One of the charges levelled against the author-pays model of open access is that it will make it more difficult for authors from poorer countries to get their research published. David Spurgeon, in a paper in this week's BMJ (BMJ 2004;328:1337) highlights a more significant problem: the under representation of '3rd world' health issues in the leading medical journals. This suggests that the chief issue facing poorer countries is not page charges, or even access to journals, but in getting funding for research on their principal health challenges.
Posted by
Health Perspectives at 6/04/2004 02:54:00 AM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
