[BOAI] BioMed Central Press Release

[Stevan Harnad]

              ** Apologies for Cross-Posting **

On 24-Jun-09, at 5:01 AM, Charlotte Webber (BioMed Central) wrote in  
the press release appended in full after this posting):

> The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) now requires  
> authors to publish research results into open access journals and  
> also encourages dual submission into an institutional repository.

I invite readers to review the CIHR policy below and judge whether the  
above is an accurate description of the policy or self-serving spin by  
a commercial journal publisher (and IR service-provider) promoting its  
product:

CIHR Policy on Access to Research Outputs: http://www.cihr-irsc.gc.ca/e/34846.html

-- Grant recipients are now required to make every effort to ensure  
that their peer-reviewed publications are freely accessible through  
the Publisher's website (Option #1) or an online repository as soon as  
possible and in any event within six months of publication (Option #2).

-- Under the second option, grant recipients must archive the final  
peer-reviewed full-text manuscripts immediately upon publication in a  
digital archive, such as PubMed Central or the grantees institutional  
repository. 

-- Publications must be freely accessible within six months of  
publication, where allowable and in accordance with publisher  
policies...

-- Grant recipients may also wish to submit their manuscripts to a  
journal that provides immediate open access to published articles (if  
a suitable journal exists). CIHR considers the cost of publishing in  
open access journals to be an eligible expense under the Use of Grant  
Funds.

Yes, the difference between the reality and the spin makes a  
difference: a considerable difference. The underlying issue is always  
the same: Should priority be given to requiring Green OA self- 
archiving of all journal articles to make them OA, or to publishing  
articles in Gold OA journals to make them OA?

No institution or funder on the planet "requires authors to publish  
research results into open access journals"!

This is wishful thinking on the part of the publishers of open access  
journals. And when put in the way it is put in this BMC Press Release,  
it generates confusion at a time when OA mandates are still few and  
what is needed is clarity, not self-serving spin by commercial  
publishers promoting their Gold OA journals.

Of lesser consequence, but worthy of note, are two further points  
related to the BMC press release:

(1)  "[T]he University's Supporter Membership with BioMed Central" is  
an incoherent (and self-serving) subscription-like notion that (if  
anyone gives it just a moment's careful thought) cannot scale to the  
day when many, most or all journals and publishers are Gold OA (10,000  
universities "joining" the publishers of 25,000 journals with  
individual annual memberships). "Membership" only gives the illusion  
of making any sense at all today, when a few Gold-OA journal-fleet  
publishers like BMC (now part of Springer) are promoting it to short- 
sighted and serials-stressed librarians: http://bit.ly/g62wK

(2) Re: "BioMed Central's "Open Repository" system... using BioMed  
Central's extensive open access knowledge and technology experience":   
I am of course all for promoting Institutional Repositories (IRs); but  
one cannot but feel a touch sceptical about the notion of a commercial  
Gold OA publisher "promoting" IRs when IRs are -- and let us state  
this quite openly -- fundamentally in conflict with their primary  
commercial mission, which is to promote their Gold OA product. Green  
OA simply means author self-archiving of articles published in any  
journal at all -- and most journals are non-OA journals, let alone BMC  
journals. Hence it is inescapable that Green OA self-archiving is in  
competition with Gold OA publishing at this time.

(Green OA will no longer be in competition with Gold OA once Green OA  
mandates have prevailed globally, and if and when the resulting  
universal Green OA eventually induces a universal transition to Gold  
OA by making subscriptions unsustainable. But today, for Gold OA  
publishers, promoting Green OA means promoting a rival means of  
providing OA itself, and, especially for commercial Gold OA  
publishers, that would be a bad business strategy. "Don't buy my  
product, because you can get it elsewhere for free." Hence the spin  
you see above.)

Full Disclosure: I promote and very strongly endorse University of  
Southampton's "rival" IR system (Eprints); but Eprints is  
noncommercial, free, and has, and always has had, only one agenda,  
which is to promote universal Green OA, as quickly and as effectively  
as possible. "Eprints Services," fee-based, is only offered,  
reluctantly, as an option for those institutions who insist that they  
do not wish to set up Eprints on their own, for free; and Eprints  
Services revenues are used solely to sustain and promote the use of  
the free software, and Green OA itself: http://www.eprints.org/openaccess/ 
  Moreover, I would welcome BMC's Open Repository Service as an ally,  
not a rival, if BMC ORS, too, could dedicate itself to the  
straightforward promotion of universal Green OA, without the obvious  
strains of conflict-of-interest evident in this press release.

Stevan Harnad

> News release from BioMed Central
> 24 June 2009
>
> "Canadian Excellence" strengthened by extensive adoption of open  
> access
>
> * Wilfrid Laurier University adopts Open Repository and BioMed  
> Central Membership
> * Open access movement gains ground in North America
>
> BioMed Central and Wilfrid Laurier University today announce the  
> launch of Laurier IR, an institutional repository that provides a  
> visible point of open access archiving of intellectual output for  
> all members of the University community.
>
> Built on BioMed Central's "Open Repository" system and using BioMed  
> Central's extensive open access knowledge and technology experience,  
> Laurier IR is a personalized in-house repository that will  
> significantly increase access to the university's scholarly  
> information and also highlight the talent of the Universities  
> researchers and students.
>
> Laurier University is just one many organizations globally that have  
> adopted Open Repository since its inception. Open Repository is  
> built upon DSpace, an open-source solution for accessing, managing  
> and preserving scholarly material.
>
> In addition, the University's Supporter Membership with BioMed  
> Central reduces the barriers for Laurier researchers publishing in  
> BioMed Central's open-access journals by providing researchers with  
> a 15 percent discount on the article processing charges.
>
> The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) now requires  
> authors to publish research results into open access journals and  
> also encourages dual submission into an institutional repository.  
> Complying with this mandate and also heeding wider position  
> statements from bodies such as the Canadian Library Association  
> (CLA) necessitated Wilfrid Laurier University to establish Laurier IR.
>
> Laurier IR embraces the 'open access' movement by allowing authors  
> to submit their original research directly to the repository.   
> Electronic documents, including articles, pre-prints, monographs,  
> reports, movies and databases can all be archived in the repository.
>
> The service ensures that Laurier's scholarly communication output is  
> consolidated, thus enabling researchers to broaden their knowledge  
> base through greater collaboration and also providing a central  
> point to store teaching support materials across the Laurier  
> community.
>
> Laurier University aims to build a full community structure for  
> their repository within the next 12 months which will include  
> customized designs and collections for particular groups of  
> researchers. They also hope to implement a 'content recruitment  
> strategy' to ensure that as much scholarly output from the  
> university as possible is held with the repository.
>
> Speaking of the continued development of Laurier IR said "Laurier is  
> excited to be developing an institutional repository" said Dr.  
> Deborah MacLatchy, Vice-President: Academic and Provost at Laurier.  
> "It will be an excellent way for other scholars, as well as students  
> and professionals, to access scholarly and creative works and theses  
> published by Laurier faculty and students. It increases Laurier's  
> presence internationally and extends our scholarly output to a much  
> wider audience, such as researchers in the developing world."
>
>
>
> -ENDS-
>
> Media Contact
> Matt McKay
> Head of PR
> BioMed Central
>
> Tel:  +44 (0) 203 1922 2216
> Mob: +44 (0) 7825 257 423
> Email: matthew.mckay at biomedcentral.com
>
>
> Notes to Editors:
>
> 1. BioMed Central (www.biomedcentral.com) is an STM (Science,  
> Technology and Medicine) publisher which has pioneered the open  
> access publishing model. All peer-reviewed research articles  
> published by BioMed Central are made immediately and freely  
> accessible online, and are licensed to allow redistribution and  
> reuse. BioMed Central is part of Springer Science+Business Media, a  
> leading global publisher in the STM sector.
>
> 2. For more information on the Laurier Open Research Archive,  
> contact project manager Debbie Chaves at dchaves at wlu.ca
>
> 3. Open Repository (http://www.openrepository.com/) is a service  
> from BioMed Central to build, launch, host and maintain  
> institutional repositories for organisations. Built upon the latest  
> DSpace repository software the service has been designed to be  
> flexible and cost-effective. BioMed Central's economy of scale makes  
> it possible for organisations that could not otherwise afford to, or  
> lack the infrastructure or technical capacity in-house to run their  
> own repositories.

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