John Blossom observes in Shore News Commentary that “it’s not the best of times for independent scholarly journal publishers, a fact that keeps them moving towards distributors with more marketing and distribution savvy.” Blackwell have announced 39 new publishing partnerships and 59 journal titles added to its list for 2006. Six hundred and sixty-five societies now partner with Blackwell (Blackwell Publishing Press Room)

With major players keen to grow their lists and independent societies worried about the impact of online publishing (and, of course, open access) I suspect this is likely to be a growing trend.

(via Peter Suber.)