INASP (International Network for the Availability
of Scientific Publications) and ACU (Association
of Commonwealth Universities), through their
Publishers for Development initiative, recently
hosted an online discussion on the question, 'Why
are publishers participating in developing country access initiatives?'
All participants were learned society and
commercial scholarly publishers (publishing in
all sectors, including health). The results of
the discussion are provided below. ...
There are a number of major access initiatives -
and many smaller schemes focused on specific
disciplines or even individual titles - which
enable developing country researchers and
students to access scholarly information freely
at point of use. Commonly these are focused on
supplying free or proportionately priced access
to academic journals and databases, but there are
also several support programmes which aim to
strengthen the capacity of libraries to access
and use these resources more effectively.
Publishers already provide considerable support
to these schemes, offering proportionately
discounted access to their principal titles - or
in some cases free access - most often in
electronic form, but occasionally also for print
subscriptions where libraries still struggle to
make good use of online information. ...
Some key motivations for publishers’ participation:
A moral argument:
For many there is an important moral or
philanthropic argument. Publishers, committed to
advancing scholarly and scientific investigation,
wish to extend access as widely as they can, and
to ensure as many people as possible can reap the
benefits of research. Developing countries are
unable to pay ‘market rates’ but publishers can
help by making subscriptions more affordable,
thereby ensuring the digital and academic divide is narrowed.
The business case:
This moral argument is also underpinned by a
business case. Publishers’ key objective is to
serve their authors as well as they can. Making
sure that their publications - and thus their
authors’ research - are disseminated as widely as
possible is central to this. ... Discussion
also noted that as well as serving the authors
some publishers serve society partners who have
this dissemination as part of their articles of existence. ...
Authors are not so much interested in the
quantity of readers, but that the "right" people
are reading - that can be those that have
influence over their careers or those that could
advance their research by putting it into direct practice. ...
See also our past posts on INASP and on developing country access initiatives, such as HINARI.
Posted by
Gavin Baker at 7/02/2009 07:48:00 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.
