Re: Information Access Alliance Urges DOJ & FTC to Explore Remedies

["Anthony Watkinson" <anthony.watkinson@btopenworld.com>]

I accept part of Jan's argument. I do agree that anyone can make 
their research public (but they can now) and I was assuming that 
assertions without peer review would not carry much credence. I 
am very interested in the mixed model he is putting forward. All 
these models need to be worked out - in detail - or so it seems 
to me. Why not do that first?

Anthony

----- Original Message -----
From: "JOHANNES VELTEROP" <velteropvonleyden@btinternet.com>
To: <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
Sent: Sunday, February 18, 2007 8:59 PM
Subject: Re: Information Access Alliance Urges DOJ & FTC to Explore Remedies

> Anthony,
>
> You're asking too much here, if you want open access to cure 
> all the world's ills before you'd accept it. And the trade-off 
> is not between some authors not being able to publish and lots 
> of readers not being able to have access. The trade-off is 
> between some authors perhaps not being able to pay for formal 
> publication and lots of readers not being able to have access. 
> Authors can virtually always publish their stuff, albeit 
> informally. Besides, perhaps author-side payment is eventually 
> not the best way anyway to achieve large scale open access.
>
> What about a system whereby institutions pay a 'contribution' 
> to keep the journals that they value 'in the air' as it were? 
> Such contributions could be tailored to the profile (in terms 
> of size and subjects covered, for teaching and/or research, 
> etc.) and readers' and authors' needs with regard to the 
> journals in question. A transition to a system that would 
> support open access is bound to be difficult, to be sure. But 
> if the energy now used for the futile exercise of fighting the 
> future could be redirected to efforts to find solutions, then 
> we would be making progress already, even if it doesn't 
> immediately result in open access in all disciplines for all 
> the journal literature.
>
> The bottom line is that the money now being spent on the 
> scientific literature can be spent so much better, so much more 
> optimally with regard to what the function of the journal 
> literature for the scientific enterprise is in the first place, 
> when that money somehow 'buys' open access rather than 
> subscriptions.
>
> Jan Velterop
>
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: Anthony Watkinson anthony.watkinson@btopenworld.com
> To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
> Sent: Tuesday, 13 February, 2007 11:54:19 PM
> Subject: Re: Information Access Alliance Urges DOJ & FTC to Explore
> Remedies
> for Journal Bundling: Comments Available on Web
>
> There are a lot of assertions here. Until an Open Access 
> advocate (believer) can explain to me how a system of author 
> (or proxy) payment can be made efficient or fair and not 
> prevent some authors from publishing, I remain to be convinced. 
> And, as we see from their behaviour (never mind surveys) this 
> is the view of most of the academic community
>
> Anthony