[BOAI] Major international associations join together to underscore their support for immediate open access to research articles

[Iryna Kuchma]

[Forwarded message from Maxie Putlitz]


  *Major international associations join together to underscore their
support for immediate open access to research articles*

May 14, 2014

As organizations committed to the principle that access to information
advances discovery, accelerates innovation and improves education, we
endorse the policies and practices that enable Open Access - immediate,
barrier free access to and reuse of scholarly articles.

Policies that promote Open Access are increasingly being adopted worldwide
by research funders, academic institutions and national governments in
order to improve the use and value of scholarly research. We fully support
such policies and the dual avenues for implementing them: open access
repositories and open access journals. These policies play an important
role in creating an environment where our collective investments in
research can be maximized for the benefit of the public, and for society at
large.

Many policies have employed the use of embargo periods - delayed access to
research articles for a short period of time to help protect publishers’
subscription revenue as they shift to new business models. We consider the
use of embargo periods as an acceptable *transitional mechanism* to help
facilitate a wholesale shift towards Open Access. However, embargo
periods dilute the benefits of open access policies and we believe that, if
they are adopted, they should be no more than 6 months for the life and
physical sciences, 12 months for social sciences and humanities.  We
further believe that mechanisms for reducing - or eliminating - embargo
periods should be included in any Open Access policy.

Any delay in the open availability of research articles curtails scientific
progress and stifles innovation, and places unnecessary constraints in
delivering the benefits of research back to the public.



*Signatories*

COAR: Confederation of Open Access Repositories

EIFL: Electronic Information for Libraries

LIBER: Ligue des Bibliothèques Européennes de Recherche - Association of
European Research Libraries

National Science Library, Chinese Academy of Sciences

OpenAIRE: Open Access Infrastructure for Research in Europe

SPARC: Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition



For more information click here
<https://www.coar-repositories.org/?p=3989>or contact Kathleen
Shearer, Executive Director, COAR,
kathleen.shearer at coar-repositories.org









--

COAR e. V. Office
c/o Göttingen State and University Library
Platz der Göttinger Sieben 1

37073 Göttingen
Germany


+49 551 39-22215 (Tel.)
+49 551 39-5222 (Fax)
office at coar-repositories.org <coar-office at sub.uni-goettingen.de>
http://coar-repositories.org/
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