Re: Publicly funded research

[Vivian Stieda <vstieda@ucalgary.ca>]

NIDDR and OSERS already does this, do they not? If I am not mistaken, all
research that comes out of an OSERS & NIDRR funded grant must be made
publicly available. Thus US citizens, and by virtue of the web, the rest
of us, have free access to the full text of papers that have come out of
NIDDR and OSERS funded research. Examples of this can be found at Abledata
and the NARIC information centre.

(The cheeky side of me also can't help think that since US taxpayers seem
to have already agreed to pay for this kind of model, it seems reasonable
that a similar kind of infrastructure could be set up for other government
funded research in other disciplines, say medicine. And as a Canadian and
thus non-tax paying contributor to this initiative, I'd be only too
delighted to help you move this initiative forward)

Vivian Stieda
Health Knowledge Network

> While I don't believe the US government can dictate WHERE something is
> published, I do believe it has every right and even an obligation (to the
> public health if nothing else) to dictate the conditions of how the
> published research that comes out of grants it funds.  Specifically, it
> could require that all of it be made available to the public free, as
> Medline is now.  I believe it is such a big player (the elephant in the
> living room?) that it could make such a requirement stick.  Sure, JAMA can
> get it "first" (or Nature or Science), but then it also becomes available
> elsewhere.  If publishers don't like it, then so much the better for open
> access journals.
>
> Harvey Brenneise
> Michigan Public Health Institute
> hbrenne@mphi.org