[GOAL] Re: Meaning of Open Access

Wed May 9 13:01:22 BST 2012

On 2012-05-09, at 7:39 AM, Jan Velterop wrote:

> The definition of Open Access in the BOAI:
> 
> By "open access" to this literature, we mean its free availability on the public internet, permitting any users to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of these articles, crawl them for indexing, pass them as data to software, or use them for any other lawful purpose, without financial, legal, or technical barriers other than those inseparable from gaining access to the internet itself. The only constraint on reproduction and distribution, and the only role for copyright in this domain, should be to give authors control over the integrity of their work and the right to be properly acknowledged and cited.
> 
> Signed by Stevan as well. But declared not valid anymore
> by him, apparently, or at least not a guide anymore to what
> Open Access is and should be.

A provisional definition, of a new possibility and vision,
crafted by a team of well-meaning but not omniscient
visionaries at the time -- and since  updated in keeping 
with reality and practical experience.

http://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/442-guid.html

There could never have been OA mandates by institutions
and funders if we had insisted that what must be mandated
was Libre OA.

A provisional definition.

Jan seems to think that this is a matter that requires 
constitutional hermeneutics and perhaps Supreme 
Court ratification.

Stevan Harnad

> 
> Jan
> 
> 
> On 9 May 2012, at 11:37, Stevan Harnad wrote:
> 
>> ** Cross-Posted **
>> 
>> On 2012-05-09, at 4:12 AM, Jan Velterop wrote:
>> 
>>> I would favour doing away with both the terms 'libre OA' and 'gratis OA'.
>>> Open Access suffices. It's the 'open' that says it all. Especially if it is made
>>> clear that OA means BOAI-compliant OA in the context of scholarly
>>> research literature.
>> 
>> I don't doubt that Jan would like to do away with the terms libre and gratis OA. 
>> He has been arguing all along that free online access is not open access,
>> ever since 2003 on the American Scientist Open Access Forum:
>> 
>> http://users.ecs.soton.ac.uk/harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/subject.html#msg6478
>> 
>> This would mean that my "subversive proposal" of 1994 was not really a 
>> proposal for open access  and that the existing open access mandates 
>> and policies of funders and institutions worldwide are not really open access 
>> mandates or policies.
>> http://roarmap.eprints.org/
>> 
>> It is in large part for this reason that in 2008 Peter Suber and I proposed 
>> the terms "gratis" and "libre" open access to ensure that the term
>> "open access" retained its meaning, and to make explicit the two 
>> distinct conditions involved: free online access (gratis OA) and
>> certain re-use rights (libre OA):
>> 
>> http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/2008/04/strong-and-weak-oa.html
>> 
>> For Peter Murray-Rust's crusade for journal article text-mining rights,
>> apart from reiterating my full agreement that these are highly important
>> and highly desirable and even urgent in certain fields, I would like
>> to note that -- as PM-R has stated -- neither gratis OA nor libre OA
>> is necessary for the kinds of text-mining rights he is seeking. They
>> can be had via a special licensing agreement from the publisher.
>> 
>> There is no ambiguity there: The text-mining rights can be granted
>> even if the articles themselves are not made openly accessible,
>> free for all. 
>> 
>> And, as Richard Poynder has just pointed out, publishers are
>> quite aware of (perhaps even relieved with) this option, with 
>> Elsevier lately launching an experiment in it:
>> 
>> http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/pipermail/goal/2012-May/000433.html
>> 
>> This makes it clear that the text-mining rights PM-R seeks can be
>> had without either sort of OA, gratis or libre...
>> 
>> Let us hope the quest for Open Access itself is not derailed in this
>> direction.
>> 
>> Stevan Harnad
>> 
>>> On 9 May 2012, at 08:30, Peter Murray-Rust wrote:
>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 10:25 PM, Stevan Harnad <amsciforum at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> On Tue, May 8, 2012 at 3:23 PM, Jan Velterop <velterop at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> JV> So by all means, let legal measures play a role, but not at the expense of lowering the bar to 'gratis' OA. If one believes in mandates, then there is no reason why BOAI-compliant OA ('libre' in your [SH] lingo) should not be mandated.
>>>> 
>>>> I'd like to suggest that the term "libre OA" be dropped. "Gratis OA" implies freedom for anyone to read the manuscript somewhere. "Libre OA" imlies the "removal of some permission barriers" but neither says which or how many. Since Gratis OA has already required the removal of one permission barrier (the permission being granted to post on the web, permanently) it can be argued that all Gratis OA is ipso facto Libre OA.
>>>> 
>>>> This renders the term Unnecessary and confusiing, and allows many people and organizations to imply they are granting rights and permissions beyond GratisOA when they are not. If there are current examples where the use of "libreOA" plays a useful role it would be useful to see them.
>>>> 
>>>> The only terms that make operational sense and are clear are Gratis OA and BOAI-compliant OA . It is a pity that the latter is a long phrase and maybe its usage will contract the phrase.
>>>> 
>>>> I would be grateful for clear discourse on these definitions and the suggestion of retiring "libreOA". 
>>>> 
>>>> P.
>>>> 
>>>> -- 
>>>> Peter Murray-Rust
>>>> Reader in Molecular Informatics
>>>> Unilever Centre, Dep. Of Chemistry
>>>> University of Cambridge
>>>> CB2 1EW, UK
>>>> +44-1223-763069
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