[GOAL] Re: Elsevier's query re: "positive things from publishers that should be encouraged, celebrated, recognized"

[Peter Murray-Rust]

On Wed, May 16, 2012 at 1:06 PM, Jan Velterop <velterop at gmail.com> wrote:

What I don't understand, Steve, is your apparent hostility to OA articles
> in hybrid journals. Whence this hostility? Why 'gold-only' journals? Why
> not 'gold-only' publishers? As long as the OA articles in question are
> CC-BY, then what's the problem?
>
> There are several practical problems with hybrid OA. These are all down to
the publisher and could be rectified if they wished.


   - labelling. It is extremely difficult to determine whether something is
   hybrid OA. Many publishers don't label the OA articles differently from the
   toll-access. Those that do call them tings like "Free Access", "Author
   Choice", which are operationally useless. Sometimes it's stamped on the
   table of contents and not the paper, sometimes the otehr way round, etc.
   - licences. Many hybrid articles have no licences. Almost all that do
   have specifically added CC-NC. This is not BOAI-compliant
   - The readers' rights are often impossible to determine, even by very
   intelligent and perceptive humans.



> Discoverability? Well, CC-BY articles, including those published in hybrid
> journals, can be deposited in institutional archives without the slightest
> hesitation (remember, gold *includes* green), if that helps. In fact, if
> the reasoning is that all of an institute's output should be in that
> institute's repository, all gold articles should be deposited in any event
> (and the advantage is even that any FUD has no bearing on gold CC-BY
> articles).
>


   - Firstly, not all authors HAVE institutions. Pharma companies?
   Charities? etc.
   - Even if it's in an IR it's almost undiscoverable unless you are
   looking for a specific article by someone-you-know-worked/works there.


So if I have an article by Foo (@bar) and Plugh (@XYYZY) how do I know
where to look (@foo) or @XYZZY and what are my chances of success?

Can anyone answer questions like:
* find me all hybrid deposited articles in Repo XYZZY - not a chance
* find me all hybrid articles in UK/PMC - not a chance
* find me all chemistry hybrid articles

Until we build 21st C search and index engines then all repository-based OA
is rooted in the 20th Century



> In the Bethesda Statement on Open Access (
> http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/bethesda.htm#definition) a note was
> included saying that "Open access is a property of individual works, not
> necessarily journals or publishers." That seems to me an entirely logical
> and reasonable stipulation.
>
> I agree completely. And it is appallingly supported by both publishers and
Institutional Repositories (many of which do not label anything or
blanket-stamp everything as non-resuable (like Cambridge).

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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