WORKSHOP: Economic Perspectives on
Scholarly Communication in a Digital Age
September 11-12, 2008
Sponsors: The Mellon Foundation
University of
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 11
11:00 a.m. - noon Registration
noon – 1:00 p.m. Lunch
1:00 – 1:30 p.m. Introduction: Paul Courant (U. Michigan Librarian, Dean of Libraries, Professor
Public Policy, Professor of Economics, and Professor of Information)
1:30 – 2:30 p.m. Paper 1: Glenn Ellison (MIT Dept. of Economics)
"Is Peer Review in Decline?" (paper in PDF)
Discussant: Joshua Gans (Melbourne Business School)
2:30 – 2:45 p.m. Break
2:45 – 3:15 p.m. Paper 2: James Evans (U. Chicago Dept. of Sociology)
“Online Access and the Growth, Contraction, and Extension of Science”
3:15 – 3:45 p.m. Paper 3: Philip Davis (Cornell Dept. of Communication)
“Open Access Publishing, Article Downloads, and Citations: Randomised Controlled
Trial” (paper in PDF)
3:45 – 4:00 p.m. Break
4:00 - 4:30 p.m. Paper 4: Mark McCabe (U. Michigan School of Information and Ross School of
Business), Christopher Snyder (Dartmouth Dept. of Economics), and Roger Schonfeld
(Ithaka Harbors)
“Measuring the Impact of Digitization and Online Availability on Journal Citations”
4:30 – 5:30 p.m. Discussion of Papers 2-4: Patrick Gaule (Ecole Polytechnique Lausanne)
7:00 p.m. Dinner
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 12
8:00 – 9:00 a.m. Continental Breakfast
9:00 – 10:00 a.m. Paper 5: Tim Simcoe (U. Toronto Rotman School of Management)
“What’s in a (Missing) Name? Status and Signaling in Open Standards Development”
Discussant: Justus Haucap (U. Nuremberg Dept. of Economics, German Institute for
Economic Research (DIW Berlin), and German Monopoly Commission)
10:00 – 11:00 a.m. Paper 6: Joshua Gans (Melbourne Business School) and Scott Stern (Northwestern
U. Kellogg School of Management) “Patents, Papers & Secrecy: The Disclosure of
Scientific and Commercial Knowledge” (paper in PDF)
Discussant: Christopher Snyder (Dartmouth College)
11:00 – 11:15 a.m. Break
11:15 – 11:45 p.m. Keynote Talk: Andrew Odlyzko (U. Minnesota School of Mathematics)
“The Perils of Technological Forecasting”
11:45 – 12:45 p.m. Lunch
12:45 – 1:45 p.m. Paper 7: Avi Goldfarb (U. Toronto Rotman School of Management)
“Search Engine Advertising: Pricing Ads to Context” (paper in PDF)
Discussant: Patrick Jordan (U. Michigan Dept. of Computer Science)
1:45 – 2:45 p.m. Paper 8: Marc Rysman (Boston U. Dept.of Economics)
“Platform Pricing at Sportscard Conventions”
Discussant: Pai-Ling Yin (MIT Sloan School of Management)
2:45 – 3:00 p.m. Break
3:00 – 4:00 p.m. Paper 9: Doh-Shin Jeon (U. Pompeu Fabra Dept. of Econ. and Business)
“The Pricing of Academic Journals: A Two-Sided Market Perspective” (paper in PDF)
Discussant: Oz Shy (U. Haifa and U. Michigan)
4:00 – 5:00 p.m. Keynote Talk: Ted Bergstrom (U.C. Santa Barbara)
“Dealing with Big Deals” (paper in PDF)
5:00 p.m. Adjourn