... Recently, a question was raised on liblicense as to whether open access is necessary outside of the field of medicine.
The answer is: yes!!
While the moral imperative of open access is perhaps most easily seen in the field of medicine, the same arguments apply across the disciplines.
One example is the field of Education. Even at the very wealthiest universities where students and faculty have access to all the literature in this field, access to the scholarly literature for the practising educator, parents and other professionals involved in education (such as school-based social workers), is for all practical purposes limited to what is freely available. Evidence-based practice is this area - teachers who are able to keep up with the latest in their field and look up answers to issues that come up in the classroom - requires open access. School library budgets tend to be very limited; a school library that has all the resources that it needs to meet the needs of the students is indeed fortunate. A school library with sufficient resources to meet the needs of teachers and administrators is truly exceptional. ...
Posted by
Gavin Baker at 5/18/2009 07:39:00 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.
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.
