Rick Johnson, Director of SPARC, just sent this message to SPARC members. I blog it here with his permission.
I want to alert you about an important development. Yesterday the U.S. House of Representatives Appropriations Committee approved an important provision in connection with the FY 2005 National Institutes of Health (NIH) appropriation. The Committee Report accompanying the FY 2005 Labor, HHS, Education and Related Agencies Appropriations Bill recommends that NIH provide free public access to research articles resulting from NIH-funded research. The Report calls on NIH to offer access to authors' final manuscripts (as accepted for journal publication) and supplemental materials via PubMed Central six months after publication. If the grantee used NIH funds to pay any publication charges (e.g., page or color charges, or fees for digital distribution), PMC access would be immediate. The Report instructs NIH to inform the Committee by December 1, 2004 how it intends to implement the policy.
This proposal is a reasoned, incremental step that balances the interests of taxpayers and publishers. We believe it will enhance the nation's return on investment in NIH research and contribute to the translation of bench science into clinical practice.
SPARC and its allies are working to ensure that the proposal is endorsed in the Senate. In the coming days I will share with you additional information, including steps you can take to demonstrate your support.
PS: This is extraordinarily important news. It sensibly focuses on OA archiving, which leaves authors free to publish in non-OA journals if they like. It sensibly avoids the mistakes of the Sabo bill, such as needlessly requiring the public domain rather than open access and needlessly interfering with patentable discoveries. The NIH is the largest funder of science in the US federal government, five times larger than the second-largest funder, the NSF. Expect opposition, and be prepared to support this proposal through personal and institutional letters to members of Congress. I'll report further details as I get them.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 7/15/2004 10:49:00 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.
