A: The access principle holds that with a form of knowledge that is constituted as a public good, which is the case with research and scholarship, the knowledge should be circulated as widely and publicly as possible, especially as that wider circulation increases the value and quality of that knowledge. The Internet, as a new publishing medium, is proving itself capable of a considerable increase in access and circulation over print, and we are thus compelled to explore how this medium can contribute all that it can to this principle.
Q: Many publishers argue that journals and materials for which one must pay are somehow by definition of higher quality than various open models. How do you respond?
A: The empirical evidence argues otherwise: For example, the Public Library of Science (PLoS) Biology, a relatively new open access journal that operates on author fees, has the highest “impact factor” (number of times articles are cited) by a considerable margin among biology journals indexed by the ISI Web of Science. But that is only part of the quality story. The majority of journals now allow their authors to “self archive” their published articles in open access institutional repositories (usually located in the author’s university library). But note that in all cases, someone pays, though it is not necessarily the reader, and these alternatives are greatly increasing access to this knowledge.
Q: What economic models could allow those who publish journals to embrace the access principle? How can costs be covered?
A: First, there are now open access approaches that call for no change to the current financial models that most journals follow: There are journals, as I noted, whose policies permit authors to self-archive the final version in their library or on their Web site, while other journals grant open access six months or more after the initial publication of their otherwise subscription-controlled content. Then, too, there are new economic models for open access publishing based on the reduced costs afforded by online systems, which is where my Public Knowledge Project comes in, with its open source software (Open Journal Systems) for managing and publishing journals that significantly reduces costs. As societies and publishers move to online editions, and away from print — in the face of libraries canceling print editions when they have a choice — the reduced publishing costs can enable forms of open access, through author fees, society subsidies and institutional support. I would add that there can be no sense of fixed costs that need to be met in scholarly publishing as long as journal subscription prices range, as they currently do, from hundreds of dollars to, in at least one case, over $20,000. [...]
Q: How do you think scholarly publishing will be different five years from now?
A: The scholarly publishing of journals will move increasingly online, with print editions eventually disappearing, and, and thanks to the efforts of open access advocates, this move will lead to a far greater proportion of the literature available through some form of open access, in what can only be called a mixed knowledge economy. The resulting increase in global and public access may well prove to be the best thing that has happened to research and scholarship in some time.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 12/20/2005 09:37:00 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.
