On Wed, 12 Nov 2003, Philip Pecorino wrote: > Here are some questions with which I need some assistance. > > What would it mean for a university or other academic institution to support > or "endorse" Open Access?
It would mean that they either encourage or (better) mandate that all research output must be made open-access, either by publishing it in an open-access journal (if one of the 560 existing open-access journals is suitable for that piece of research http://www.doaj.org/) or else by publishing it in one of the remaining 23,440 toll-access journals AND self-archiving it in the institutional eprint archives (or a suitable central archive, if one exists). For this, the institution should create institutional eprint archives (preferably at the departmental level) and formalize the open-access provision strategy: Free GNU software for creating OAI-compliant eprint archives: http://software.eprints.org/ Model for an institutional or departmental open-access provision strategy: http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/archpolnew.html > What would it mean in theory and in practice? Both in theory and in practise it means the above. > Is there a model anywhere for such support or endorsement? See the above model. http://www.eprints.org/self-faq/#institution-facilitate-filling And here is a list of 109 known institutional eprint.org archives: http://software.eprints.org/#ep2 Look especially at the bigger ones, like CalTech, Indiana, Australian National, Lund, Trento, LMU-Muenchen, Melbourne, Queensland, Southampton, Virginia Tech, Weizmann, CNRS, Nicod, Firenze, as they are the ones with the successful archive-filling policies. See also the 239 archives at OAIster (not all institutional) http://oaister.umdl.umich.edu/o/oaister/ and the 127 archives at OAI (not all institutional) http://oaisrv.nsdl.cornell.edu/Register/BrowseSites.pl > What would the institution be committing to do? Minimally? Ideally? Minimally? - Departmental archives and encouragement to fill them, along the lines of the Berlin Declaration. (But not likely to produce results.) http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/berlin.htm Ideally? - a university-wide open-access provision policy for all peer-reviewed research output http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/archpolnew.html - a standardized university online CV for research assessment: http://paracite.eprints.org/cgi-bin/rae_front.cgi - a university-library-based proxy self-archiving service, along the lines of the CalTech or the St. Andrews archives http://library.caltech.edu/digital/ http://library.caltech.edu/evdv/CODA.ppt http://eprints.st-andrews.ac.uk/proxy_archive.html - a parallel university data-archiving initiative http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/data-archiving.htm - a parallel university book-impact (metadata and bibliography) initiative http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/bookcite.htm - a programme of promoting, monitoring, measuring and demonstrating the maximization of university research impact by maximizing university research access http://citebase.eprints.org/cgi-bin/search http://citebase.eprints.org/analysis/correlation.php http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving.htm > Would encouraging and providing for self archiving be only a start? If successful, the institutional open access it provides with certainty would be an end in itself, for the institution itself. The rest would follow at a global cross-institutional level. http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0028.gif http://www.nature.com/nature/debates/e-access/Articles/harnad.html#B1 > Would it mean encouraging faculty who are editors or editorial board members > to move the toll journals to an open access mode? Not a bad idea, but not much an institution (or editors) can do there. Editorial Boards have defected for lower-toll-access publishers, but asking them to defect to open-access publishers might be asking for too much at this time. Besides, it does not do much for the institution's own annual research output. > Would it mean encouraging faculty to submit to open access journals? Yes, where suitable ones exist. > Only to open access journals? Definitely not! Such an unrealistic recommendation at this time would be a recipe for having the entire institutional open-access initiative fail, and lose its credibility. There are 24,000 refereed journals today, and fewer than 600 of them are open-access. > What would it mean for its libraries? Initially, little. Institutional open-access provision will not solve the serials budget crisis. But it is an investment in an eventual solution -- and meanwhile provides immediate open access, along with its benefits, in terms of enhanced visibility and impact. http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmselect/cmsctech/399/399we152.htm > Thanks in advance to any who care to enlighten me. > > Philip A. Pecorino, Ph.D. > Professor, Philosophy > Queensborough Community College, CUNY The enlightenment is hereby provided. The rest is in CUNY's hands. Research funding agencies too can help: http://www.eprints.org/self-faq/#research-funders-do http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue35/harnad/ Stevan Harnad NOTE: Complete archive of the ongoing discussion of providing open access to the peer-reviewed research literature online is available at the American Scientist September Forum (98 & 99 & 00 & 01 & 02 & 03): http://amsci-forum.amsci.org/archives/American-Scientist-Open-Access-Forum.html http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/index.html Posted discussion to: [email protected] Dual Open-Access Strategy: BOAI-2 ("gold"): Publish your article in a suitable open-access journal whenever one exists. BOAI-1 ("green"): Otherwise, publish your article in a suitable toll-access journal and also self-archive it. http://www.soros.org/openaccess/read.shtml http://www.eprints.org/signup/sign.php http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0026.gif http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0021.gif http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0024.gif http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0028.gif
