If you read the ADT report, you will find that the authors don't count
theses which are not made electronically OA for some good reason
satisfactory to the university (government or commercial confidentialty,
aboriginal cultural sensitivity, etc), and this is the source of the 95%
shortfall. Such theses are not exposed to the world through ADT, and even
the ID/OA button cannot and should not make them accessible while the reason
for the embargo continues.
I should add that some of the mandates are of the kind: All students who
enrol after 200x must ...". Such mandates take time to bite, and probably
approach 100% after about 6-8 years (see my earlier papers).
I note that theses are not exactly the same as refereed research articles.
Their primary purpose is to gain a degree (dissemination is only an
important secondary aim), and there are generally no publishers to get in
the way. The University is the publisher. The graduate generally retains
full copyright.
Universities find it easier to mandate thesis deposit than research article
deposit. In both cases, the aim is of course not to set up a policed system,
but to make it clear to the people concerned that this is part of their
researcher duties.
In summery - 95% compliance is essentially complete, as Stevan Harnad noted.
Arthur Sale
> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
[mailto:AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-
> ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG] On Behalf Of Stevan Harnad
> Sent: Tuesday, 26 June 2007 7:00 PM
> To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
> Subject: Re: [AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM] Publish-or-Perish
> Mandates and Self-Archiving Mandates
>
> On Mon, 25 Jun 2007 sgt3_at_psu.edu wrote:
>
> > What surprises me here is that there is only 95% compliance. For
> > any mandatory ETD program...
> >
> > ...What is the penalty for a faculty member who ignores a
> > university policy to deposit research papers in the university's
> > IR?
> >
> > Until "mandatory" means something more than "strongly suggest"
> > and has serious consequences for noncompliance, I suspect that
> > the uptake will fall far short of Stevan's ideal Green OA world.
>
> (1) 95% compliance is just fine! From today's starting point of c. 15%
> spontaneous, unmandated deposits, 95% is and should be music to all of
> our ears.
>
> (2) No penalty for noncompliance. We are just talking about doing
> a few keystrokes, for the author's own benefit. As long as the
> institutional/funder mandates are official, explicit links to the CV
> and performance review are sufficient, as the actual outcomes already
> show. The rest is already driven by incentives, in the form of the
> increasingly palpable benefits of enhanced research access, usage
> and impact.
>
> (3) To help make those benefits all the more palpable and motivating,
> incentive metrics will soon be burgeoning too, sweetening the road.
> See the Netherlands "Cream of Science", Citebase, and Arthur Sale's
> download metrics.
>
> (4) In other words, the "serious consequences" are positive, not
> negative!
>
> The only essential component is the mandates, and they are on the way...
>
> Stevan Harnad
>
> > >> From: Arthur Sale (U. Tasmania)
> > >> Subject: Mandatory policy success
> > >>
> > >> The results of a survey carried out by the Australasian Digital
> > >> Theses program have recently been released. The full report is
> > >> available at
> > >>
> > >>
http://adt.caul.edu.au/memberinformation/submissionsurvey/survey2006.doc
> > >>
> > >> It applies to the deposit of open access electronic copies of
> > >> research theses (eg PhD) in university repositories in
> > >> Australia and New Zealand (and thence searchable through the
> > >> ADT gateway http://adt.caul.edu.au/).
> > >>
> > >> It is apparent from the report (and indeed highlighted by the
> > >> authors) that a mandatory deposit policy results in a submission
> > >> rate of 95% of all theses accepted, while its absence results
> > >> in a submission rate of 17-22% (in other words, a pitifully
> > >> empty repository). While this should not be news to anyone,
> > >> the report has hard quotable facts on the success of an
> > >> institutional mandatory policy over a substantial population
> > >> of universities.
> >
> >
Received on Wed Jun 27 2007 - 08:14:46 BST