From Outsell's e-briefs for February 27, 2004: "Not a week goes by without new actions and declarations within the academic world regarding the serials crisis and the growing willingness of libraries to push back on major publishers offering unattractive bundled access deals. What's new now is that the resistance (and the attendant support for open access alternatives) is moving up and out of the library to higher levels of university administration. Explicit criticisms of traditional publishers are often part of these declarations - particularly Elsevier, which continues to be the lightning rod for academia's frustrations. This week's latest examples: - William Destler, Provost of the University of Maryland, issued a statement of support for the actions of the university's libraries in canceling access to bundled collections in order to retain the ability to cancel specific Elsevier titles. - The Faculty Senate at Stanford University adopted a resolution supporting library moves to cancel some subscriptions and encouraging faculty to withhold articles from certain publishers. There is increasing solidarity among the libraries whose budgets are in the middle of the crisis, the faculties whose members contribute the content, and the university administrators who wind up paying the bills. They are taking action to regain control over the millions they spend on content, even at the short-term cost of disrupted consortial deals. Whether or not open access ultimately gains ground as an alternative, it's clear that the current model is breaking up."
Posted by
Peter Suber at 3/02/2004 12:02:00 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.
