[Bob Dawson]

Petition to Require free access over the Internet to scientific journal articles arising from taxpayer-funded research.
Signatures needed by mid-June.
This is not about being Democrat or Republican
https://wwws.whitehouse.gov/petition...paign=shorturl

"Requiring the published results of taxpayer-funded research to be posted on the Internet in human and machine readable form would provide access to patients and caregivers, students and their teachers, researchers, entrepreneurs, and other taxpayers who paid for the research. Expanding access would speed the research process and increase the return on our investment in scientific research."

[Bob Dawson]

Petition to the White House: as of June 1 2012 we have 22,685 signatures on the petition, which started on May 13.
We need an additional 2,395 signatures by June 19, to reach 25,000 signatures.
(The total of signatures is updated daily at the bottom of the petition)

[Bob Dawson]

Petition to the White House was launched May 13; today is June 2 and there are 24,000 signatures on the petition; the original aim was to get 25,000 by June 19 - looks like there will be more than 25,000.

[Bob Dawson]

june 4 - done! 25,000 signatures and still going
thanks to all

Honestly, I don't think you will ever succeed with this. A huge amount of research is paid by tax money. You are asking scientific journals for free access, which will lead them to go bankrupt because if normal people have free acces, anyone has free access.

What is the next step ? All companies supported by tax funding should give away their developed meds for free ?

I do not work for these companies or am I related to any scientific journal. I would also love to have all research openy public for me because I really like to read science into the details. But I don't think your proposal is viable.

[Bob Dawson]

[QUOTE= Honestly, I don't think you will ever succeed with But I don't think your proposal is viable.[/QUOTE]

Parkinson's research can't wait for the publishers of science journals to drag their system forward a few centuries. The current business model of academic journals is itself no longer viable and has become a barrier, one of many such barriers.

http://www.scientificjournals.org/op...s_movement.htm

Dysfunctional practices in the journal publishing system

Recent independent studies of the journal publishing market have concluded that it is not working optimally because of structural problems. Subscription fee-based and print-based scholarly publishing system has become dysfunctional and is in a state of crisis. .. ..
At a time when digital and online access should enable researchers to maximize the reach and impact of their research, the restrictive business practices of traditional publishers have placed serious constraints on the dissemination of knowledge. All of this is detrimental to both readers and authors….
the Internet widens distribution and allows scholars to share knowledge instantly with a worldwide audience. It fosters openness in the flow of scientific and creative ideas as a means to advancing knowledge. Many scholars now believe that open-access publishing is the wave of the future

[johnt]

Bob,

You beat me to it: you must type faster than me!

Diego24,

It may have made sense to charge for access in the days before word proccessors and the internet. In those days the publisher had work to do.

Now it can all be done online by the scientists themselves for free: from setting up an editorial board, to finding reviewers, to distributing.

In my opinion, the real currency here is "kudos". Once scientists see that having a paper in a free access online journal gives at least as much kudos, they are happy to use this route.

You write:
"What is the next step ? All companies supported by tax funding should give away their developed meds for free ?"

It seems to me to be unfair that a company supported by tax dollars should not act socially responsibly.

John

Originally Posted by johnt

Bob,
Diego24,

It may have made sense to charge for access in the days before word proccessors and the internet. In those days the publisher had work to do.

Now it can all be done online by the scientists themselves for free: from setting up an editorial board, to finding reviewers, to distributing.

Maybe you are right. I know the following ... I did a PhD in control theory and I do know I had to write my papers myself, sent it to the journals and let them get reviewed. The reviewers are not paid. The journals contact researcher from who they know they are working on something similar and ask them to review the papers (so I also got asked several times to review papers ... for free). The scientist will receive feedback from these reviewers. The paper can be rejected, accepted or accepted with modifications. If the paper gets accepted, possible after the modifications, the university has to pay for the paper to get published.

This is what I know about the system. At first sight it seems indeed unfair. So I wonder why these journals are asking money for it. They ask money from the ones writing the papers, as well as from the ones reading the papers. But maybe there is a hidden reason for this ? If the reason is just make people rich, you have a point in making these papers available for free.

But still, being right is not enough. For example, in electrical engineering you have the IEEE community. This is a very big community with a huge amounts of journals. This community is very big and rich. I don't think they are gonna allow your wish to become reality. I feel like you are doing a Don Qijote here, fighting against windmills. But still props for you trying.

Originally Posted by johnt

It seems to me to be unfair that a company supported by tax dollars should not act socially responsibly.

I dont think in this case you are completely right. The company is also based on private money. The owners are taking risks with their money too. If the company fails, the owners have a big problem. Moreover, a company that doesn't create profits ? That simple doesn't work. For people to do something there needs to be some incentive.

Even if these companies don't give away their products for free, still they give something back to the people. They create jobs for the people. They do research that not only makes humanity take a step forward, but also gives other people ideas to start their own companies. And the best of all ... one day they will find a cure for the existing diseases and help us all; even though we might have to pay for that cure.

If I would be a president or whatever, I would invest in companies doing research because these are the ones boosting the economy of your country and creating well being for the people.