CENDI, the group of science and technology information managers for US federal agencies, has released the minutes of its Principals and Alternates Meeting from January 6, 2009:
#3 Promote public access (PA) to Government-funded R&D results....
Public access requires an open repository. The PubMed Central repository infrastructure is freely available and is being used internationally. A lighter weight version was just installed in the United Kingdom, and a joint activity is underway with the Canadian Institute of Health Research and CISTI. The Archival DTD for journal articles used in PubMed Central has been endorsed by the LOC and the British Library as an archival standard for journal literature. NAL [National Agricultural Library] has also developed a repository based on DSpace for final published versions of intramural publications.
The value of public access to education, including K-12, is huge. Innovation and advancement come from this public access. The Human Genome Project proved that public access to scientific data produced by both publicly and privately funded research groups fuels scientific discovery and commercial innovation. There are barriers to sharing within the agencies and some federal libraries are buying back agency materials in journal issues because they can’t get them any other way. Getting the results from grants is actually more difficult than from contractors. However, activities are underway. NIST [National Institute of Standards and Technology] is doing interim and other project report formats. Environmental conservation data is being included in the Biodiversity Heritage Library, which is being created through a partnership including the Smithsonian....
#9 Support improved health care and better disaster preparedness and response through the development of an interoperable health information technology infrastructure....
The Interagency Working Group on Digital Data (IWGDD) is one of several working groups under the Committee on Science of the National Science and Technology Council (NSTC) of the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). There are 29 members including a number of CENDI members. There has been good participation with some of the very best data people involved.
The charge to the group was to develop a strategic plan and promote its implementation....
There are three core recommendations in the IWGDD’s report. A Standing Subcommittee is essential to continue promotion and implementation of the recommendations. Appropriate departments and agencies should lay the foundation for agency digital scientific data policy and make the policy publicly available. Agency projects should be required to submit data management plans....
It was suggested that the Public Access debates might provide some lessons learned that would be valuable for ensuring data generator compliance....Each proposal should be required to state the broad impact expected by making the data from the research available. The Data Management Plan formalizes these issues....
The European Union is increasingly turning to open data to encourage economic growth. This has always been the US approach....
Comment
Don't overlook this bit: "[S]ome federal [agency] libraries are buying back agency materials in journal issues because they can’t get them any other way." That gives some sense of the value of (1) having an OA repository of agency research output, (2) requiring deposit at the time an article is accepted for publication.
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.
