Adam Penenberg, Academic Journals Open to Change, Wired News, June 9, 2005. Excerpt: 'Seven years ago, Michael Eisen, an assistant professor of genetics and development at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, proposed a program to link experimental data from his lab to relevant pieces of scientific literature. At the time, it seemed a no-brainer. Most scientific journals had begun publishing online, and Eisen believed a system to connect raw data to existing research might produce a multiplier effect. Scientists have always built on the work of other scientists, and he knew that the internet could have a profound impact on the pace of scientific discovery. He and his postdoctoral adviser, Pat Brown, fully expected cooperation from Stanford Library, which hosts a large number of scientific journals. "Instead," Eisen recalled, "we were told that the articles we wanted belonged to the publishers and we should basically piss off." It had never occurred to Eisen that publishers could own scientific literature. He was offended by the idea that scientists could be wronged by copyright. This went double for the public, whose tax dollars pay for much of the scientific research undertaken today. "All of a sudden, I saw how ridiculous this system was in the internet age," he said, "and I've been working to change it ever since." In October 2000, Eisen, Brown and Harold Varmus, a former director of the National Institutes of Health, co-founded the Public Library of Science, or PLoS....[Foundations and universities] pay the bulk of the $10 billion that goes to scientific and medical publishers each year, and what do they get in return? Limited access to the research they funded, and no right to reuse the information. "It's ridiculous to give publishers complete control of an invaluable resource that they had an extremely limited role in creating," Eisen said.'
Posted by
Peter Suber at 6/09/2005 08:03:00 AM.
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.
