Mind the Gap

Features Special Feature Mind the gap Rhonda Oliver (Group Head of Publishing of the Biochemical Society and Managing Director of Portland Press Limited) In December 2009, the US Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office of the President and the White House Open Government Initiative launched a public consultation on Public Access Policy. The Administration sought comments from public on the access to publicly funded research results, such as those that appear in academic and scholarly journal articles. Currently, the Downloaded from http://www.portlandpress.com/biochemist/article-pdf/32/2/24/4024/bio032020024.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 National Institutes of Health (NIH) require that research funded by its grants be made available to the public online, free, within 12 months of publication. The Administration canvassed opinion on whether this policy should be extended to other science agencies and, if so, how. Introduction We are very concerned by the prospect of any move The Biochemical Society is an international member- to impose free release of peer-reviewed journal articles ship-based learned society which was founded in 1911. with short embargo periods, or no embargo at all, when The Society is based in London and its mission is to there are no authoritative data on whether such a move promote the advancement of the molecular biosciences would affect the viability of our journals in the long run. and to represent the interests of all those working in We welcome the recognition of the importance of the sector. peer-review, as we make a In addition to being a “we do not believe that the US Government significant financial invest- scientific learned society, should expropriate journal articles in which ment to manage the pro- the Biochemical Society is the Biochemical Society (through Portland cess by which a submitted also a not-for-profit pub- Press Limited) has invested and added con- manuscript becomes part lisher via its wholly owned siderable value.” of the ‘minutes of science’ subsidiary, Portland Press in the shape of the ‘version Limited, and therefore this response to your consulta- of record’. However, our value-added activities are not tion is made from both perspectives. paid for by US taxpayer dollars and we do not believe Portland Press Limited publishes a number of books that the US Government should expropriate journal and journals, including the Society’s flagship journal, articles in which the Biochemical Society (through the Biochemical Journal, which was founded in 1906, Portland Press Limited) has invested and added consid- and has been serving the scholarly scientific commu- erable value. nity for over 100 years. We also publish on behalf of Publishers are experimenting with a number of a number of other learned societies; for example, the journal business models and we believe that we should International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular be allowed to retain control of our own business models, Biology, the International Federation for Cell Biology, operating in a free market. Peer-reviewing research is a the Société Française des Microscopies and the Société very expensive activity and has to be paid for by some- de Biologie Cellulaire de France. In 2009, we launched body. It is therefore extremely important that any policy a new open-access journal on behalf of the American to mandate access to research outputs funded by the US Society for Neurochemistry. Government does not destabilize the scholarly publish- The Biochemical Society welcomes this opportunity ing system that has served the scientific community, and to respond to the OSTP open consultation, recognizing society as a whole, so well. as it does the vital role scholarly publishers play in the communication of science. Although based in the UK, our authors and read- Key words: digital data , ers are international. Around 25% of submissions to the fraud, gamma correction, Biochemical Journal come from the USA, and the USA histogram equalization, accounts for ~50% of our online subscriber usage. Any image processing, neutral public access policy adopted by the US Government will Portland Press launched ASN Neuro a Gold Open Access Journal contrast stretching therefore have a significant impact. on behalf of the American Society of Neurochemistry in 2009 24 April 2010 © 2010 The Biochemical Society Special Feature Features Question 1 How do authors, primary and secondary publishers, libraries, universities and the Federal Government contribute to the development and dissemination of peer-reviewed papers arising from federal funds now, and how might this change under a public access policy? Researchers and their organizations provide the facili- ties and knowledge to conduct scientific research and Downloaded from http://www.portlandpress.com/biochemist/article-pdf/32/2/24/4024/bio032020024.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 educate the researchers of the future. Publishers play a vital role in the validation, certi- fication, dissemination and digital preservation of the outputs of scientific research. We fund and support the peer-review process, which, combined with our journal brands, enables the scientific literature to be ranked and sorted, by quality and scientific discipline. The Biochemical Society accepts the principle that governments, via their taxpayers, fund substantial amounts of research carried out in the biomedical sci- ences, and therefore that these taxpayers should have access to those outputs. However, governments do not pay for the versions of record that are the end-product of the scientific literature. It is essential that any policy does not harm or limit the ability of publishers to create the peer-reviewed scholarly literature, for example, by drastically reduc- ing our legitimate right to generate revenues from the value-added publishing services that we provide. Question 2 What characteristics of a public access policy would best accommodate the needs and interests of authors, primary and secondary publishers, libraries, universities, the Federal Government, accessibility to research outputs. users of scientific literature and the public? Any public access policy should respect the free market in which publishers operate to allow them to find As the Federal Government has paid for the data arising new ways to expand access in a sustainable fashion. from scientific research, the basis of any federal public There is no one optimal embargo period for all access policy should be restricted to the immediate scientific disciplines and, in respect of the current NIH public posting of a research report summarizing the public access mandate, we believe that any reduction in major findings of the research. Such reports would ben- the current 12-month embargo period would be very efit from being tailored for the members of the general damaging to the Biochemical Society’s needs. public, i.e. by providing context and significance to a non-specialist audience. In this respect, we commend Question 3 patientINFORM, a free online service that provides patients and their families access to important research Who are the users of peer-reviewed publications information relating to a number of diseases. arising from federal research? How do they access patientINFORM is a collaborative project, actively and use these papers now, and how might they if managed and funded by STM (of which the Biochemi- these papers were more accessible? Would others cal Society is a member). It is a very good example use these papers if they were more accessible, of publishers working together to enhance the public and for what purpose? April 2010 © 2010 The Biochemical Society 25 Features Special Feature The primary users of the peer-reviewed literature are repositories such as PubMed Central (PMC) would be academics and researchers in universities, research in- more helpful about sharing their usage data. stitutions and in industry. There is a shortage of data In 2006, as part of the centenary celebrations of the regarding the real demand from the public for access to Biochemical Journal, the journal archive back to 1906 the peer-reviewed scientific literature. was digitized and deposited in PMC. It became imme- There are data to show that ~96% of STM journals diately apparent that this was shifting usage away from are available online and that this is now overwhelmingly our own website. how the literature is accessed by users. It is well known that librarians use usage statistics to There is little evidence that lack of access to the inform their cancellation decisions, so this was a matter scholarly literature is a problem for users (see RIN Study of great concern to us. This situation was compounded on Access to Professional and Academic Information in by a refusal by PMC to provide us with the detailed us- Downloaded from http://www.portlandpress.com/biochemist/article-pdf/32/2/24/4024/bio032020024.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 the UK, August 2009) and most academics have access age information we need to understand and manage the to the literature via subscriptions taken out by their situation. institutions. In addition, the Biochemical Society makes its jour- Question 5 nals accessible to users in the developing world through the Research4Life programme (HINARI, AGORA, etc.) What features does a public access policy need to – as do many other publishers in both the commercial have to ensure compliance? and not-for-profit sectors. Unsurprisingly, there is evidence that users predomi- Question 4 nantly wish to access the version of record. Relying on individual authors to submit their ar- How best could federal agencies enhance public ticles resulted in low levels of compliance – even after access to the peer-reviewed papers that arise such compliance was mandated by their grant givers. from their research funds? What measures could We offer authors the choice to pay to make their agencies use to gauge whether there is increased article freely available online immediately on publica- return on federal investment gained by expanded tion (so-called Gold Open Access), but take-up is low.

Load more