[GOAL] Re: RCUK & EC Did Not Follow Finch/Willets

[Stevan Harnad]

I am flattered that Dr. Watkinson feels I had special influence on Ian
Gibson and his Select Committee. I wish I had had. But alas the truth
is as I have already written: I was not one of the 23 witnesses invited
to give oral evidence (several publishers were).  Ian's parliamentary
assistant Sarah Revell pencilled me in for a personal appointment on 
Wednesday October 13 2004 if Ian's jury duty ended in time (it did) but
my recall of that breathless brief audience was that it was too
compressed for me to be able to stutter out much that made sense,
and I left it pretty pessimistic. And my over-zealous attempts to
compensate for it via email were very politely but firmly discouraged 
by  the committee's very able clerk, Emily Commander. So my input 
amounted  to being one of the 127 who submitted written evidence, 
plus that tachylalic audience on the 13th. The rest of the influence 
on the committee was from written reasons, not personal charisma.

As to publishers, and learned-society publishers: they are pretty
much of a muchness in their fealty to their bottom lines. The only
learned societies that could testify with a disinterested voice (let
alone one that represented the interests of learned research
rather than earned revenues) were the learned societies that
that were not also publishers.

Stevan Harnad

On 2012-07-22, at 10:42 PM, LIBLICENSE wrote:

> From: ANTHONY WATKINSON <anthony.watkinson at btinternet.com>
> Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2012 09:44:48 +0100
> 
> Of course publishers are going to lobby against the green route to
> open access: the arguments from publishers are well known and in no
> way hidden and whether or not the lobbying is aggressive is a matter
> of one's own perceptions surely.
> 
> Going back to 2003/2004 I was asked to be the expert adviser to the
> committee that we both referred to and had a pleasant conversation
> with Ian Gibson, the member of parliament who was the committee chair.
> It seemed to me in our conversation that Dr. Gibson had already been
> lobbied by Professor Harnad or his disciplines and that his mind was
> already made up. I cannot remember now whether or not Dr. Gibson said
> that he had met Professor Harnad but it was definitely the impression
> I had.
> 
> Anyway I refused the opportunity of influence because I did not think
> I could be dispassionate. I did propose working with someone closer to
> Professor Harnad's views (whom I named) and recommended other people
> who were neutral and could do the job. In the end Dr. Gibson plumped
> for David Worlock, who was an excellent choice.
> 
> I just do not believe on the basis of what others have told me - I
> have no direct knowledge and nor clearly has Professor Harnad - that
> the decisions of the Finch committee were pre-determined. Members of
> the committee I have spoken to do not confirm Professor Harnad's
> statements.
> 
> I find this statement fascinating:
> 
> "There were more -- Learned Societies are publishers too -- but three
> publishers would already be three too many in a committee on providing
> open access to publicly funded research".
> 
> I am impressed by the suggestion that Professor Harnad actually thinks
> that learned societies, organisations that represent the academic
> communities, should not be involved in decisions which will have such
> an impact on the said academic communities!
> 
> Anthony
> ________________________________
> From: LIBLICENSE <liblicense at GMAIL.COM>
> To: LIBLICENSE-L at LISTSERV.CRL.EDU
> Sent: Thursday, 19 July 2012, 23:44
> Subject: Re: RCUK & EC Did Not Follow Finch/Willets
> 
> From: Stevan Harnad <harnad at ecs.soton.ac.uk>
> Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2012 23:36:11 -0400
> 
> On 2012-07-18, Anthony Watkinson on LIBLICENSE wrote:
> 
> There were three publishers on the Finch committee (out of seventeen
> members)... [1]
> 
> I do not know of any evidence that they had a special line to Finch
> herself or any special privileges. I do not know of any special
> influence that representative bodies for publishing might have had.
> Does Professor Harnad? [2]
> 
> Some years ago Professor Harnad had a lot of influence on the
> conclusions of a Parliamentary Science and Technology Committee in the
> UK. Perhaps he expects the same special channel he had then [3]
> 
> 
> [1] There were more -- Learned Societies are publishers too -- but three
> publishers would already be three too many in a committee on providing
> open access to publicly funded research.
> 
> [2] The recommendations of the Finch committee were identical to the
> ones for which publishers have been lobbying aggressively for years
> (ever since it has become evident that trying to lobby against OA itself
> in the face of the mounting pressure for it from the research community is
> futile and very ill-received by the research community).
> 
> The publisher lobbying has accordingly been for the following:
> "Phase out Green OA and provide money to pay for Gold OA."
> 
> The Finch outcome was already pre-determined as a result of
> publisher lobbying before the committee was even constituted:
> 
> Finch on Green: "The [Green OA] policies of neither research funders
> nor universities themselves have yet had a major effect in ensuring that
> researchers make their publications accessible in institutional repositories…
> [so] the infrastructure of subject and institutional repositories
> should [instead]
> be developed [to] play a valuable role complementary to formal publishing,
> particularly in providing access to research data and to grey literature, and
> in digital preservation [no mention of Green OA]…"
> 
> Finch on Gold: "Gold" open access, funded by article charges, should be
> seen as "the main vehicle for the publication of research"… Public
> funders should establish "more effective and flexible arrangements"
> to pay [Gold OA] article charges… During the transition to [Gold] open
> access, funding should be found to extend licences [subscriptions]
> for non-open-access content to the whole UK higher education and
> health sectors…"
> 
> But that's all moot now, as both RCUK and EC have ignored it,
> instead re-affirming and strengthening their Green OA mandates
> the day after Mr. Willets announced the adoption of the recommendations
> of the Finch committee:
> 
> "[P]eer reviewed research papers which result from research that
> is wholly or partially funded by the Research Councils... must be
> published in journals… [either] offering a “pay to publish” option
> [Gold OA] or allowing deposit in a subject or institutional
> repository [Green OA] after a mandated maximum embargo
> period… of no more than six months… except… AHRC and…
> ESRC where the maximum... is 12 months…"
> http://roarmap.eprints.org/671/
> 
> [3]The 2004 recommendations of the Parliamentary Select
> Committee on Science and Technology were based on
> 23 oral testimonials and 127 written testimonials. Mine was one
> of the 127 written testimonials. If anything had influence on the
> outcome, it was evidence and reasons.
> http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmselect/cmsctech/399/39916.htm
> http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmselect/cmsctech/399/39917.htm
> 
> The 2004 Select Committee recommendation had been this:
> 
> “This Report recommends that all UK higher education institutions
> establish institutional repositories on which their published output
> can be stored and from which it can be read, free of charge, online.
> It also recommends that Research Councils and other Government
> funders mandate their funded researchers to deposit a copy of all
> of their articles in this way... [T]he Report [also] recommends that
> the Research Councils each establish a fund to which their funded
> researchers can apply should they wish to pay to publish...”
> http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmselect/cmsctech/399/39903.htm
> 
> At that time, despite the fact that the UK government (again under
> pressure from the publishing lobby) decided to ignore the Select
> Committee’s recommendation to mandate Green OA, RCUK and
> many UK universities adopted Green OA mandates anyway.
> 
> As a  result, the UK became the global leader in the transition to
> Open Access.
> 
> If heeded, the Finch Committee recommendation to downgrade
> repository use to the storage and preservation of data, theses and
> unpublished work would have set back global OA by at least a decade.
> 
> Fortunately, the RCUK has again shown its sense and independence,
> reaffirming and strengthening its Green OA mandate.
> 
> Let us hope UK’s universities — not pleased that scarce research funds,
> instead of being increased, are to be decreased to pay extra needlessly
> for Gold OA — will likewise continue to opt instead for cost-free Green OA
> by mandating it.
> 
> If so, the UK will again have earned and re-affirmed its leadership role
> in the global transition to universal OA.
> 
> Stevan Harnad