Stephen Downes

Comments

Re: CIHR Introduces New Open Access Policy

, September 5, 2007 7:28 p.m.

Stephen:
It is a little bit unfair to criticize NRC Research Press [the publishing arm of "your own organization"]. AFAIK, Canadian IP addressees are able to access gratis the complete content of NRC journals back to 1998 [when they converted to electronic issues in addition to paper]; archived volumes [in progress, the Canadian Journal of Chemistry is accessible back to 1951 through partial contributions from the Canadian academic chemistry community and the Canadian Society for Chemistry] seem to be available to all Canadian universities.
NRCRP is obligated to run on a cost-recovery basis so would have to find funds to provide universal open access.
BTW, NRC also has lots of "grey literature" [contract reports and other
internal information, nominally public information, but not abstracted, so virtually inaccessible. How about a campaign to bring this content to light?

Cheers

Brian Lynch

Brian M. Lynch, M. Sc., Ph.D. [Melbourne], FCIC
Senior Research Professor, Department of Chemistry [2006-2009]
Business Manager, ACS Chemical Information Bulletin [2007-2009]
Office: Angus L. MacDonald Library, Room 102
St. Francis Xavier University
Antigonish, Nova Scotia B2G 2W5, Canada
T: 902-867-3992, 902-867-0450 [cell] F: 902-867-2414
e-mail: blynch@stfx.ca; brian.m.lynch@gmail.com
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Re: CIHR Introduces New Open Access Policy

Anymouse, September 6, 2007 7:35 a.m.

I question Bryan's claim that OA would cost more than what the NRC is doing now (providing free access to some IP addresses and blocked or priced access to others). Universal OA would cost less.

In an article four years ago I discussed the NRC policy and argued out that "it costs less to provide unrestricted access to all internet users than to discriminate between authorized and unauthorized users and block access to the unauthorized. If [Canadian] taxpayers deserve open access [to NRC content], then they deserve it without paying extra for the apparatus to block [non-Canadians]."

See http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/newsletter/09-04-03.htm#taxpayer
(Sorry, this comment software wil not let me turn the URL into a link.)

In the same article I raised the possibility that subscription revenue from non-Canadians might pay the costs of the access discrimination system. If it does, then the current policy might actually save NRC money. But even then, the reason would not be that OA costs more than non-OA, but that the higher costs of a non-OA system are covered by the higher revenues of a non-OA system. And even then, the surplus subscription income would have to be significant to outweigh the lower costs and indirect benefits of universal OA, including network effects, medical and scientific discoveries by non-Canadians that benefit Canadians, and maximizing the return on the Canadian investment in research.

Peter Suber
Research Professor of Philosophy, Earlham College
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/
peter.suber@earlham.edu
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Re: CIHR Introduces New Open Access Policy

Stephen Downes, September 6, 2007 8:28 a.m.

I was not referring specifically to the NRC Research press when I made my comment (though I would certainly agree with Peter Suber, that it would be more efficient to provide universal access than to block non-Canadian URLs).

I was thinking rather of NRC researchers themselves, who like other academic publish research papers on a regular basis. These research papers are paid for by the Canadian taxpayer, but they are licensed (NRC does not typically transfer copyright) to journals that restrict access.

I have been proposing internally for some time now that NRC create an institutional archive of published works, with an institutionally mandated OA policy. This would make all NRC-authored freely available.

I am sensitive to the argument that we need to consider costs, especially as NRC goes through additional cost-reduction exercises. I have argued that our Open Access policy should be funded through a reduction and eventual elimination of the purchase of published research materials. NRC's CISTI research library should change its focus, from paying for access by NRC researchers to external materials, to providing access to external users to material written by NRC staff.

By ending the policy of paying publishers for publicly funded research, we free enough revenues not only to provide strong Open Access institutional arching and access, but also to pay for services to the community such as the journals published by NRC Research Press.

I also take the point about 'grey literature'. A lot of that literature is in relation to work performed by NRC in cooperation with corporate and academic partners. Which means the task of bringing it to light involves not only online publication, but also some sort of process.

I too would like to see this material made more widely available. My own thinking is that this is best accomplished by making the task of research itself a more open one. Reports that I write related to collaborative projects often do remain proprietary (some necessarily and permanently so, like evaluations of research funding proposals for agencies such as ACOA or NSERC). But the practice of acquiring the relevant expertise - reading and commenting on research literature, discussions with colleagues, formation of ideas, etc. can be conducted openly, as I do on my website.
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Re: CIHR Introduces New Open Access Policy

Anymouse, February 27, 2008 5:25 p.m.

Can Canadian academics and researchers launch a similar campaign to EU and US petitions for mandated open access to taxpayer-funded research (Alliance for Taxpayer Access and EU petition on recommendation 1 of the EU Paper of Technical Evolution of publishing markets)?

I would agree that in the end we pay more to restrict access than we would for open access. I would argue for a model of a) mandate access b) shift funding to add a premium to research grants to be passed on to OA publishers for their cost-recovery and c) de-regulate copyright restrictions for academic work since a) and b) only free up research in a forward fashion (that which is already published under traditional models cannot be unlocked by mandates and shifted funding). C) is necessary to really shift the funding from purchasing restricted access to investing in open access dissemination.

I wrote a policy paper for a human rights class people might find interesting. Canada is obligated to contribute to the progressive realization of human rights through international cooperation, so it would seem that blocking IP addresses of other countries so they can't access knowledge they could use to meet human rights obligations, violates our obligations to international cooperation for development. Especially since knowledge is required to establish basic human rights, such as preventing infectious disease. In the time you got to this sentence, how many children died of preventable infectious disease? How many of these could be prevented if no barriers to access existed? As far as NSERC is concerned, blocking IP addresses creates an inertia for the development of science esp in developing countries. We are sending a message that if you want to do science, you must come here, which contributes to brain drain. It sounds moralistic, but I do remember a rep of one of the funding agencies speaking of not wanting to mandate open access, but allow it to be voluntary. The funders have to mandate ethical requirements and require things of researchers as a matter of course. If indeed this is an ethical issue, funders can insist that as a matter of research ethics (such as the Access Principle - Willinksy), they require open access dissemination.

here is my paper on human rights and open access in canada www.stratongina.net/openaccess

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