PSP Endorses the Brussels Declaration on STM Publishing

[Barbara Meredith <bmeredith@publishers.org>]

Contact: Barbara Meredith (212) 255-0200

U.S. Professional and Scholarly Publishers Endorse International 
Declaration on Scientific, Technical, and Medical Publishing

New York, NY, March 7, 2007. The Professional and Scholarly 
Publishing Division of the Association of American Publishers 
(AAP) today announced its formal endorsement of the Brussels 
Declaration on STM Publishing, a statement by the International 
Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers 
(STM), articulating key industry principles.

The Brussels Declaration was issued in the context of the 
European Commission's Communication on Scientific Information and 
its Conference on Scientific Publishing in the European Research 
Area in Brussels on February 15-16, and has been endorsed thus 
far by 42 commercial and non-profit society publishers and by ten 
publishing associations worldwide.

Affirming that the mission of scholarly publishers is to maximize 
the dissemination and preservation of knowledge through 
economically self-sustaining business models, the Declaration 
expresses a unified view of the role of the global STM publishing 
community and the contribution of private sector publishers to 
science and society.  While the Declaration takes no position for 
or against any particular business model, it does caution that 
the open deposit of accepted author manuscripts risks 
destabilizing subscription revenues and undermining the integrity 
of the peer- reviewed literature. The signatories support the 
creation of rights-protected archives that preserve scholarship 
in perpetuity, and welcome innovative business models that 
promote economic sustainability, based on a sensible and 
evidenced-based approach to policymaking. The full text of the 
Declaration can be found at: 
http://www.stm-assoc.org/brussels-declaration

The decision to endorse the Declaration was made by the 
Professional and Scholarly Publishing Division's 18-member 
Executive Council.  AAP's Vice President for Professional and 
Scholarly Publishing Barbara Meredith  said: "We applaud STM for 
creating a declaration that frames the key issues in the current 
debate about how best to advance scholarly communication in the 
digital age."

The Association of American Publishers is the national trade 
association of the U.S. book publishing industry. AAP's more than 
300 members include most of the major commercial publishers in 
the United States, as well as smaller and non-profit publishers, 
university presses, and scholarly societies.

Members of AAP's Professional and Scholarly Publishing Division 
(www.pspcentral.org) publish the vast majority of materials used 
in the U.S. by scholars and professionals in science, medicine, 
technology, business, law, reference, social science, and the 
humanities, and are worldwide disseminators, archivists, and 
shapers of scientific research via print and electronic means. 
The Division's more than 100 members comprising professional 
societies, commercial publishers, and university presses produce 
books, journals, computer software, databases and electronic 
products."

Barbara J. Meredith
Vice President
Professional/Scholarly Publishing
Association of American Publishers, Inc.
71 Fifth Avenue, 2nd Floor
New York, NY 10003 USA
Tel: 1-212-255-0200 X223
Fx:  1-212-255-7007
bmeredith@publishers.org
www.pspcentral.org
www.publishers.org
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