Re: Poynder on OA in Europe

From: Barry Mahon <barry.mahon_at_IOL.IE>
Date: Sun, 18 Mar 2007 17:46:27 +0100

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On Fri, 16 Mar 2007 17:13:56 +0100, Stevan Harnad <harnad_at_ECS.SOTON.AC.UK> wrote:

> From Peter Suber's Open Access News

> Why did the EC step back from the
> brink, and where does this leave the OA Movement? ...
>
> "The EC's long-awaited policy on Open Access was published as
> a Communication on 15th February, and formally announced at a
> conference on scientific publishing held in Brussels.
>
> "While the Commission has decided that it will encourage researchers
> to publish their papers in "author-pays" OA, or hybrid, journals it
> chose not to introduce a self-archiving mandate. Rather it will issue
> programme-specific "guidelines" for making publicly-funded research
> available on the Web after an embargo period. This, it says, will
> be done on a sectoral basis, taking into account the specificity of
> the different scholarly and scientific disciplines."

Why is anybody surprised?? The EC support for R&D is an economic activity, it is designed to create economic development, jobs, etc. The political justification for the vast amounts the EC has spent and is spending of the various Framework programmes is that they will keep the EU ahead in the technical/economic game. Any 'guarantee' of OA by the EC would send commercial partners running for cover. My own recollection of the programmes is that commercial partners in EU projects were very reluctant to publish anything, at least until they had patents and other cover in place. I recall a speaker from a commercial player, at an early Esprit conference, saying - "we are in this because it is the cheapest money you can get to do R&D and we are in it on our terms"

Bye, Barry
Received on Sun Mar 18 2007 - 18:29:48 GMT