"Independent and critical thinking" researchers will act according to the evidence: depend on it. They may be slow, but they are not stupid…
Not only do I agree that they're not stupid, I wouldn't even say that they're slow. And as for acting according to the evidence, I couldn't agree with you more. In my experience talking about these issues with faculty researchers, their ambivalence about OA is based neither on stupidity nor on slowness, but on an insufficiency of evidence that OA is always and necessarily the answer. Researchers tend to see OA models as presenting a mixed bag of upsides and downsides (as any publishing model does). Researchers are generally smart and quick enough to immediately recognize, for example, that mandates constrain their publishing options, so they approach mandate proposals cautiously. One way they demonstrate caution is by insisting that such mandates include powerful escape clauses, thus turning them into "mandates" rather than mandates. --- Rick Anderson Assoc. Dean for Scholarly Resources & Collections Marriott Library, University of Utah Desk: (801) 587-9989 Cell: (801) 721-1687 rick.ander...@utah.edu
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