John,
The analysis in Martin Richardson's Nature debate contribution
(
http://www.nature.com/nature/debates/e-access/Articles/richardson.html )
is an interesting starting point, but it raises more questions than it
answers:
(1)The data presented is for a single journal - The EMBO Journal.
This is a major journal, presumably subscribed to the majority of large
institutions. But most journals published in the biomedical sciences are not
as widely subscribed as the EMBO Journal. It would be interesting to examine
the equivalent graph for other journals, to see whether, for example, there
is an inverse correlation between number of subscribing institutions and the
access-boost (if any) resulting from open-access.
(2) The data presented lists only *relative* access stats for that journal.
Analysis that included absolute figures would make it feasible to compare
journals with different access policies, rather than being restricted to
looking solely for the impact of opening up access to old articles at a
particular point in time, for one particular journal.
(3) Finally, the strongest message from the data in the graph is that
(unsurprisingly), accesses to the paper in the first 3-6 months after
publication account for a disproportionately large percentage of total
article accesses. The effect of open access during this initial period of
most intense interest remains to be systematically investigated.
Matt
==
Matthew Cockerill Ph.D.
Technical Director
BioMed Central Limited (
http://www.biomedcentral.com)
34-42, Cleveland Street
London W1T 4LB
Tel. +44 20 7631 9127
Fax. +44 20 7580 1938
Email. matt_at_biomedcentral.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: John Sack [mailto:sack_at_STANFORD.EDU]
> Sent: 21 January 2002 00:37
> To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
> Subject: Re: Full-Text Useage Statistics: Open Access vs.
> Firewalled
>
>
> Vicky, Jan, others,
>
> I believe the analysis you are interested in has already been done by
> Martin Richardson, Journals Publishing Director of Oxford University
> Press, for the journals EMBO J and and Nucleic Acids Research (both
> published by OUP) using data supplied by HighWire to Martin.
>
> The analysis was published in the Nature e-access Debates on
> 5 April 2001
> at
> http://www.nature.com/nature/debates/e-access/Articles/richardson.html
>
> Again, I'm not certain that's the analysis you're after, but
> I think it is.
>
> John
>
> On Thu, 17 Jan 2002 08:34:47 -0800 Victoria Reich
> <vreich_at_stanford.edu>
> wrote:
>
> > Jan:
> >
> > I have access to the data, but the data
> > belongs to the publishers not to HighWire.
> > I'll see if I can get permission from several publishers
> > to do some informal analysis.
> >
> > Vicky
> >
> > Jan Velterop wrote:
> > >
> > > David,
> > >
> > > More data are always welcome, of course. Unfortunately,
> direct comparisons
> > > will always be flawed, because in the very nature of
> these comparisons we
> > > are not comparing like with like. They will have to rely
> on really striking
> > > differences (such as a factor of 10 or even 20 for the
> number of downloads)
> > > in order to convince. I would fully expect articles in
> ArXiv to be accessed
> > > more often than their firewalled versions in physics
> journals. For a start,
> > > they usually appear on ArXiv earlier. There is probably
> also an effect of
> > > how widely subscribed the journal in question is. In the
> case of EMBO J its
> > > wide circulation may actually depress the e-access
> figures (people already
> > > have it anyway). Access figures for journals on HighWire
> just before and
> > > just after open access may give useful insights. (Vicky,
> can you help in
> > > this regard?)
> > >
> > > Of course we need to work on the recognition of BioMed
> Central's quality. We
> > > are working hard on that and our journals are being
> monitored by ISI in
> > > order to build up an impact factor. However, it is good
> to keep an eye on
> > > the fact that the overwhelming bulk of scientific
> journals has a relatively
> > > low impact factor, and yet forms the mainstay of science
> communication
> > > (pedestrian perhaps, but that's the reality). You may not
> care much about
> > > 'lesser material' than first rate (although I bet you,
> too, subscribe to
> > > some journals with an impact factor of 2 or less), but
> you have to realise
> > > that you are reasoning from the very privileged position
> of an elite
> > > university. There are plenty of authors who care deeply that their
> > > contribution to knowledge is shared with the less
> privileged (those working
> > > on tropical diseases, for instance, see www.shared.de).
> And there are plenty
> > > researchers in the field (working on tropical diseases in
> sub-Saharan
> > > Africa, for instance) who are happy with access to solid
> applied science,
> > > with or without impact factor. One of them once remarked
> to me, only
> > > half-jokingly, that the usefulness of scientific articles
> to him in the
> > > field was inversely proportional to the impact factor.
> Quality is a relative
> > > thing.
> > >
> > > Having said all that, we are at BioMed Central working,
> of course, on the
> > > credibility and quality perception of the material we
> publish. This takes
> > > time, but I strongly believe that what we are doing is
> worth doing, with or
> > > without sceptics.
> > >
> > > Best regards,
> > >
> > > Jan Velterop
> > > PS. Stevan, thanks for substituting BioMed Central for
> Biometnet in Dvid's
> > > original message (I assume it was you who made the correction)
> > > PPS. David, please distinguish between the two. In
> publishing as in science,
> > > details matter.
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Stevan Harnad [mailto:harnad_at_cogprints.soton.ac.uk]
> > > Sent: 16 January 2002 22:32
> > >
> > > Subject: Re: Full-Text Useage Statistics:
> Open Access vs.
> > > Firewalled
> > >
> > > ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> > > Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2002 16:52:12 -0500
> > > From: David Goodman <dgoodman_at_PRINCETON.EDU>
> > > Reply-To: September 1998 American Scientist Forum
> > > <AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG>
> > > To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
> > > Subject: Re: Full-Text Useage Statistics: Open Access vs.
> Firewalled
> > >
> > > Jan,
> > > I do not think you have enough data yet for your titles. You are
> > > comparing one group of articles in an open environment
> with different
> > > articles in a closed environment.
> > >
> > > Stevan is correct that for the same articles, the open
> environment is
> > > much more used, at least for ArXiv. This is compatible
> with recently
> > > collected preliminary data from this university which
> shows very low
> > > print and quite low electronic use from the journals
> whose articles are
> > > in fields covered by arXiv, even though that area of
> coverage is a major
> > > research subject here.
> > >
> > > I can think of many sources from which relevant data
> could potentially
> > > be gathered. E.G., access for Highwire titles the month
> before and the
> > > month after the access is open to the public.
> > >
> > > What Biomed Central needs to prove to me is that its
> articles are of
> > > first-rate quality. I do not care much about use of
> lesser material,
> > > from any source, paid or unpaid, just because it's there.
> I care about
> > > use of excellent material, which is what the scientists
> really need.
> > > It's excellence in scientific quality that matters
> most--only then comes
> > > ease of availability to it.
> > >
> > > If you prove able to arrange for both, you will have
> solved the problem.
> > > -- Best wishes, David
> > >
> > > Stevan Harnad wrote:
> > > >
> > > > On Wed, 16 Jan 2002, Jan Velterop wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > Dear fellow Open Accessors,
> > > > >
> > > > > May I put a question to you? Would any of you have an
> idea of access
> > > figures
> > > > > of full-text articles in Open Access environments vs.
> protected access
> > > > > environments?
> > > > >
>
> > > > > We have recently analysed the figures for BioMed
> Central and come to an
> > > > > average full-text access statistic per article per
> month of more than
> > > 100
> > > > > downloads. On top of that there are a lot of
> 'abstract-visits' (a
> > > multiple
> > > > > of that number). From a recent Elsevier presentation
> (at e-ICOLC) I have
> > > the
> > > > > following figures: ca. 10 million full-text downloads
> a month from
> > > > > ScienceDirect and 40 million abstract-visits
> (ScienceDirect currently
> > > > > contains 1.8 million articles), which translates to
> something in the
> > > order
> > > > > of 5.5 full-text downloads per article per month.
> > > > >
> > > > > I wonder if we have enough data to show unambiguously
> that Open Access
> > > > > increases an article's visibility by a really
> significant factor (almost
> > > 20
> > > > > on the basis of the figures above).
> > > >
> > > > Data are accumulating, and it would be easy for someone to do a
> > > > systematic study, using archives such as the Physics Arxiv where
> > > > accesses to the firewalled vs. free draft of the same work can
> > > > be specifically compared.
> > > >
> > > > Perhaps others will know of such systematic comparisons underway
> > > > currently. I know only of these two at the moment:
> > > >
> > > > Lawrence, S. (2001) Online or Invisible? Nature 411 (6837): 521.
> > > > http://www.neci.nec.com/~lawrence/papers/online-nature01/
> > > >
> > > > and
> > > >
> > > > Odlyzko, A.M. (2002) The rapid evolution of scholarly
> communication, A.
> > > > M. Odlyzko. Learned Publishing, 15(1), pp. 7-19. Also to
> > > > appear in Bits and Bucks: Economics and Usage of
> Digital Collections,
> > > > W. Lougee and J. MacKie-Mason, eds., MIT Press, 2002.
> > > > http://www.dtc.umn.edu/~odlyzko/doc/rapid.evolution.pdf
> > > >
> > > > Stevan Harnad
> > >
> > > --
> > > David Goodman
> > > Research Librarian
> > > and Biological Science Bibliographer
> > > Princeton University Library
> > > Princeton, NJ 08544-0001
> > > phone: 609-258-3235
> > > fax: 609-258-2627
> > > e-mail: dgoodman_at_princeton.edu
> > >
> ----------------------
> John Sack, Associate Publisher and Director,
> HighWire Press, Stanford University
> Phone: 650-723-0192; fax: 650-725-9335
> http://highwire.stanford.edu/~sack/
> sack_at_stanford.edu
>
Received on Mon Jan 21 2002 - 16:23:08 GMT