JISC posted a short note yesterday on the Harold Varmus and Bob Campbell interview on the BBC. JISC's comment on OA: "Traditionally University researchers and other academic authors give papers they have written to publishers free of charge. These authors in turn have usually been funded to undertake their research, somewhat indirectly, by the taxpayer. Publishers will then use these papers to help populate the journals they publish, whether electronically or on paper. The irony, as some see it, is that the publishers then sell subscriptions to sets of their journals back to Universities, who are also funded through government. Thus it can be argued that the traditional models have the potential to hinder access to research, which has been publicly funded in the first place. This anomaly is exacerbated by the fact that subscription charges to journals, which institutions must pay, have risen above the cost of inflation. Open Access, on the other hand, which JISC is endorsing (through its Open Access Programme), means that researchers pay the publishers a fee when their papers are accepted for publication. This money comes out of their research grants, which can usually be sourced from public funds."
Posted by
Peter Suber at 3/11/2004 08:37:00 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.
