[GOAL] Interview with Professor Martin Hall, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Salford, Manchester

[Richard Poynder]

Martin Hall was a member of the committee that published the controversial
Finch Report on OA in the UK.

 

Some excerpts:

 

*** On green OA:

 

"[I]t's important to recognize that there are a number of varieties of green
OA . green means different things to different people; for some, it's an
argument that all research outputs should be free at the point of use as a
matter of principle, while for others, it's the availability of the last
version over which the author holds copyright, before surrendering copyright
to a publisher.

 

"It's also important to watch out for the context in which green is evoked.
In some arguments, green is advocated as the alternative to subscription
publishing. But for others, the argument is made to have green in
conjunction with a 'national licence', a policy that, if implemented, would
perpetuate for-profit subscription publishing.

 

"My preference would be to drop 'gold' and 'green', and rather differentiate
between, on the one hand, full and upfront APCs and, on the other-hand,
subscriptions, licences and other forms of pay-walls that restrict access.

 

.

 

"Green OA is not a transitional strategy . an approach that does not push
towards full, up-front APCs will not result in genuine open access, where
the version of record is free, under a CC-BY licence, at the point of use."

 

 

*** On the possible "collateral damage" that the Finch recommendations could
inflict:

 

"[T]here are risks here. The Finch Group had a specific brief and there were
bound to be areas that we could not cover. A lot more work needs to be done
on the future of the scholarly monograph - and this is particularly
important for the Humanities.

 

"Independent researchers are finding it more and more difficult to publish,
and ways need to be found that provide appropriate access to funds for
independent researchers, for full APCs. And some of the specialized
societies that currently publish subscription journals are going to find the
transition hard. These are real concerns that need attention."

 

 

*** On whether the Finch Report should have cautioned against the use of
hybrid OA:

 

"Good point. I don't see the use for hybrid models if policies push for
full, upfront APCs."

 

 

*** On whether the UK research councils (RCUK) look set to plough their own
furrow, ignoring the Finch recommendations despite the fact that the UK
government has accepted them all:

 

"It was not up to the Finch Group to tell the Research Councils what to do,
and we did not do so. Similarly, the government's response to the Finch
Report allows the Research Councils full and appropriate latitude in setting
their conditions for the receipt of grant funding. All these furrows are
running in the same direction."

 

 

*** On what the OA policy of the Higher Education Funding Council for
England (HEFCE) is likely to be in the wake of the Finch Report, the
recently-announced EC Communication on OA, and the publication of RCUK's OA
policy:

 

"It will be important to see exactly what HEFCE means by 'green'. For the
purposes of the 2020 Research Excellence Framework (or its equivalent),
HEFCE could merely require that the author's last version is made available
via a repository (a condition that can, of course, be met at present).

 

"Alternatively, they may require open access to a version of record, which
will be a big push towards full and upfront APCs. HEFCE (in contrast with
the Research Councils) is also going to have to work out what to require for
research outputs that can (and must) be submisable, but which are for
research not supported with public funds. The details will be important
here."

 

More here:
http://poynder.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/the-oa-interviews-martin-hall-vice.htm
l

 

 

 

 

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