Many of our top scientists and academics publish affordable books that are well cited and seen as seminal work. However, there are also books that go on sale for $1000 or more, written by relatively unknown authors, supposedly to disseminate knowledge and research.
- Who buys these books (individuals or libraries spending someone else's money)?
- Who writes these books (does it indicate author quality or motivation issues)?
- Who publishes these books (are 4 (or even 3) figure prices a sign of 'predatory' publishers)?
If we use citation as an indicator of who has read and valued them, is there some sort of correlation between making a book financially available, and the real contribution it makes to our field (e.g. increased price = less access = less citation +/- less worth)?
It's a good question. I also have observed such kind of circumstances. The book price is relatively dependent on the value of the author and at the same time how the printing companies add price to the existing worth of the author. I hope there can be scientific proof for this claim.
One area is the books that have multiple authors ('collected papers', 'handbook of X', 'encyclopedia of Y'. These are often useful reference books, but they are often over-priced (you don't see these sorts of prices in a book store for 'civilian' books). So what makes us different? Is it because we often buy these books with someone else's money (book grants, libraries, etc.)? If so, it doesn't say much for our ethics ...
First of all, "worth" cannot be assessed easily - it's multidimensional for a start, and one reader may give the verdict "bad", while another might say "excellent"! So that measure goes away, as it is not uniform among buyers. Next: price. Easier, especially if there is one version of the sturdy type (hard cover) and a soft cover one with a much lower price - those options are very good to have. I have several hundred books in my office - some bought with my own money, some with grant money. I have seen that some publishing houses have a rather a lot higher prices for all books that they sell, while we have Dover Publications, that re-print famous math books almost for free. I like them, and therefore I have two of my books issued by them.
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