Rep. Istook asked Dr. Zerhouni about the NIH public access policy, saying that the report indicates that there are “still problems with the policy as most research is not being made available.” He asked “what do we need to do to stimulate the public access policy?”
In response, Dr. Zerhouni reviewed the policy goals and conceded that “it seems the voluntary policy is just not enough” and that he will have to review the recommendations of the NLM Board of Regents. However, he said the 6 to 12 months is “a different issue” about the economic viability of publishing and peer review. He called this “the sweet spot” and said “I don't think we should do anything at the expense of peer review.”
There are two pieces of good news here. (1) Dr. Zerhouni thinks a mandate may be necessary and, contrary to appearances, even easier to adopt than a shorter embargo. (2) There's good evidence that the "sweet spot" for biomedical journals is considerably shorter than six months (more on this later), giving us a fair chance to answer his doubts.
I'll blog the official transcript of this dialog as soon as I can in order to confirm the accuracy of this account.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 4/06/2006 04:36:00 PM.
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.
