Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) recently sent written questions to the NIH about its public-access policy and received written replies. Sen. Harkin is the ranking Democrat on the Senate Subcommittee that appropriates funds for the NIH. Some of Sen. Harkin's questions are the same as those posted yesterday from Sen. Durbin. For these, the NIH answers and my comments are the same. Here's what's new:
Question: I'm also concerned that the policy could place researchers in a difficult position. It's up to researchers to negotiate with publishers to get permission to post the articles in the NIH database. Since participation is voluntary, publishers might pressure researchers not to release their work at all, or to wait a full 12 months. Do you share this concern? How will you know if this pressure is taking place?
Answer: We will be gathering statistics on grantee participation rates and their specified embargo periods. An NIH Public Access Working Group of the NLM Board of Regents has been established and includes representatives of various stakeholder groups that will advise the NLM Board of Regents on implementation and assess progress in meeting the goals of the NIH Public Access Policy. The above statistics will be presented to this Working Group and, if it appears necessary, the Working Group may suggest modifications of the policy to ensure that the public archive is sufficiently timely and comprehensive.
Question: Finally, could you provide this subcommittee with a report, as soon as possible after December 1, 2005, on how many eligible articles were deposited in PubMed Central during the first six months of the policy and what the average embargo period was. Additionally, we would like to know how many articles are in the pipeline awaiting posting. Lastly, do you have any way of tracking through PubMed the number of articles supported with NIH funds but not submitted to PubMed Central? In other words, will you be able to provide both the numerator and the denominator of the equation that will demonstrate success of your policy?
Answer: We estimated that the results of NIH-supported research were published in approximately 60,000 to 65,000 articles based on the number of articles published in the last several years that contained an NIH grant number within the text. We will estimate participation by comparing the actual number of papers deposited in the NIH Manuscript Submission (NIHMS) system for a given interval with the historical average. For example, 5,000 deposited articles per month would indicate approximately 100% participation. By the close of the calendar year sufficient data should be available to make an assessment of the degree of participation. Statistics for the distribution of the embargo periods requested by authors will be readily available from the submission system.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 6/23/2005 04:23:00 PM.
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.
