Hello Fons,
Your query ("what motivates authors to make their work available in this way")
made me think of my own situation. Perhaps publishing in peer-reviewed journals
is analogous to receiving Merit Badges in Scouts: In some instances, it’s how
one gets rated, noticed, or makes it to the next level. It seems (at least in
the U.S.) that professors are pressured to publish in professional journals. As
this applies to me, I was told (as a Master’s student) that I’d need at least a
few peer-reviewed articles under my belt in order to get into a doctoral
program of study. There’s a catch, of course, because it’s difficult to do
research in hearing science without university affiliation. At present, I’m
pursuing research while, at the same time, on the lookout for a doctoral
advisor. Doing good deeds and being committed to purposeful work is great, but
I suppose I'm still deficient when it comes to those "Merit Badges."
I have written a couple of noteworthy articles regarding hearing, but only one
appeared in a "peer-reviewed" journal. An earlier article was intended for a
much broader (albeit layman) readership, and it reached people who could truly
benefit from the information contained within the article. Specifically, the
article was about hearing protection and muzzle blasts, and it appeared in
Outdoor Life magazine. Submitting the same article to, for example, Audiology,
might have earned Brownie points needed for admission to grad school, but
submitting an article regarding hearing protection to hearing scientists /
audiologists is simply preaching to the choir. I was happy that the article
found favor with a large readership even though it didn't appear in a
"professional" journal. A second article regarding binaural electronic hearing
protectors found its way to Noise & Health (which IS peer-reviewed), and I was
grateful that they accepted it for publication. I
had previously submitted the article to JASA, and had received a very kind
rejection letter. Some magazines will accept or reject articles because of
reader interest or current research trends. The Journal of the Audio
Engineering Society is known for publishing articles on Ambisonics, but maybe
they rejected a series of related articles, and Acta Acustica united with
Acustica picked them up (?). Once copyrighted, I imagine that the publisher has
exclusive rights to the manuscript, even in derivative form. But how they can
justify high prices certainly eludes me. Downloading single articles from JASA
is kind-of pricey, too. Subscription to AES’s library is reasonable, and you
wonder why others aren’t the same. Furthermore, the AES offers anthologies that
include hard-to-find articles.
I wished I could simply upload research and schematic diagrams to my website
and make them available for good will to all researchers. But unless something
gets published in a professional journal, it may be (mis)construed as
“amateurish” or “unimportant” to those in academia. How unfortunate this is!
Please know that I am grateful to all of you who have freely shared you
insights, expertise, and wisdom, whether you’re an audio professional with
years of experience or a hobbyist with personal opinions on music and
Ambisonics.
Sincerely,
Eric
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL:
<https://mail.music.vt.edu/mailman/private/sursound/attachments/20120111/f30e268e/attachment.html>
_______________________________________________
Sursound mailing list
Sursound@music.vt.edu
https://mail.music.vt.edu/mailman/listinfo/sursound
