Here are two articles from the December issue of BioScience. In both cases, not even an abstract is free online, at least so far. (Thanks to Donat Agosti.)
Timothy M. Beardsley, Who Pays for Publication? An editorial. Excerpt: 'The immediate impetus to [Ellen Paul's] concern [see second article, below] (and that of [the American Institute of Biological Sciences]) is a startling proposal that was issued last September by Elias Zerhouni, director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). In line with recommendations from the US House of Representatives Appropriations Committee, Zerhouni proposed that within six months of publication, articles resulting in whole or in part from NIH-funded research be made available online to the public at no cost. Copyright be damned, he might have added. [PS reply.] By mandating open-access publication in what would have to be a huge government-funded database, Zerhouni's scheme threatens the ability of not-for-profit, as well as commercial, publishers to cover the costs of peer review, editing, and production by the traditional method of charging libraries and individuals for subscriptions. [PS reply.] ...Scientists understandably like the idea of their work being made widely available, and many societies are studying methods for increasing access. It remains to be seen whether scientists will be as enthusiastic about paying the several thousand dollars per article that even not-for-profit publishers would have to charge, over the long term, for open-access publication. [PS reply.]'
Ellen Paul, Warning: Open Access May Be Hazardous to the Health of Your Scientific Society. Excerpt: 'For most scientists, the open-access controversy has seemed to come out of the blue. All of a sudden, government policies about free online access to research publications are looming, catching scientific societies by surprise. In fact, the issue has been simmering for years. A timeline maintained by Peter Suber, an open-access advocate at Earlham College, shows the first open-access journal appearing in 1990. It is telling that Suber's timeline actually begins in the 1960s, with the development of the Internet. Call it open access, or call it free-and-easy access --it must be reckoned with. As NIH director Elias Zerhouni said in a meeting with publishers and scientific societies, "the status quo is not an option." Neither is a government-mandated, inflexible model that ignores the concerns of small, nonprofit scientific societies. An important issue with serious consequences requires a more thoughtful, nuanced approach that allows everyone --including authors, publishers, and nonprofits-- time to adapt to this radical change in scientific publishing.' (PS: I have only two very general replies to Ellen Paul's article. First, publishers have had time and will have more time to adapt to the NIH policy. Second, continuously rising subscription prices are hazardous to the health of a journal, the research niche it serves, and the scientific society that become dependent on the revenue.)
Posted by
Peter Suber at 1/05/2005 03:30:00 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.
