Tag Archives: Open Access

A shift in open access policy in Canada?

A shift in open access policy in Canada?

Instead of 6 month, what gave researchers a leg to stand on when negotiating a shorter embargo period with publishers, the Canadian Institute for Health and Research (CIHR), wants scientists to publish within 12 month.

As of January, 2013, CIHR-funded researchers will be required to make their peer-reviewed publications accessible at no cost within 12 months of publication – at the latest. While the revised Policy provides researchers with clear guidance on CIHR’s minimum expectation, in the spirit of public benefits of research, CIHR continues to encourage researchers to make their publications accessible for free as soon as possible after publication. Compliance with the Open Access Policy will continue to be monitored through end of grant reporting.

See also this bog entry.

Open Access to scientific research can save lives

Open Access to scientific research can save lives

Peter Suber, director of the Harvard Open Access Project, and Darius Cuplinskas, director of the Information Program at the Open Society Foundations, want open access to become the default method and vote for the development of effective open-access policies.

The economic benefits of open access are estimated to be in the hundreds of billions of dollars. The decision to place the results of the Human Genome Project in the public domain without delay, for example, helped ensure that scientists everywhere can use the data. The $3.8-billion investment in the project has had an estimated economic impact of $796-billion.

No hard targets for gold open access

No hard targets for gold open access

Paul Jump on the Research Council’s open access strategies:

Research Councils UK has insisted it will not punish universities that publish a lower proportion of gold open access papers than it envisaged in its allocation of block grants for article fees – provided the block grants are not misused.

See also the discussion on Implementing Finch.

The OA Interviews: Harvard’s Stuart Shieber

The OA Interviews: Harvard’s Stuart Shieber

Stuart Shieber is the Welch Professor of Computer Science at Harvard University,Faculty Co-Director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, Director of Harvard’s Office for Scholarly Communication (OSC),  and chief architect of the Harvard Open Access (OA) Policy — a 2008 initiative that has seen Harvard become a major force in the OA movement.

If research is not reproducible then what is the point in publishing?

If research is not reproducible then what is the point in publishing?

Marcus D. Hanwell, open science activist and Technical Lead in the scientific computing group of a private company, calls for open access to research publications.

We need to work harder to engage people in the work we are doing, especially those of us who are funded by the various research agencies and trusts from around the world. We need to take a stand against publishers demanding too many rights over our work, which we give to them freely thanks to the funding we receive.

Open Access eBooks: the next big thing?

Open Access eBooks: the next big thing?

A well researched article on the development in open access book publishing.

There are several models: from free to read (all rights reserved); to free to use and reuse (CC-BY); to non commercial and/or no derivatives. In terms of formats, it’s a case of online versus downloads. From online reading only (HTML, e-reader formats) to PDF (personal copy) or both. OA book publishing motives range from front list publishing to a back list long tail approach. Some have a dedicated OA programme or service traditional monographs.

The costs of Open Access

The costs of Open Access

The Sanford C. Berstein Research, widely recognized as Wall Street’s premier sell-side research firm in releasing independent surveys of major institutional clients,  has published data on Elsevier’s possible cost savings due to the probable introduction of open access:

We estimate that a full transition to OA could lead to savings in the region of 10-12% of the cost base of a subscription publisher. 

Open Access to publicly funded scientific research has just been approved in the European Parliament.

Open Access to publicly funded scientific research has just been approved in the European Parliament.

This is attempted to be announced as “Victory for the >Academic Spring<”.

Read the Sample of new Rules of Participation in Horizon 2020.

See also the discussion on the conservative shift - to compensate scientific publishers in case of economic loss - of the Horizon 2020. In German & English.

We need to talk about open access

We need to talk about open access

But the duty of implementation falls not only to librarians. Researchers are just as responsible for making OA work but, unfortunately, many have yet to pick up this issue with serious intent. They are too busy and too inured to traditional modes of operation (and impact factors). But we need to talk to more of them so that this issue can break out of library committees and out of the blogosphere. Ideas for how to do that are most welcome.

Stephen Curry. 

The Global Young Academy (GYA) embraces Open Science movement as being in the best interest of science

The Global Young Academy (GYA) embraces Open Science movement as being in the best interest of science

The Global Young Academy issued a position statement that identifies obstacles that currently stand in the way of giving free access to scientific results and data, and advocates ways forward that will transform scientific research into a truly global endeavour. The GYA calls for scientific results to be made freely available for scientists around the world and for future generations.

Responses to 50 Shades of Grey in Scientific Publication

The recent blogpost 50 Shades of Grey in Scientific Publication: How Digital Publishing Is Harming Science in the Huffington Post by Dr. Douglas Fields generated quite a few responses. 

Have a look at the whole story: See also our post from October, 20th 2012.


Open access dialog ‚Publish open access or perish?‘

Open access dialog 'Publish open access or perish?'

The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) will give a combination of a symposium and a workshop on publish open access. Amsterdam, February, 6th 2013, 1-5pm. Registration is free.

After an introduction by Cameron Neylon (PLoS) and Martin Rasmussen (Copernicus Publications), participants will discuss several statements relating to open access of publications, in both small groups and in a plenary session. The aim of this KNAW open access dialog is to raise awareness of open access by discussing controversial statements. In this way, advantages and disadvantages of the various publication models as well as do’s and don’ts will be considered.

Why all pharmaceutical research should be made open access

Why all pharmaceutical research should be made open access

The government wants to make all publicly funded research available – but the same must be demanded of pharmas also.

Cory Doctorow’s column series Digital Rights, Digital Wrongs for The Guardian.

Read also this blog entry on open access to all data from clinical trials by Tom Jefferson, member of the Open Knowledge Foundation.

This article on how open data can save money refers to Tom Jefferson’s blog entry advising that

pharmaceutical companies must release all the results of their clinical trials as open data, so that independent researchers can check what has been found.

The Denton Declaration as Open Data Manifesto invites to contribute by signing the declaration

The Denton Declaration as Open Data Manifesto invites to contribute by signing the declaration

Intentions of the Denton Declaration, a project initiated by Open Acces @ UNT, of the University of North Texas are:

  • A culture of openness in research.
  • A federated model of archiving data to enable discoverability, transparency, and open access.
  • A robust and sustainable funding regime for research data management infrastructure (technical, policy, and human resources).
  • The development and adoption of metadata standards for research data.
  • Long-term access to data that supports published research outputs.
  • Support for researchers in negotiations with publishers to allow open access to research in repositories.
  • Recognition of researchers’ intellectual property in data and scholarly research outputs.

Does science need ‚open evaluation‘ in addition to ‚open access?‘

Does science need 'open evaluation' in addition to 'open access?'

Scientists, not publishers, are in the best position to develop a fair evaluation process for scientific papers. (…) “Peer reviews should be made public information, like the scientific papers themselves.” (says Nikolaus Kriegeskorte, MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, Univesity of Cambridge, UK).