RE: NYTimes.com Article: Moore Foundation funds new journals

[Jan Velterop <jan@biomedcentral.com>]

At BioMed Central we have operated an Open Access publishing model
(applied to nearly 90 journals covering the biology and medical areas) for
some time now, and although all reseach articles are fully openly
accessible, without any barrier whatsoever, they are not placed in the
'public domain'. The articles we publish can be distributed further by
anyone, but we insist that proper attribution is given.

Our definition of Open Access is as follows (see also
http://www.biomedcentral.com/info/about/charter):

1. The article is universally and freely accessible via the Internet, in
an easily readable format and deposited immediately upon publication,
without embargo, in an agreed format - current preference is XML with a
declared DTD

- in at least one widely and internationally recognized open access
repository (such as PubMed Central and INIST France).

2. The author(s) or copyright owner(s) irrevocably grant(s) to any third
party, in advance and in perpetuity, the right to use, reproduce or
disseminate the research article in its entirety or in part, in any format
or medium, provided that no substantive errors are introduced in the
process, proper attribution of authorship and correct citation details are
given, and that the bibliographic details are not changed. If the article
is reproduced or disseminated in part, this must be clearly and
unequivocally indicated.

We believe that with this definition we do justice to both the need for
maximising the article's visibility and impact as well as the need for
proper attribution and unambiguity of reference.

Jan Velterop
BioMed Central

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Fytton Rowland [mailto:J.F.Rowland@lboro.ac.uk]
> Sent: 19 December 2002 02:44
> To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
> Subject: Re: NYTimes.com Article: Moore Foundation funds new journals
> 
> Quote from the NY TImes article
> 
> "........with the goal of cornering the best scientific papers and
> immediately depositing them in the public domain."
> 
> Am I right in thinking that "public domain" is different from 
> free public access?  If something is in the public domain there is no 
> copyright in it
> - in US law can that mean that someone can claim authorship 
> of work that is not theirs?  In the academic world it matters that work 
> is attributed to the right person, even if that person has publicly 
> declared that anyone can read it without payment.
> 
> Fytton Rowland