`and I repeat: it is an arbitrary and counterproductive hoop that the
publisher is being paid to jump through, for no good reason
whatsoever, and to no genuine advantage, just disadvantage'
And I repeat that if you have taken money to jump through an
arbitrary hoop then you can, and should, be castigated if you don't
jump through that hoop. But I must admit I do love the implication
that this is heroic `passive resistance' on the part of the
publishers to a `bad' policy!
David
____________________________________________________________________________
From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
[mailto:AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG]
On Behalf Of Stevan Harnad
Sent: 26 June 2009 20:39
To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
Subject: Re: Funder Grant Conditions, Fundee/Institutional
Compliance, and 3rd-Party Gobbledy-Gook
On Fri, Jun 26, 2009 at 12:20 PM, David
Prosser<david.prosser_at_bodley.ox.ac.uk> wrote:
> Hang on, deposit is not an `arbitrary hoop' that the publisher can
jump
> through as and when they are bothered. It is a condition of the
contract
> between the Wellcome and the publisher. If a publisher accepts
Wellcome's
> money to make a paper Gold OA then one of the conditions of the
contract
> between them is that the publisher does the deposit. It is exactly
one of
> the services that the Gold publisher is being paid to publish
(irrespective
> of whether or not its part of the definition of Gold OA.).
>
> You may not agree with the strategy, but let's not get confused
about what
> is being paid for.
I think I fully understand and understood that, David, and I repeat:
it is an arbitrary and counterproductive hoop that the publisher is
being paid to jump through, for no good reason whatsoever, and to no
genuine advantage, just disadvantage (for the reasons I had been at
pains to explain fully in the posting appended below, as well as the
posting following it).
And, yes, this concerns a short-sighted and unreflective component of
Wellcome's strategy -- one that is making the otherwise commendable
and historic Wellcome OA mandate not only far less effective than it
could be, but providing a dysfunctional model for others to emulate,
instead of one that really could scale, systematically, and
successfully, globally: The fundee and fundee institution should be
required to make the deposit, whether the article be published in a
paid-Gold OA journal or a subscription journal. (And the default
deposit should be the author's refereed final draft [or better]; and
the default locus of deposit should be the author's institutional
repository, from which it can then be harvested or imported to
further repositories if desired.)
And I can only repeat my hope that Wellcome's response may be
enlightened enough to fix [this dysfunctional component of Wellcome's
policy] at this point (it's easy) rather than (as I fear), just
digging in deeper with a 'harrumph' and 'we know what we're doing'
and 'mind your own business'..." -- which, I regret to have to say,
David, is a lot closer to the spirit of your own response here...
Stevan Harnad
> ________________________________
>
> From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
>
[mailto:AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG]
On
> Behalf Of Stevan Harnad
> Sent: 25 June 2009 22:22
> To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
> Subject: Funder Grant Conditions, Fundee/Institutional Compliance,
and
> 3rd-Party Gobbledy-Gook
>
>
>
> There is a very simple fix for the (self-created) problem of
"noncompliant"
> publishers -- i.e., those who are paid for Gold OA by funders like
Wellcome
> and then fail to deposit the paid-up article:
>
> Gold OA fees are paid for Gold OA. That means the publisher makes
the
> article OA on his own website (and, of course, since all Gold OA
journals
> are also Green, also endorses immediate Green OA self-archiving by
the
> author in any repositories he chooses).
>
> Let us not castigate publishers if they do not immediately also
jump through
> the arbitrary hoop of further depositing their Gold OA article in
some
> designated repository or other on behalf of the author or the
funder. That
> is an extra (and as far as I know, it is not part of the definition
of Gold
> OA publication, nor the service that the Gold OA publisher is being
paid to
> provide).
>
> So if not the publisher, who is at fault if the article is not
deposited?
>
> (I pause to let you reflect a few moments.)
>
> Well of course the fault is the absurd, again-not-thought-through
mandate
> requiring fundees to make their articles OA, but relying on a 3rd
party
> (unfunded by the funder, and merely paid to make the article OA) to
do the
> deposit!
>
> Not only does that make no sense at all for Gold OA articles, but
it also
> makes compliance and grant fulfillment a gratuitously complicated
overall
> affair, complicated to comply with, even more complicated to
monitor
> compliance with: http://bit.ly/3oxWHy
>
>
>
> For articles published in non-OA journals, the fundee must do the
deposit;
> for articles published in Gold OA journals (or only those that are
paid-OA?
> or only those whose paid-OA is paid by the funder?) the publisher
must do
> the deposit.
>
> I truly hope that the sensible reader will see at once that the
sensible way
> for a funder to mandate deposit is to put the onus for compliance
eclusively
> on the grantee and the grantee's institution, as with all other
funding
> conditions, not to offload it willy-nilly onto non-grantee 3rd
parties
> (whose services may be paid for, but who certainly are not being
paid for
> repository deposit but for Gold OA publishing).
>
> And while we're at it, this is yet another reason why the default
repository
> specified by the funder should be the grantee's own institutional
repository
> and not, again, institution-external repositories. For with local,
one-stop
> deposit, the institution can collaborate, as usual, in ensuring
compliance
> with grant fulfillment conditions, by monitoring the deposits in
its own
> repository, making sure that every grant-funded article has been
deposited,
> regardless of whether it happens to be published in a Gold or
non-Gold
> journal. (And, as a bonus, the institution is then also more likely
to go on
> to adopt an IR deposit mandate of its own, for the rest of its
research
> output, in all fields, whether or not funded by that funder.)
>
> Chasing after 3rd parties -- whether publishers or
institution-external
> repositories -- creates gratuitous complications for absolutely no
extra
> gain, only needless extra pain.
>
> Is there any hope at all that funders who have committed to these
> dysfunctional and counterproductive stipulations will be
enlightened enough
> to fix them at this point (it's easy) rather than (as I fear), just
digging
> in deeper with a "harrumph" and "we know what we're doing" and
"mind your
> own business"...
>
> With a sigh of resignation,
>
> Your weary archivangelist.
>
>
>
> PS If you want to find the origin of much of this easily remedied
confusion,
> look again at that mixed blessing, the well-meaning, timely,
> welcome and highly influential -- but relentlessly unreflective --
ebiomed
> proposal http://www.nih.gov/about/director/ebiomed/com0509.htm and
its
> subsequent incarnations across the years...
>
> On Thu, Jun 25, 2009 at 6:42 AM, Sally
> Morris<sally_at_morris-assocs.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>> Isn't it the case that it's only in the case of articles published
Open
>> Access, and where the fee is paid by Wellcome, that there is any
>> requirement
>> on the publisher to do the depositing?
>>
>> Many other journals/publishers have a Wellcome-compliant policy
for
>> self-archiving of the accepted version, but they are not paid
anything nor
>> are they required to do anything, as far as I am aware
>>
>>
>> Sally
>>
>>
>> Sally Morris
>>
>> South House, The Street
>>
>> Clapham, Worthing, West Sussex BN13 3UU, UK
>>
>> Tel: +44(0)1903 871286
>>
>> Fax: +44(0)8701 202806
>>
>> Email: sally_at_morris-assocs.demon.co.uk
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
>>
[mailto:AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG]
On
>> Behalf Of Alma Swan
>> Sent: 25 June 2009 07:04
>> To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
>> Subject: Re: The Beginning of Institutional Repositories
>>
>> A little bird-in-the-know also told Alma that although 91% of
>> Wellcome-funded research is published in journals compliant with
the
>> Wellcome policy, a major reason for disappointing deposit levels
in UKPMC
>> in
>> the first year of the Wellcome policy (at least) was that the
*publishers*
>> were not depositing as agreed (and as they were being paid to do).
>>
>> I daresay they're shaping up by now.
>>
>> Alma Swan
>> Key Perspectives Ltd
>> Truro, UK
>>
>>
>> On 24/06/2009 11:01, "Sally Morris (Morris Associates)"
>> <sally_at_MORRIS-ASSOCS.DEMON.CO.UK> wrote:
>>
>>> That's what they told Alma. It is not, however, what they are
doing so
>> far
>>>
>>> Sally
>>>
>>>
>>> Sally Morris
>>> Partner, Morris Associates - Publishing Consultancy
>>>
>>> South House, The Street
>>> Clapham, Worthing, West Sussex BN13 3UU, UK
>>>
>>> Tel: +44(0)1903 871286
>>> Fax: +44(0)8701 202806
>>> Email: sally_at_morris-assocs.demon.co.uk
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
>>>
[mailto:AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG]
On
>>> Behalf Of Stevan Harnad
>>> Sent: 23 June 2009 14:13
>>> To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
>>> Subject: Re: The Beginning of Institutional Repositories
>>>
>>> On Tue, 23 Jun 2009, Sally Morris (Morris Associates) wrote:
>>>
>>>> The perceived necessity for institutional and other mandates
does, in a
>>>> sense, reflect a failing - that researchers simply do not see
'what is
>>>> in
>>> it
>>>> for them' and therefore do not, by and large, deposit
voluntarily. What
>>>> this tells us is an interesting question
>>>
>>> It is indeed an interesting question. I think a partial answer is
given
>>> by Alma Swan's surveys, which showed not only that 95% of
researchers
>>> would comply with a deposit mandate, but that 81% would do so
>>> *willingly*, and only 14% reluctantly.
>>>
>>> To me, that suggests that researchers are inclined to deposit,
but not
>>> inclined enough to do so without a mandate from their
institutions or
>>> funders.
>>>
>>> The reasons most are *inclined* to do so, yet only a few actually
do it
>>> without a mandate are multiple. I have identified at least 34 of
them:
>>>
>>> Harnad, S. (2006) Opening Access by Overcoming Zeno's
Paralysis, in
>>> Jacobs, N., Eds. Open Access: Key Strategic, Technical and
Economic
>>> Aspects, chapter 8. Chandos.
http://eprints.ecs.soton.ac.uk/12094/
>>>
>>> The three chief worries are about doing so are that (1) it might
be
>>> illegal, (2) it might put their paper's acceptance for
publication by
>>> their preferred journals at risk, and (3) it might be
time-consuming.
>>>
>>> These -- and the 31 other worries -- are all groundless, and
individual
>>> researchers can be successfully informed about this, one by one;
but
>>> that is not a very practical route to reaching a deposit rate of
100%
>>> worldwide. Official institutional and funder mandates reassure
>>> researchers
>>> that there is nothing to worry about, their institutions and
funders
>>> back them, everyone is doing it, and, as they quickly learn, the
time
>>> it takes to deposit it is minuscule.
>>>
>>> Carr, L. and Harnad, S. (2005) Keystroke Economy: A
>>> Study of the Time and Effort Involved in Self-Archiving.
>>> http://eprints.ecs.soton.ac.uk/10688/
>>>
>>> I am not saying that this fully resolves the puzzle of why it is
taking
>>> so
>>> long to reach the outcome that is so obviously and demonstrably
optimal
>>> for research and researchers, and fully within reach. We will
have to
>>> leave that to future historians and sociologists. What is urgent
now
>>> -- for the sake of research itself, as well as for researchers,
their
>>> institutions and funders, and the tax-payers that fund the
research --
>>> is that this optimal and inevitable outcome should be facilitated
and
>>> accelerated by mandates, so we reach it at long last. For the
longer we
>>> delay, the more research impact and progress keeps being lost,
>>> needlessly.
>>>
>>> So full speed ahead with deposit mandates now, and then we can
study
>>> why it took so long -- and why it needed to be mandated at all --
at
>>> our leisure, after we have universal OA.
>>>
>>> Stevan Harnad
>>
Received on Fri Jun 26 2009 - 21:53:56 BST