How Society Publishers Can Compete Today

I wish to describe a situation that I often come across and then try to explain how it came about. What are its implications for scholarly communications and library consortia in particular, and can we project into the future to think about how this situation could evolve?

So here is the situation. Please note that throughout this discussion, I am presenting the case as professional societies see it. I frequently am contacted by these societies to help them with their publishing programs. Most of these societies are in the STM area, but humanists occasionally make that phone call, too. Virtually all of these conversations are about journals, not books or databases. I should add that I am not the only person who gets these calls. There is a whole little industry of consultants who work with professional societies. This is because not-for-profit professional societies often lack experienced business people, so the leadership looks outside when problems arise.