From: Sandy Thatcher <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Mon, 11 Nov 2013 13:21:45 -0600

What strikes me about Allington's post is that it argues for just what
the AAP has been arguing for in the U.S. for a long time, viz., that
the most efficient and logical way to make the results of
government-funded research available to the public is to  make better
use of the system that already exists whereby government agencies
require reports on research to be submitted (and, in the UK's case,
written in language the public can understand), which then can be
posted immediately to the web with no embargo period involved at all.
His point about the OA system relying on articles written for journals
instead underlines this recommendation because, in his view (which I
share), most of the technical literature is written in a way that
makes it NOT accessible to the general public and devotes space to
discussions of theories, literature reviews, and the like that most of
the public could care less about, since it is the results themselves
that they want to be told about. What do you have to say about this
argument, Fred?

Sandy Thatcher


> From: "Friend, Fred" <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Wed, 6 Nov 2013 12:34:41 +0000
>
> I welcome Daniel Allington's contribution to discussions about open
> access. Having read all through his article, I find it difficult to
> understand Kent Anderson's response to the article. In the points
> Daniel Allington makes there is much to support the development of
> open access as a good way forward for research communication. The
> thrust of Daniel's argument is partly about the current situation in
> the UK, which is of the UK Government's making, and partly about the
> role of open access in solving perceived problems in the research
> communication infrastructure.
>
> On the current UK situation it is the UK Government and not open
> access supporters who have attempted to impose one particular model
> upon a complex academic environment. The rest of the world - and until
> recently the UK - has been careful to follow various routes to open
> access and has avoided the rushed implementation of one particular
> open access model (see my article "How did the UK Government manage to
> spoil something as good as open access?"
> http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2013/10/17/uk-government-manage-to-spoil-open-access/).
> Daniel Allington recognises the UK Government's wish to protect the
> publishing industry but fails to recognise the impact of that
> motivation upon the rest of the research communication infrastructure.
>
> On the many problems in the current research communication
> infrastructure, it is quite true that open access has been - and still
> is by many commentators across the world - seen as a more effective
> model than the toll-access model which has dominated research
> communication for many years. It is not that open access is presented
> as a solution to problems but as an alternative way forward arguably
> more cost-effective than the present infrastructure. Again open access
> supporters recognise the complexity of the research communication
> process. The open access principle is sufficiently flexible to be
> applied in different ways, using different forms of the model for
> different forms of publication, in different cultural environments and
> within different research funding structures.
>
> This is the point at which ordinarily I might embark upon a detailed
> critique of Daniel Allington's paper, but if I were to do so our
> respected Moderator would remind me of the understandable Liblicense
> restriction upon length of submissions to the list. Daniel Allington's
> points deserve to be taken seriously, and the force of the emotion
> which lies behind them is fully understandable. Yet his article cannot
> be used to condemn the entire development of open access as a viable
> alternative to the flawed research communication system we have had to
> live with for many years. It is important for researchers to feel that
> they are involved in the solutions to the problems Daniel Allington
> identifies.
>
> Fred Friend
> Honorary Director Scholarly Communication UCL
> ________________________________________
>
> From: Jim O'Donnell <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Tue, 5 Nov 2013 19:04:49 -0500
>
> Kent Anderson in the Scholarly Kitchen
> (http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2013/11/05/not-the-answer-an-academic-carefully-assesses-the-arguments-for-open-access/)
> points to an interesting essay by UK sociologist Daniel Allington, who
> takes it for granted that mandated gold OA will prevail in the UK, but
> has now had second thoughts about the process and offers an extensive
> analysis:
>
> http://www.danielallington.net/2013/10/open-access-why-not-answer/#sthash.643dajcu.dpbs
>
> Jim O'Donnell
> Georgetown U.