The forces at work are in a near stalemate, locked in an internal struggle within the scientific community.  We find ourselves at a tipping point, perched upon the peak of the mountain of choice.  On one side we are presented with the barren desert of the closed access status quo; on the other we have the verdant forest of OA progress.  However, neither combatant can generate sufficient momentum to surge over the edge.

Into this quagmire must the public come.  Take, for example, a plumber (whom, according to Sarah Palin, represents the American “Common” Man).  Now this plumber, lets call him John to avoid any confusion with the “real” plumber, he hears a mention of the OA debate and is overwhelmed with apathy — an expected result.  Not only does the topic initially seem uninteresting; to him, it is like a war between the Zorgons and Blastothons on the planet Marsas. (This shabbily written example is purely fictitious.  Any resemblance to actual aliens is incidental and does not express the views of the author on what surely are peace-loving creatures.)

However, John might well find a certain Quote of a certain Doctor from a certain Civil Rights Movement quite interesting: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”  In other words, it DOES matter.  The OA discussion DOES matter to John, not only for the sake of justice itself, but also for the improvement of science as a whole, which will inevitably improve John’s life in one way or another.

So now I make my plea.  I call on all the Johns of the world, all of the Jills, all of the non-scientists and all of the public.  This fight is your fight as well.  Make your voice heard and throw your support in for the OA movement.  Disregard the myopic assumption that not caring is for the best faring.  Call your Representative, write a letter to the editor, throw a fundraiser for PLoS, do ANYTHING.  Just don’t do nothing at all.

Nathan

The mandate concerning NIH-funded research represents the first step in a very long journey toward complete OA for all.  The interconnectedness between government and research is quite tangible.  Therefore, government policy can be a major impetus for greater momentum for the OA movement.

For this reason, I encourage all of you to contact the President-elect to demonstrate your support.  If we can bring OA into the spotlight in Obama’s science policy, these next four years may bring many great victories for the movement.

Nathan

PMC lends itself to comparison with arXiv: both are free digital archives of research papers helping advance the cause of OA.  However, the differences abound.  Firstly, PMC emphasizes the biomedical aspects of research while arXiv focuses upon the physical and quantitative sciences.  Secondly, PMC is a resource funded by taxpayer dollars (through the NIH) but arXiv is operated by the private Cornell University.

Thirdly, papers are added to PMC by the journals that publish them; manuscripts are uploaded onto arXiv by the authors themselves.  Finally, PMC ensures that the papers it archives have been subjected to thorough peer review (thus making Indexing by PMC a mark of validity).  In contrast, arXiv does not impose any sort of review onto uploaded papers.

PMC and arXiv offer unique strengths and limitations and emphasize different fields of scientific endeavour.  However, it appears clear that they are two very different approaches to the same ultimate goal: increasing access to scientific literature.

Nathan

While this is certainly a great positive, the more interesting aspect of arXiv is its emphasis.  Its focus encompasses those areas often not found in many OA publishers, such as mathematics, physics, computer science, and statistics.  It does not impose any sort of peer review, it truly is an archive of e-prints, a very successful one at that.  According to its homepage, as of the 3rd of October arXiv has posted over 500,000 articles online under open access.

Cornell University currently owns, operates, and largely funds arXiv, however it does recieve some funding from the National Science Foundation.  Paul Ginsparg established arXiv in 1991, and it was originally hosted by Los Alamos National Laboratories.

Nathan

However, BMC is by no means the only OA publisher with such an approach.  The Public Library of Science clearly leans toward the biomedical sciences as well.  PLoS currently publishes seven journals, six of which are biomedical and one is general.  However, while on its face it may be general, PLoS ONE in fact publishes the great majority of its papers in the biomedical fields.  In fact, only 184 papers have been published under the categories of Chemistry, Physics, and Mathematics combined.  To put this in perspective, PLoS ONE has published around three times that many in Neuroscience (551 papers) alone.

Regardless of the specific reason, it is clear that OA has in general focused heavily upon publishing biomedical scientific research.  Perhaps in order for OA as a movement in general to succeed, we must expand its base of support to include more completely the entire spectrum of scientific inquiry.

Nathan

DOAJ is especially helpful to authors with limited funds as they search out OA options that do not require publication fees which sometimes fall beyond their limited means.  The DOAJ For authors page allows prospective OA contributors to search out journals based on field and whether or not publication entails a fee.

By centralizing all of the OA journal information, DOAJ allows researchers dependent upon OA papers to quickly and effectively search through 1263 OA journals with the Find articles engine by keyword.  With this streamlined approach, OA researchers can avoid wasting time being turned away by incessant payment pages.

The directory also seeks to ensure that the reader can attain a quality piece of OA work through two primary requirements delineated in the About page:1) the paper must satisfy the OA definition promulgated here, 2) the journals must exercise quality control through either peer review or editorial selection.  Overall, the DOAJ is an invaluable resource for OA authors and readers around the world.

Nathan

In fact, this issue extends beyond those high school students engaged in research.  Many instructors assign their pupils research reports that must cite published papers.  Being directed to a payment page after reading an exciting abstract can be a very frustrating experience for a pre-college student, or any person in general for that matter.  This frustration may even turn some students off from scientific research in general, especially if their only experiences with it have involved pulling out their hair.

In other words, the lack of OA has far reaching consequences, extending far beyond the relatively limited scope of academia.  In order to continue scientific advances, young budding researchers must be exhilirated and enthralled by science, not annoyed and frustrated by its pecuniary red tape.

Nathan

One primary distinction is between Green and Gold OA.  Green OA is the option to self-archive a paper, while Gold OA inolves paying a publication fee in order to make the paper freely available when published in the journal.

An additional dimension of this discussion involves recently introduced terms: gratis and libre.  Gratis means that the paper is free to access.  Libre describes the situation in which the paper is both free to access and free to use.

Regardless of the outward differences, the fundamental goal of all types of OA remain the same: to improve access to papers and thus accelerate advances in scientific research.  As long as this basic mission is preserved, the semantics are largely irrelevant.

Nathan

In other words, it is critical that investigative journalists such as Richard Poynder (as featured in an earlier post) keep up the pressure on OA publishers to stay true to the spirit of the movement, in spite of (often unfounded) legal threats such as from Scientific Journals International (SJI).  I applaud the courage of the whistleblower who recently posted revealing details about SJI’s unsavory practices on this blog.

Without the noble efforts of Poynder and his investigative colleagues acting as watchdogs over the open access movement, it could quickly devolve into disarray.  I would also like to encourage any employee of an illegitimate “OA” publisher to come forward and help keep OA true to its original purpose.

Nathan