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--></style><title>[BOAI] Re: Wrong Advice On Open Access: History
Repeating</title></head><body>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>I agree that the only solution is aN
INSTITUTIONAL MANDATE. My question is:</blockquote>
<div><br></div>
<div>In view of the fact that all researchers want to publish in
top-notch jornals (the 5.000 core journals), isnt' there an
incompatibility between the pre-print publishing of peer-reviewed
papers and the subsequent publishing of the papers in one such
journal?<u> Will the publisher agree that the pre-print be
published?</u></div>
<div><br></div>
<div>I have a problem, for example, with the commercial publisher
Peter Lang. It does NOT allow me to put in my institutional repository
the papers (post-print) that have been published in Peter Lang
books.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Elsevier acccepts the post-print publication under the conditon
that one does not use the Elsevier logo.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Can anymore please answer the pre-print question:<u> will a
commercial publisher accept that one put on one's institution IR
the<b> pre-prints</b> of the papers to be later published in their
journals</u>?</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Thankx a lot.</div>
<div>Françoise Salager-Meyer (Universidad de Los Andes, Mérida.
Venezuela)</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>I am about to give a lecture on Open Access in developing
countries and I would very much like to have a reply to my
question!</div>
<div>****</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><br>
<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>On Fri, Oct 30, 2009 at 9:45 AM, Noel,
Robert E. <rnoel@indiana.edu> wrote:</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite><br>
> Does it make that much difference how universities, scholars, and
readers<br>
> arrive at Open Access?<br>
<br>
How they do it does not matter if they do arrive at OA. But it
makes<br>
every difference if they don't.<br>
<br>
> the price of "Nuclear Physics B" (Elsevier) has been
going down in recent years<br>
> and many users of that literature regard that as a positive
thing<br>
<br>
Lower journal prices does not mean OA.<br>
<br>
> It makes me think that open access is not the primary
goal,<br>
> but that a specific path to open access is the primary goal<br>
<br>
No, OA is the primary goal and lowering journal subscription prices
is<br>
not a path toward that goal. (And journal boycott threats, even if<br>
motivated by OA rather than journal pricing, are ineffectual, as
the<br>
PLoS boycott has shown.)<br>
<br>
Robert Noel is conflating the journal affordability problem and
the<br>
research accessibility problem.<br>
<br>
Stevan Harnad<br>
<br>
<br>
On Fri, Oct 30, 2009 at 9:45 AM, Noel, Robert E.
<rnoel@indiana.edu> wrote:<br>
> Does it make that much difference how universities, scholars, and
readers arrive at Open Access? I'm a little puzzled by the
lengths to which Steven Harnad goes to advance a specific path, while
very deliberately excluding other cogent, seemingly sensible ideas.
I have not talked to Jackson about "Getting Yourself out of
the Business"; perhaps he read the "Wrong Advice"
message below and now agrees with Mr. Harnad, I don't know.<br>
><br>
> It seems the efforts of Berkeley's mathematician Rob Kirby
(launched SPARC endorsed "Algebraic and Geometric Topology",
and "Geometry and Topology") were largely seeded by the
spirit of Jackson's strategy as opposed to any other strategy.
Kirby has been concerned about commercial publishers' journal
prices and took action that seems to me to have been constructive
action (see Notices of the AMS, 2004, "Fleeced"). The
message of that opinion piece again seems to me to be related to
Jackson's points, and not so much to the Harnad solution. In
what ways are the actions of Prof. Bruynooghe and JLP's editorial
board roughly a decade ago a failure? The resignation of that
Board was motivated by "Getting yourself out of the
Business". Similarly, the price of "Nuclear Physics B"
(Elsevier) has been going down in recent years and many users of that
literature regard that as a positive thing. Many variables have
driven that drop in price, and it's presumptuous to think that none of
them have to do with Jackson's points.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>><br>
> Anyway, others have devoted much more time and energy to this
topic than I have, but I'm skeptical of recommendations that bluntly
reject other strategies from the outset. It makes me think that
open access is not the primary goal, but that a specific path to open
access is the primary goal, and that access itself is a convenient
result, but still an afterthought. It's tantamount to engineers
and scientists recommending to policy makers that solar and wind
energy are viable alternatives that will reduce a country's dependence
on oil, but research into biofuels, maglev trains, and clean coal is
utter nonsense, and reducing individual energy consumption by changing
lifestyles is a sham, and in fact counterproductive.</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>><br>
> Does anyone on the planet have this much foresight as to how
civilization should communicate and share information?<br>
><br>
> Bob Noel<br>
> Swain Hall Library<br>
> Indiana University<br>
> Bloomington, IN 47405<br>
><br>
> -----Original Message-----<br>
> From: boai-forum-bounces@ecs.soton.ac.uk
[mailto:boai-forum-bounces@ecs.soton.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Stevan
Harnad<br>
> Sent: Wednesday, October 21, 2009 8:35 AM<br>
> To: American Scientist Open Access Forum<br>
> Cc: SPARC Open Access Forum<br>
> Subject: [BOAI] Wrong Advice On Open Access: History Repeating
Itself<br>
><br>
> [Apologies for Cross-Posting: Hyperlinked
version is at:<br>
> http://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/641-guid.html
]<br>
><br>
> With every good intention, Jason Baird Jackson -- in
"Getting Yourself<br>
> Out of the Business in Five Easy Steps"<br>
>
http://jasonbairdjackson.com/2009/10/12/getting-yourself-out-of-the-b<span
></span>usiness-in-five-easy-steps/<br>
> is giving the wrong advice on Open Access, recommending a
strategy<br>
> that has not only been tried and has failed and been
superseded<br>
> already, but a strategy that, with some reflection, could have
been<br>
> seen to be wrong-headed without even having to be tried:<br>
><br>
> * Choose not to submit
scholarly journal articles or other works to<br>
> publications owned by for-profit firms.<br>
> * Say no, when asked to
undertake peer-review work on a book or<br>
> article manuscript that has been submitted for publication by
a<br>
> for-profit publisher or a journal under the control of a
commercial<br>
> publisher.<br>
> * Do not seek or accept the
editorship of a journal owned or under the<br>
> control of a commercial publisher.<br>
> * Do not take on the role of
series editor for a book series being<br>
> published by a for-profit publisher.<br>
> * Turn down invitations to
join the editorial boards of commercially<br>
> published journals or book series.<br>
><br>
> In the year 2000, 34,000 biological researchers worldwide signed
a<br>
> boycott threat to stop publishing in and refereeing for their
journals<br>
> if those journals did not provide (what we would now call) Open
Access<br>
> (OA) to their articles. http://www.plos.org/about/letter.html<br>
><br>
> Their boycott threat was ignored by the publishers of the
journals, of<br>
> course, because it was obvious to them if not to the researchers
that<br>
> the researchers had no viable alternative. And of course the<br>
> researchers did not make good on their boycott threat when
their<br>
> journals failed to comply.<br>
><br>
> The (likewise well-intentioned) activists who had launched the
boycott<br>
> threat then turned to another strategy: They launched the
excellent<br>
> PLoS journals (now celebrating their 5th anniversary) to prove
that<br>
> there could be viable OA journals of the highest quality. The<br>
> experiment was a great success, and many more OA journals have
since<br>
> spawned, some of them (such as the BMC -- now Springer --
journals) of<br>
> a quality comparable to conventional journals, some not.<br>
><br>
> But what also became apparent from the (now 9-year) exercise was
that<br>
> providing OA by creating new journals, persuading authors to
publish<br>
> in them instead of in their established journals, with their<br>
> track-records for quality, and finding the funds to pay for the
author<br>
> publication fees that many of the OA journals had to charge
(since<br>
> they could no longer make ends meet with subscriptions) was a
very<br>
> slow and uncertain process.<br>
><br>
> There are at least 25,000 peer-reviewed journals published
annually</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>> today, including a core of perhaps
5000 journals that constitute the<br>
> top 20% of the journals in each field, the ones that most authors
want<br>
> to publish in, and most users want to access and use (and
cite).<br>
><br>
> There are now about 5000 OA journals too, likewise about 20%, but
most<br>
> -- unlike the PLoS journals (and perhaps the BMC/Springer and
Hindawi<br>
> journals) -- are far from being among the top 20% of journals.
Hence<br>
> most researchers in 2009 face much the same problem that the<br>
> signatories of the 2000 PLoS boycott threat faced in 2000: For
most<br>
> researchers, it would mean a considerable sacrifice to renounce
their<br>
> preferred journals and publish instead in an OA journal: either
(more</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>> often) OA journals with comparable
quality standards do not exist, or<br>
> their publication charges are a deterrent.<br>
><br>
> Yet ever since 2000 (and earlier) there has been no need for
either<br>
> threats or sacrifice by researchers in order to have OA to all of
the<br>
> planet's peer-reviewed research output. For those same
researchers who<br>
> were signing boycott threats that they could not carry out
could<br>
> instead have used those keystrokes to make their own
peer-reviewed<br>
> research OA, by depositing their final, peer-reviewed drafts in
OA<br>
> repositories as soon as they were accepted for publication, to
make<br>
> them freely accessible online to all would-be users webwide,
rather<br>
> than just to those whose institutions could afford to subscribe
to the<br>
> journals in which they were published.<br>
><br>
> Researchers could have made all their research OA spontaneously
since<br>
> at least 1994. They could have done it OAI-compliantly
(interoperably)<br>
> since at least 2000.<br>
><br>
> But most researchers did not make their own research OA in 1994,
nor<br>
> in 2000, and even now in 2009, they seem to prefer
petitioning<br>
> publishers for it, rather than providing it for themselves.<br>
><br>
> There is a solution (and researchers themselves have already
revealed<br>
> exactly what it was when they were surveyed). That solution is
not<br>
> more petitions and more waiting for publishers or journals to
change<br>
> their policies or their economics. It is for researchers'
institutions<br>
> and funders to mandate that their researchers provide OA to their
own<br>
> refereed research by depositing their final, peer-reviewed drafts
in<br>
> OA repositories as soon as they are accepted for publication, to
make<br>
> them freely accessible online to all would-be users webwide,
rather<br>
> than just to those whose institutions can afford to subscribe to
the<br>
> journals in which they were published.<br>
><br>
> I would like to suggest that Jason Jackson (and other
well-meaning OA<br>
> advocates) could do incomparably more for global OA by lobbying
their<br>
> own institutions (and funders) to adopt OA mandates than by
launching<br>
> more proposals to boycott publishers who decline to do what<br>
> researchers can already do for themselves. (And meanwhile, they
should<br>
> deposit their articles spontaneously, even without a
mandate.)<br>
><br>
> OA Week 2009 would be a good time for the worldwide research
community<br>
> to come to this realization at long last, and reach for the
solution<br>
> that has been within its grasp all along.<br>
><br>
> Stevan Harnad<br>
><br>
><br>
> --<br>
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><br>
<br>
<br>
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