There is still genuine irony in the claim that 'both forms of access can and
do provide "free at point of use" access'
Subscription-only content is free at point of use, *if* your institution
pays for it and you are accessing from a context in which you gain access to
your institutional access rights.
Open Access content is unconditionally free at point of use to anyone at any
time.
The THES article is itself an example showing that although
subscription-only content *can* be free at point of use, it frequently isn't
(even to those for whom it is most relevant). That's not to say that THES
should be open access. But it does demonstrate the falsity of claiming that
'author-pays' versus 'reader pays' is just a matter of economics, and
doesn't really affect accessibility.
Matt
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Stevan Harnad [mailto:harnad_at_ecs.soton.ac.uk]
> Sent: 09 January 2004 12:04
> To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
> Subject: Re: Archivangelism
>
>
> On Fri, 9 Jan 2004, Simon Tanner wrote:
>
> > The article "'Open access' for the rich only" is only available to
> > registered users of this site.
> > www.thes.co.uk
> > 14 day FREE TRIAL
>
> The irony is only apparent, not real! THES is not a
> peer-reviewed research journal
> but a commercial magazine. Its writers are doing paid work
> for hire. The authors
> of journal articles are not: They are giving away their work free for
> research impact.
>
> "1.1. Distinguish the non-give-away literature from the give-away
> literature"
> http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Tp/resolution.htm#1.1
>
> "1.2. Distinguish income (arising from article
> sales) from impact (arising from article use)"
> http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Tp/resolution.htm#1.2
>
> (Letters are not works for hire, but it may be complicated to
> make a site partly
> free and partly not, and in any case that is a matter for
> magazine policy.)
>
> Can you imagine newspapers and magazines covering their costs
> by charging their
> journalists to publish?
>
> Stevan Harnad
>
> NOTE: A complete archive of the ongoing discussion of providing open
> access to the peer-reviewed research literature online (1998-2004)
> is available at the American Scientist Open Access Forum:
> To join the Forum:
>
> http://amsci-forum.amsci.org/archives/American-Scientist-Open-
Access-Forum.html
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Received on Fri Jan 09 2004 - 12:25:30 GMT