<table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" ><tr><td valign="top" style="font: inherit;"><div>Jimmy Wales may well have founded Wikipedia, but that doesn't mean he does not understand the differences between it and OA scholarly materials. He is a smart cookie and a fast learner.</div><div><br></div><div>It would make more sense to contact him and give him some background than simply criticising and muttering darkly amongst ourselves.</div><div><br></div><div>Charles<br><br>Professor Charles Oppenheim<br><br>--- On <b>Wed, 2/5/12, Stevan Harnad <i><harnad@ecs.soton.ac.uk></i></b> wrote:<br><blockquote style="border-left: 2px solid rgb(16, 16, 255); margin-left: 5px; padding-left: 5px;"><br>From: Stevan Harnad <harnad@ecs.soton.ac.uk><br>Subject: [GOAL] Re: Wikipedia founder to help in [UK] government's research scheme<br>To: "Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci)" <goal@eprints.org><br>Date: Wednesday, 2 May,
2012, 13:32<br><br><div class="plainMail">On 2012-05-02, at 6:00 AM, Andrew A. Adams wrote:<br><br>>> "The [UK] government has drafted in the Wikipedia founder Jimmy<br>>> Wales to help make all taxpayer-funded academic research in Britain<br>>> available online to anyone who wants to read or use it."<br>> <br>> I was hoping that the new government might be less star-struck than the <br>> previous one. Plus ca change, plus ca meme chose, it would seem. We really <br>> don't need Jimmy Wales advising on this. The team behind eprints has been <br>> (with minimal funding) developing the technology needed for many years and <br>> there are many academics in the UK much better versed in the intricacies of <br>> UK academic work and life than Mr Wales. Sigh. I foresee another lost couple <br>> of years wasted on this instead of getting to grips with the known problem <br>>
and the known solution (including providing better funding for eprints <br>> development to the team that created it and still does the software <br>> engineering for it).<br><br>Andrew is so right (and the current UK government is showing as much good <br>sense in turning to JW as they showed for many years in turning to RM).<br><br>Wikipedia is based on the antithesis of peer review. Asking JW to help make<br>sure peer-reviewed research is available to all is like asking McDonalds to<br>help the WHO/FDA make sure that wholesome food is available to all.<br><br>The way to make all taxpayer-funded academic research in Britain available <br>online to all is already known: Make it a mandatory condition of funding <br>that the fundees make it available online to all (OA). <br><br>Britain (RCUK) has already gone a long way toward toward doing just <br>that -- a much longer way than any other country so far. But there are still <br>some crucial
implementational details that need tweaking in order to make <br>those mandates work:<br><br>1. The requirement has to be to deposit in the fundee's institutional repository.<br><br>2. The deposit must be immediately upon acceptance for publication.<br><br>That way the fundee's institution will be empowered to monitor and ensure<br>compliance with the mandate. In addition, when there is an embargo on <br>making the immediate-deposit OA immediately, the institution's email-eprint-request<br>Button can tide over immediate research usage needs during the embargo on<br>an automated, accelerated individual-request basis. Institutional deposit will<br>also motivate institutions to mandate OA for all of their research output, not<br>just the RCUK-funded portion.<br><br>But these are all implementational details that could be fixed by just <br>updating the language of the mandates -- making it explicit that research<br>that is not institutionally deposited
immediately loses its funding. Each <br>institution's research grant support office, already so solicitous about<br>complying with all conditions for applying for, receiving and retaining grants <br>will assiduously see to it that institutional fundees understand and comply.<br><br>But JW does not know any of this. And if he did, he would be no better<br>able to implement it than anyone else. It's the *implementation* that's <br>needed, to make the broth edible and available to all -- not more cooks<br>(and especially not from McDonalds' kitchens)!<br><br>Stevan Harnad<br>_______________________________________________<br>GOAL mailing list<br><a ymailto="mailto:GOAL@eprints.org" href="/mc/compose?to=GOAL@eprints.org">GOAL@eprints.org</a><br><a href="http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal" target="_blank">http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal</a><br></div></blockquote></div></td></tr></table>