Open Access to Scientific Research
A critical issue for African science is the extraordinary cost of subscribing
to international journals, many of which need to be paid for in precious foreign
exchange. A solution may be at hand.
A number of influential scientists have begun to argue that the cost of
research publications has grown so large that it impedes the distribution of
knowledge. Some subscriptions cost thousands of dollars per year, and those
journals are usually available online only to subscribers. This looks less like
dissemination than restriction, especially if it is measured against
the potential access offered by the Internet. That is why a coalition led by
Dr. Harold Varmus, the former director of the National Institutes of Health,
is creating a new model, called the Public Library of Science.
Several years ago Dr. Varmus's group issued an open letter, signed by some
30,000 colleagues, calling on the publishers of scientific journals to make
their archived research articles freely available online. Most journals
declined, so they would not undercut the profitable business of selling
expensive subscriptions to libraries. But there is a basic inequity when much of
the research has been financed by public money.
The Public Library of Science plans to confront that inequity by establishing
a new series of peer-reviewed journals that will be freely available on the
Internet. The first ones, published this October, will be PLoS Biology and PLoS
Medicine. The aim is to create a freer flow of data about research and results.
The journals will pay for themselves by charging a small fee to the
organizations and institutions that support the research.
Most non-scientists, admittedly, will not have much use for free access to
new discoveries in, say, particle physics. But it is a different matter when
it comes to medical research. Popular nostrums abound on the Web, but it can be
very hard, if not impossible, to find the results of properly vetted,
taxpayer-financed science - and in some cases it can be hard for your doctor to
find them, too. The Public Library of Science could help change all that,
creating open access to research. The publishers of scientific journals are
naturally skeptical, but the real test will come in the marketplace of
ideas. What will matter this fall, when the new journals make their debut,
is how many scientists choose to publish in them rather than in the journals
traditionally deemed the most prestigious in their disciplines.
The Public Library of Science (PLoS) is a non-profit organization of
scientists and physicians committed to making the world's scientific and
medical literature a freely available public resource.
The internet and electronic publishing enable the creation of public
libraries of science containing the full text and data of any published research
article, available free of charge to anyone, anywhere in the world.
Immediate unrestricted access to scientific ideas, methods, results, and
conclusions will speed the progress of science and medicine, and will more
directly bring the benefits of research to the public.
To realize this potential, a new business model for scientific publishing is
required that treats the costs of publication as the final integral step of
the funding of a research project. To demonstrate that this publishing model
will be successful for the publication of the very best research, PLoS will
publish its own journals. PLoS Biology is accepting submissions now, and the
first issue will appear in print and online in October 2003. PLoS Medicine
will follow in 2004.
PLoS is working with scientists, their societies, funding agencies, and other
publishers to pursue our broader goal of ensuring an open-access home for every
published article and to develop tools to make the literature useful to
scientists and the public.
More information:
Public Library of Science: 185 Berry Street Suite 1300 San Francisco CA 94107
USA phone +1 415.624.1200 email plos@plos.org
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