Open Access News

News from the open access movement


Sunday, February 11, 2007

Profile of BMC

David Weinberger, BioMed Central and Open Science Endeavors, The Filter, January 2007.  Scroll to article [1].  Excerpt:

BioMed Central is a commercial publisher of peer-reviewed scientific research that permits open (= free) access to all of its content. In so doing, it happens to exemplify a whole bunch of trends, many of which are associated with "Web 2.0." It is not a voice from the future, describing visions we cannot yet imagine. It's in some ways more valuable than that, for it's an existing business, dealing with the future in practical ways. In it we can see not just where the Web may go, but where it is right now: ...

[U]nlike most scientific journals, at BMC readers don't pay. Why not? Because putting knowledge behind a wall with a slot for dollar bills makes our species stupider. And given the economic differences in the ability to pay, it cuts off too much of the world. So, BMC's business model incorporates a sense of responsibility to the community, not just to the investors....

BMC makes its processes as transparent as possible....

BMC...urges scientists to publish their raw data so that others can mine it for knowledge....

BMC makes the reliability of its information apparent....

BMC provides a mix of top-down and bottom-up metadata....

BMC "intertwingles" its content, spinning a Web of links....

It has lots of feeds....

BMC experiments....

BMC does not pretend it's perfect....

It's not just open, it's generous....[Openness] encourages others to take content and make more of it. Generosity has built the Web....