, for what some consider a traditionally-minded industry.) B) What’s it for exactly? C) Way more importantly …what could it be?

There’s a lot happening on an academic publisher’s website. Both other SBUs have a presence on it. As mentioned: For Acquisitions, it’s a major storefront for touting its publishing services and showcasing the results of its wares, in the “online bookstore.” For Channel Sales and Licensing, likewise, it’s a showcase and source of contact information for potential vendors, agents, and partners.

Holding Acquisitions and Channel Sales units apart (from other publishers' websites) on an isolated single-publisher or dedicated website makes some sense—for the larger and older SBUs—but, does it make optimal or really any kind of sense for the new kid on the block, Direct-to-consumer Sales?

SWOT analysis for the Direct-to-consumer Sales SBU with respect to the web is one word long: Amazon. By comparison, that word describes the potential Strengths and Opportunities as well as the current Weakness and Threats of, for, and to online Direct-to-consumer Sales for scholarly presses.

We know from the success of Amazon and our own experiences as online shoppers, browsers, and researchers that end users want more to choose from, rather than less; they want platforms that approach one-stop shopping. Aggregate websites enjoy many times the traffic of balkanized sites. Academic presses have participated in consortia solutions, to offer content to libraries, for the same reasons: customers prefer more choice and greater access. We also know, by comparison to Amazon and Barnes & Nobles, academic publishers’ websites are not small; they are microscopic.

Holding Direct-to-consumer Sales sites apart, exclusively as one-publisher’s wares websites, restricts exposure to the market and therefore restricts revenue for the Direct-to-consumer Sales SBU and publisher. To answer the Q above: What is it for exactly? A: The online bookstore on a publisher’s website, as it stands, is mainly functioning as showcase for the publishing-services wares of acquisitions (to encourage folks to submit new projects) and to entice vendors to contact a press representative: it’s a visual aide for the other two SBUs.

Direct-to-consumer Sales – Consortia Solutions

To answer the other Q above: What could it be? A: It could be more. New SBUs need time to grow and mature to support their other SBUs in new ways. Simply replicating the Direct-to-consumer Sales portions of scholarly publishers’ websites together on one dedicated site (though there are many better things that can and would be done with it) would give the publishers’ Direct-to-consumer Sales unit access to far greater traffic and allow them to give growth a try.

As Joe Esposito well notes in his frequent supports for such a move, it would yield access to valuable data among other things. It would also provide a well-trafficked, shared platform for value-added services and new business opportunities (new models). I’d also point out that for the Channel Sales and Licensing SBU, which has lost so many major partners (e.g., Borders), it would provide a major new, freestanding vendor for the their titles — which is no small matter. And for the Acquisitions SBUs, across all participating scholarly publishing houses, that are facing an explosion of alternatives to the publishing services they offer, it would provide the single most comprehensive showcase of the strength, breadth, and depth of their collective publishing programs.

It would be like a year-round University Press week, highlighting what it means to publish with established and laurelled academic houses. It is all about the company you keep.

As mentioned above, the event of scholarly presses moving out onto the web to host their own, individual online “bookstore” sites was and is a fascinating development. Technically, when this happened, they forward integrated into the marketplace to compete with their own partners and other online retailers (most notably, Amazon). To reiterate: each academic publisher’s standalone “bookstore” website currently completes for sales and customers with Amazon.

Now that the ground has been taken and held, the move begs at least two questions: why would you do such a thing, and why stop there?

Way back in 2005, Seth Godin described what he called the “local max” and the “big max.” These notions could provide some explanation; big maxes are much bigger but further away from local maxes and often across a span of risky ground that is lower than the local max. Many firms stay put at local maxes because they’re currently-held ground and familiar. His point brings a Russian proverb to mind: “He, who doesn't risk, never gets to drink champagne.” They serve champagne at the big max.

Summary

Firms review SBUs out of context from one another, from time to time, to examine each unit’s opportunities and threats on their own merits; to be sure each unit is taking best advantage of the terrain. As terrains are always changing, it’s important to “make the rounds” regularly to imagine and discover new opportunities and later to exploit them in the order of greatest strategic value — especially important to make moves that give or will likely give rise to new opportunities. Only then can you be sure that a firm’s SBUs are working in concert with one another to the greatest collective advantage of the organization.

University Presses are hotbeds of experimentation these days. Scholarly publishers are moving smartly to explore consortia (scale-able) solutions for each of their longstanding SBUs. The relatively new Direct-to-consumer Sales SBU has yet to be tested at scale and is well positioned, perhaps best of the three, for life on the web (where scale lives).

As examples of what scale can do: Mashable and Pinterst and Twitter didn’t exist a few years ago (Amazon ‘didn’t exist’ a few years before that). Each has many millions of users now fulfilling needs they didn’t know they had in ways they never knew they would.

It's easy to imagine strategic investment in consortia solutions for the tiniest SBU of a scholarly publisher resulting in similar upticks in exposure to university press-developed books, journals, and accomplishments.

Conclusion

Traditional focus on the larger SBUs at a scholarly publishing house is holding the customer-facing, Direct-to-consumer Sales SBU back from its potential by keeping it tied to an individuated site. This is especially true for university presses; most of which will not draw enough traffic for this unit to be independently viable. The growth potential for a consortium-based solution for the customer-facing SBU is better than that of an average press site.

We would expect university presses to expand their reach and profits through an investment in a consortia based customer-facing website.

Managerial Accounting thru the I's of the Other

In addition to deeply thought provoking and insightful, Jacques Lacan is hilarious. If you haven’t spent some time with his works, I highly recommend it! He’s constantly cracking inside jokes of language and is wonderfully obsessed with Freud. He’s the Woody Allen of French theorists.

Freud was a systemic thinker. His theories were rigid, interdependent, and all had to add up to the bottom line of his overarching thinking — usually tying out to your mother and/or father in some rigidly unpleasant way.

Lacan was a Freudian, but what he did with and for Freud was, in a way, anti-Freudian. Lacan reclaimed Freud’s work by treating it as metaphorical rather than literal. The rapport of elements within the system was more important than their absolute value or nominative location. To reference the thinking of another noted Frenchman, it was as if he said there’s “truthiness” to Freud’s thinking; so, let’s not dismiss it entirely without first taking another look at it — looking at it sideways and in broad stokes (letting lines blur to the abstract) might yield new structures and give rise to alternate understanding, and indeed it did.

Lacan reified Freud’s truthiness. His work yielded insights well beyond superficial readings of story and character (of the subject and her family) to the deeper structures of the making of meaning in society: the very building blocks of understanding.

Lacan : Freud : : Managerial Accounting : Financial Accounting

Financial Accounting (FA) is what we all grew up with (and what many believe is the full story of accounting) with debits and credits and everything adding up to the red or the black bottom line. FA = Bean Counting. There are two versions of FA in an organization, Tax Accounting (for for-profits forms) and Balance Sheet Accounting (for everyone). One version breaks down financial transactions to assess the taxable change/s in value over a period. The other version breaks down financial transactions to assess change/s in overall value over the period. Both are purely interested in …financial transactions.

Managerial Accounting (MA) may be the best kept secret in modern bidness. It is strategic and it is not at all interested in counting beans. It is metaphorical, subjunctive (i.e., future-facing and what if…? in nature), and as a result IMHO Humanities Majors probably have a greater ability to grasp the thinking behind it than most CPA-style accountants — which is pretty huge.

One downside – the results of MA are useless to FA purposes, so it must be undertaken adjunct to FA duties. The upside/s – MA tools, once built, are brilliantly useful to managers!!!

The contextual recipe for profitability

It’s a shame, but understandable, that accountants often get a bum rap in the humanities. Many loss-leaders are needed to find one gem. Humanities majors (who probably dated painters, poets, and band members in college) will get this. A Financial Accountant will blow a gasket when multiple loss-leaders (financial losers) hit the books. This alone will set many humanities and FA folks at odds.

MA, on the other hand, can take loss-leaders and almost any “fuzzy logic” that you can describe into account — in fact, creative application of MA tools such as Activity Based Costing analysis can reveal not only what prices would support projects of a certain type and maintain success for a firm (or describe and defend needs for subventions), but with the help of a little FA and modeling it can also reveal how many must be undertaken in the next season specifically (of each type, selling at varying rates, and into uncertain markets, and given the ongoing performance of the last several lists, back- and mid-) to give rise to the increasing overarching success of the firm — with that success being defined as progress toward any number goals (financial and/or missionary).

In a word, Managerial Accounting reifies bean-counting's truthiness. It yields insights beyond superficial readings of the bottom line (of debits and credits with respect to the budget) of what happened yesterday in the business to the deeper structures of creating and adding value in society, how the firm can contribute more to the top line in a meaningful and lasting way on into the future: the very building blocks of profitability.

Perhaps most importantly, MA tools can be used to illustrate (to the more FA-minded members of staff) that the firm is in fact right on track and making the desired progress toward its broadly agreed-upon goals when that next wave loss-leaders or seasonal slumps in sales hits the books — so those discussions don’t have to begin again.

Admittedly, though they are pretty simple to master, Lacan’s concepts can seem complicated to get a hold of the first time you see them. Likewise, MA tools can seem complicated to build when you look them over, though in the end, as with most things, they’re not.

Lacan is hilarious and highly recommended, but I've found MA reading thoroughly enlightening as well. I'd say add some to your wish list, and even if you don't ever get to it, it's worth keeping in mind that there is another kind of accounting out there, a future-facing accounting, for measuring the strategic potential for the creation of value (financial and/or missionary) by a firm beyond the typical postmortem approach of an FA breakdown of how value was destroyed (and should rather be destroyed less--duh) in the comparisons of budgets with debits and credits.

R. Barthes on branding – the u press network—part 2 - the communicative impact "engine" of u presses

As mentioned previously, a brand’s value exists in the eye of the beholder; i.e., the customer. A true review of the current value of the u press network and gauge of current trends (future value) would call for market research (with authors). But, a few attributes (and how they might lead to points of parity and points of difference) are worth considering before and after such research.

Premium Access

To admit of a bias up front: I believe that the premium access component of many not-for-profit scholarly publishing, specifically herein u presses, brings unique value to the mission.

To admit of another: monetizing content is fraught, these days, and publishers will want to diversify away from monetizing content alone; nonetheless, commercial underpinnings of attracting use with content (enhancing the attractive and communicative impact of content) remains, is relevant, and brings unique value.

This post lists several attributes of u presses, in search of Points of Parity (POPs) and Points of Difference (PODs) with/from free publishing (OA): Arm’s Length, Ameliorative, Multidisciplinary, Commercial, and Active in the Market.

The hypothesis here is that the premium access component amplifies the aggregate impact on the focus of the publishing process (content), just as a sling swung around and around over one’s head, accelerates a small rock (idea) to be hurled at a giant or a target. Relevant metaphor, yes: David and Goliath; u presses were built, on premium access footing, to hurl bolts at giants (for-profit presses, popular readership, and world markets). In so far as these remain targets, u presses’ premium access status would be a value-added component of their publishing programs.

Slings & slingshots

Before vulcanized rubber, slingshots were made with a long, non-elastic, usually leather, strap or sling. A “shot” was achieved by whirling a bolt held in a small pouch at mid sling, around and around over your head, usually at arm’s length, until effective velocity and best trajectory was reached, whereupon one side of the sling would be released for a shot at the target. It took a lot of practice, professional-type practice, to hit the mark.

Premium Access & Missionary as Compound-Attribute and POD

Several attributes of u presses are listed on the info graphic below.

• Arm’s length = tied to research institutions but not beholden to them
• Ameliorative = increasing the communicative power (impact) of texts
• Multidisciplinary = rendering arguments across the disciplines and to the public
• Premium Access = impact-driven; market-facing
• Active in the market = res ipsa loquitor—but marketers do it better



Each attribute is worth examining in detail; but a salientcompound-attribute holds u presses uniquely apart from exclusively Open Access (OA) and for-profit publishers, and that is the oft mentioned and oft under-appreciated combination of “Missionary + Premium Access.”

• OA publishers = Missionary (communicatively passive)
• For-profit publishers = Premium Access (communicatively active)
• U presses = Missionary + Premium Access (communicatively active)

Decision making is different across the two camps. Missionary = importance. Premium Access = impact. Members of each camp have slightly different criteria for selection of works to be included in their specific programs (simplified here for illustration).

• Librarians = will patrons need access to it?
• Archivists = will someone need access to it someday?
• Scholars = will we need access to it for teaching or study?
• For-profit publishers = will it have impact?
• U presses = could its impact change discussions; does it matter?

Though born of missionary parents, u presses were built on a Premium Access structure like that of for-profit publishers. As such, u presses consider both importance and impact at all stages in the publishing process. I.e., u presses are largely impact-driven, professional across all services, and uniquely (with respect to other members of the missionary community) promotionally-minded, championing ideas in the marketplace, and not just to scholars and students but also to the public.

Why is this?

We live in a commercial society. For good and ill, commerce is an engine unto itself, in that it improves the tools it needs to improve its outcomes.

As the info graphic attempts to illustrate, the Premium Access component to the publishing process cycles both the selection and the “Amelioration” of texts on notions of impact; i.e., the communicative power of ideas/stories are both selected for and enhanced during Premium Access project development. Once that optimal trajectory of topical scope, attractive reason, and persuasive explication and packaging is reached, the material is released from development to be championed and consumed in the marketplace.

For-profit commercial presses select and develop projects on impact alone (subjects are taken into account, but impact is the governing criterion). For-profit commercial presses also not only influence popular discourse, but they tend to dominate it; they change discussions and encourage exploration.

Long ago, scholars, researchers, libraries, and universities realized that if popular motivations lead individuals away from new ideas and research, then granting access (alone) to new ideas would not be enough; new ideas and research will not achieve their full potential or do the most (or potential any) social good, if they are overlooked.

Academics also realized that the communicative impact of ideas is uniquely enhanced during Premium Access project development: I.e., for-profit publishers were not only dominating discourse, but they were also refining, hoarding, and continually evolving (through dint of engagement with the marketplace) best editorial, production, and marketing practices.

Why the slingshot?

U presses were charted to give researchers competitive access to popular markets. I.e., they were charted to give scholars access to the full complement of professional publishing services; namely, the Premium Access development of their ideas through discriminating selection, development, production, and marketing.

To this end, U presses were chartered with missionary objectives, to treat the best of ideas with the potential to do the most social good, and they were built on a Premium Access structure to reach into the popular markets and develop and refine the best practices to do so — on a continuing, self-improving basis — so that those best ideas could compete most successfully on the giant, for-profit publisher’s turf.

In sum

Testing ideas in a classroom is one thing. Testing ideas with your colleagues, another. Testing ideas in the marketplace, before the whole world, is quite another; it calls for specific and evolving skills, focus, and commitment. It all comes down who do you want to reach, when, and how well do you want to do it. As we experiment with and transition to new models we will need to be sure to safeguard, replicate or improve on this engine.

…

Further on Why the slingshot, yes, if you’re wondering; right hip pocket, for several weeks after reading the novel. I was the Huck Finn of Wilton, CT, walking the forests along the NY/CT state line for most of a summer; tin cans, tree trunks, and mailboxes trembled at my approach.

Max Planck Institute Librarin, Urs Schoepflin, on OA and the future of humanities research

Librarian from the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG), Urs Schoepflin, gave a talk on the IU campus on Monday, 10/22/2012. The talk was titled “Challenges for the Humanities: Scholarly Work and Publishing in the Digital Age.” Schoepflin presented the MPWIG’s European Cultural Heritage Online (ECHO), an Open Access Infrastructure to bring Essential Cultural Heritage Online. His talk was part of the History and Philosophy of Science Colloquium Series at IU.

ECHO is a framework for bringing Humanities research and scholarship online; it hosts primary materials, enables peer review, empaneled an editorial board, and brings forth finished works online, for download, and POD. I think they’ve completed 5 books already. Schoepflin discussed the history of the project, the creation of the pilot platform, and the likely road ahead. One thing that stood out: researchers and librarians at the MPWIG largely eschewed the assistance of IT professionals in its creation; they opted instead to have Humanities researchers with specific aptitudes for technology define and build what was needed to best facilitate research for the online community. They held to simpler-is-better model and made sure everything could work through a browser.

It is a fascinating infrastructural and professional approach; many institutes are participating; materials are of the highest quality. It is truly part of a new era in research. Schoepflin summed it up—specifically referencing the part about Humanities researchers learning online programming tools—by saying simply: This is the future of Humanities research.

He’s right. I had to think about it; but, he is right. What’s most right about what he said is the fact that the researchers and librarians are doing it for themselves; they learned the IT tools to build a contemporary research solution. That didn't happen in the past. It's seems it will in the future.

We’ve seen this in other industries; e.g, marketers and graphic design software. The web is informational software. It is only natural for workers to source their own skills and solutions. I’m not versed enough in OA platforms to know how common this is yet or when exactly we reached its advent; but, it’s in the past.

Schoepflin is right about OA being the future of Humanities research in the larger sense as well; it’s unlikely that we would see a future without OA in it. OA is a wonderful thing. What does this mean for scholarly communications on the whole? Could we see a world of all OA all the time an only OA all the time, everywhere?

Unlikely, as we live in a commercial society, and if we did, the resulting communication/s would be less robust, and a great deal of value would be left on the table for consumers, institutions, and publishers. However, we will see more OA, as it does certain things well.

E.g., Social Media & Marketing (that other kind of Communications): Social Media has become a huge focus of Marketing. It’s better than traditional media for certain things. Mainstream advertising was dominant to universal (an exclusive mode of communication). Social media and online advertising has bucked the old trends. Now we live in a world with both.

But, we still have mainstream marketing; its role has simply changed and refocused—in concert with the new platforms’ messaging. I.e., traditional, mainstream marketing remains part of the marketing/cultural discourse or the “marketing mix,” alongside the new, online marketing, and in many ways, the one “plays off of” the other.

Similarly, OA is changing old models. Publishing/communications programs will naturally look to make the most of OA. But, if we look at Marketing (with a capital M) responding to Social Media, we see the presence and actions of the one, "new" channel increased and altered the prospects for the other; value was ultimately found in fielding a coordinated approach that capitalized on the strengths, reach, and efficacy of each.

The scholarly communications/publishing market will seek an advantageous and complimentary equilibrium point or strategic "mix" in a similar way, if not to a similar degree.