Blimey – it’s nearly Christmas, and I haven’t written anything for a whole month … how on earth did that happen?
Well it’s not something that I or any other freelancer am likely to regret, for the simple reason that I’ve had plenty of work to keep me busy, focused and solvent for the past couple of months. After all, when you’re usually lurching from feast to famine, who knows where the next assignment will come from?
Now that the year is drawing to a close, I’m doing the blog post equivalent of kicking off my shoes, slumping onto the sofa and pouring myself a large glass of Merlot while leafing through news that I’ve missed …
The New Publishing Standard discusses what may lie ahead for the publishing industry when President-Elect Trump takes office, both in terms of defamation laws in the US (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/batten-down-hatches-implications-trump-presidency-mark-williams–9nl2e/) and the feared rise in redundancies in the UK publishing industry (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/redundancies-uk-publishing-misleading-snapshot-2024-mark-williams–dxexe/).
In the continuing ‘generative AI in publishing’ debate in the Scholarly Kitchen, Janet Salmons’ simmering fury over the collection and regurgitation of copyright-protected publications by generative AI companies for the purposes of ‘training’ (and making loads of money) pulls no punches (https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2024/11/20/guest-post-supply-chain-of-writing-fools/), while The Publishers Association expresses similar concerns as it participates in the UK government’s public consultation on the UK’s legal framework for AI and copyright (https://publishingperspectives.com/2024/12/the-publishers-association-on-the-uks-ai-consultation/).
This month, the BMJ Group launched four new open access journals (BMJ Connections Clinical Genetics and Genomics, BMJ Connections Oncology, BMJ Digital Health & AI, and JME Practical Bioethics) and one new hybrid publishing model journal (BMJ Immunology) (https://www.sspnet.org/community/news/bmj-group-adds-five-new-titles-to-journal-portfolio/). Meanwhile, the scholarly publisher Sage has acquired Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.; the latter will retain its branding for its existing journals, while some Sage life sciences and medical journals will be published under the Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. imprint (https://www.sagepub.com/explore-our-content/press-office/press-releases/2024/12/13/sage-acquires-the-scientific-and-medical-publisher-mary-ann-liebert-inc).
Consider yourself updated – now stop scrolling and get on with wrapping those presents!
Happy holidays to each and every one of you, and especially to all my wonderful clients and colleagues, past and present!