In this brief article, Clifford Lynch proposes a vision for the future of scholarly communication. He envisions a world where all universities have a university press of their own, not least at all for reasons of publishing their faculty’s more esoteric work. Lynch is adamant that a coordinated system across university presses would be beneficial, as it would streamline processes and be more economically viable than a collection of boutique institutions with idiosyncratic needs. Lynch also makes some proposals for the future of the monograph, which he sees as stuck in a fetishistic print mode, even if online. Rather, Lynch suggests, monographs should take advantage of the possibilities of electronic forms and networked technologies, and institutions should support rather than punish such experimentation. Lynch acknowledges that he does not “describe how to move from today’s situation to the future sketched [in his article]” (n.p., emphasis mine); rather, Lynch urges a reconsideration of the current business and organizational problems endemic to academic publishing, and suggests that collective action could lead to a more efficient and sustainable scholarly communication future.

 

Work cited

Lynch, Clifford A. 2010. “Imagining a University Press System to Support Scholarship in the Digital Age.” Journal of Electronic Publishing 13 (2): n.p. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/j/jep/3336451.0013.207?view=text;rgn=main