What happens when the value of your content is extracted, summarized, and delivered via an AI tool … and the audience stops there? As highlighted in The Scholarly Kitchen , this emerging dynamic, known as “the Crocodile Effect,” places AI systems between publishers and their audiences, consuming value while limiting downstream engagement. Recent data underscores the problem and urgency to address it. Publishers across industries – not just scholarly – are seeing dramatic declines in traffic, and AI-driven upstream interfaces, though growing, contribute only a fraction of overall referrals. At the same time, emerging “zero-click” behaviors on search engines, social media, and AI driven platforms are conditioning users to expect answers without leaving the platform. This dynamic is particularly acute in scholarly publishing: highly structured, fact-rich content is uniquely susceptible to being summarized, recombined, and delivered elsewhere. This creates a growing threat to how publishers capture and sustain value from their content through audience engagement. What’s at stake for scholarly publishers The implications go well beyond traffic metrics for scholarly publishers. The traditional model depends on a chain of value: discovery → access → engagement → monetization (via subscriptions, APCs, licensing, advertising, institutional relationships, etc.). AI summaries disrupt that chain at the very first step. When key findings, data points, or interpretations are surfaced directly in AI interfaces: Attribution becomes diluted , weakening brand recognition and authority. Engagement declines , reducing usage along with opportunities for deeper reading, citation, and reuse. Monetization pathways erode , particularly where metrics like cost per download (CPD), impressions, and click through rate (CTR) are used to determine value, collection development, and ad spend. Content integrity risks increase , as summaries may omit nuance, context, or limitations critical in scholarly work. In effect, publishers are providing the foundation for the knowledge economy without benefit, while AI platforms capture increasing portions of the user relationship. What can you do in response? Delta Think partners with publishers to address these issues, focusing on the following strategic areas related to usage and engagement: 1. Reassess what constitutes “value” in your content If core insights can be summarized and consumed elsewhere, publishers must emphasize elements that are harder to replicate. The question shifts from “How do we get clicks?” to “What experiences require coming to us?” 2. Strengthen direct relationships with audiences Invest or partner in channels where there is visibility. Developing strategies that involve your society networks, institutional integrations, and researcher and author workflows allow you to maintain direct engagement with readers and authors. 3. Optimize for visibility within AI ecosystems Conduct research to evaluate how your content is represented and implement recommendations to address problem areas. This includes assessment and development of metadata strategies, structured content, licensing approaches, and partnerships that ensure accurate attribution and appropriate use. 4. Explore new monetization and licensing models Identify the right approaches and determine the right deals for your content, while maintaining overall portfolio integrity. 5. Differentiate through utility and trust Lean into this by establishing your market positioning as an essential destination for validation. Establish your voice based on voice-of-the-customer market research methodologies to ensure your messaging establishes you as the authoritative source for verification, context, and deeper understanding. 6. Monitor and measure emerging referral dynamics Identify and implement new ways of tracking influence, reach, and downstream impact beyond clicks to demonstrate and quantify your value. What’s Next: Work with Delta Think to Turn the AI Threat into an AI Benefit Delta Think has expertise in all the areas outlined above. We ensure organizations develop actionable strategies to address current market changes and dynamics. The rise of AI-mediated discovery and zero-click experiences is an active and accelerating shift that requires evidence-based decision-making today. This is where Delta Think thrives. Our expert insights provide publishers with the data needed to understand where their exposure to AI-driven disintermediation is greatest, how usage patterns are evolving across channels, and which strategic responses are most likely to drive sustainable value. This includes identifying where traffic loss is most acute, where new forms of engagement are emerging, and how content, data, and licensing strategies must adapt in response. Delta Think can guide you in the development of a successful strategy that ensures the sustainability of your publishing program. Lori Carlin and Heather Staines will be attending the upcoming STM Annual Conference (April 22-23, Washington, DC) and SSP Annual Meeting (May 27-29, Chula Vista, CA), and Heather will be at the 2026 CSE Meeting (May 3-5, Durham, NC), so please reach out to set up a check in and continue the conversation. Not traveling this spring? We are always available at info@deltathink.com .

This month we examine our latest data about Article Processing Charges (APCs). Per article pricing is a fundamental building block for all paid publishing models, so our review provides an invaluable insight into how the cost of open access continues to evolve. APC prices in general continue to increase, but at a slower rate compared with this time last year. Important nuances in the distribution of prices continue to affect the value and cost of paid publishing models. Background Each year we survey the list price Article Processing Charges of a sample of more than 40 scholarly publishers. Our dataset covers more than 20,000 titles dating back to 2016 and represents one of the most comprehensive reviews of open access pricing. To compare like for like, we consistently analyze non-discounted, CC BY APCs. We take a snapshot annually in January, so we can track yearly changes while controlling for publisher price changes throughout the calendar year. Our statistics here exclude zero or unspecified APCs, although these are present in our underlying data (and available to our subscribers). This allows us to capture trends where publishers choose to charge APCs without skewing averages. We run separate analyses around APC-free models. Headline Changes Going into 2026, we see APC prices increasing, but the percentage increases continue to fall back to track long-term trends. Fully OA APC list prices across our sample have risen by around 6.8% compared with 6.4% this time last year. Hybrid APC list prices have risen by an average of 5.3% compared with 3% this time last year. Maximum APCs for fully OA journals remain at $8,900. Maximum APCs for hybrid journals now top out at $12,850 (up $160 from last year). Average APC prices have increased more this year than last year. However, the increases remain lower than the highs of a couple of years ago. Underlying trends continue. Average APC price increases are getting larger each year. There are approximately 2.4x more hybrid journals than fully OA ones, down from 2.6x last year, and 2.9x a year before that. The proportion of journals that are hybrid is slowly falling. However, because they are the majority, hybrid journals follow (or, rather, set) a similar pattern to the market overall. On average, fully OA prices are around 67% of those of hybrids – consistent with long-term trends. Around 24% of our sample of fully OA journals charge no APCs, compared with 22% last year. (We have separately analyzed the number of articles in OA journals.) Price increases vary significantly by discipline. Fully OA Arts and Humanities journals saw larger than average increases; Multidisciplinary journals saw lower than average increases. Price Distribution Market-wide headline price changes mask important nuances. We have discussed previously that the most important nuance lies in the spread of prices within a given publisher’s portfolio. For example, if the bulk of a publisher’s journals lie towards the lower end of its APC pricing, with just a few journals priced at the higher end, the average (mean) price will be higher than most authors pay. The following figures show how the spread of APC prices plays out in the market across our sample of publishers. The figures are outlines of histograms, showing how many titles sit in various price bands over the successive years of data we have curated. The red line shows the most recent year’s prices. The lines become more green as they go further back in time. Subscribers to Delta Think’s Data & Analytics Tool can see full details of the Number of Titles and Price Band axes. Hybrid Prices The spread of price bands for hybrid journals is shown in Figure 1 below.