Four important UK research organizations have produced a succinct FAQ on open access, Questions and answers about opening up access to research results. The four organizations are Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC), Research Councils UK (RCUK), Council for the Central Laboratory for the Research Councils (CLRC), and the Research Libraries Network (RLN). Currently, 10 of the 12 questions are about OA archiving and two about OA journals. From the introduction: 'Our four organisations believe that, as a matter of principle, the outputs of publicly funded research should be made available as widely and rapidly as possible. Hence we are taking steps to encourage free on-line access to research results. This document briefly describes what is meant by Open Access and repositories and attempts to answer some common questions that researchers pose....The day is approaching when anybody, anywhere with a computer and internet connection will be able to access research data or scholarly journal articles, free of charge, as soon as they are placed on-line. In future, researchers whose institutions cannot afford journal subscriptions will nonetheless be able to access articles describing the results of publicly funded research....To stimulate these changes, we are encouraging researchers to place their papers in digital repositories. We are backing up our action with our own research and development programmes to address the key issues as they arise.'
(PS: This is a useful document --as important for its clear answers as for its institutional backers. It also gives an encouraging glimpse of the still-forthcoming RCUK policy on OA.)
Posted by
Peter Suber at 5/28/2005 09:35:00 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.
