Re: Mellon Foundation Annual Report

[Sandy Thatcher <sgt3@psu.edu>]

Yes, well worth reading, but Don doesn't know all the history behind
these projects, so I think I'll be devoting my next column in Against
the Grain to a supplementary perspective.

Sandy Thatcher
Penn State University Press

Ann Okerson wrote:

>The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation's annual report this year 
>features a lengthy essay on the Foundation's initiatives in the 
>area of scholarly communications, by Donald J. Waters and Joseph 
>S. Meisel.  The purpose of the essay is to report on the 
>Foundation's activities, but the essay is in fact a broader 
>survey of how the Foundation sees the total landscape of 
>scholarly communications.  Waters has been with Mellon for about 
>a decade and has sponsored many innovative projects in that 
>time, so his range of expertise is considerable.  Their chosen 
>focus is the apparent crisis in university press publishing and 
>the state and prospects of university presses in a digital age.
>
>There is a concise report about the essay in the "Today's News" 
>section of the Chronicle of Higher Education for Monday 28 July 
>2008, while the full essay can be read online at 
>http://www.mellon.org/news_publications/annual-reports-essays/presidents-essays/scholarly-publishing-initiatives/
>
>Worth your time, or as the Chronicle says, if you are interested
>in scholarly communications, this is a page-turner.
>
>Ann Okerson/Yale Library