NYTimes.com Article: Measure Calls for Wider Access to FederallyFinanced Research

[Ann Okerson <aokerson@pantheon.yale.edu>]

Of possible interest to readers of this list.

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Measure Calls for Wider Access to Federally Financed Research

June 26, 2003
By WARREN E. LEARY 

WASHINGTON, June 25 - A group challenging the power of established
scientific journals says legislation will be introduced to make the
results of all federally financed research available to the public.

The group, the Public Library of Science, which includes scientists,
doctors, researchers and their public supporters, plans to announce
legislation on Thursday that would give taxpayers greater access to
scientific data.

The group's objective is an open system of scientific publishing that
would bypass the current system, which centers on journals that charge,
through their subscriptions, for access to results.

The measure places results of research financed primarily by the
government into the public domain so access cannot be prohibited by
copyright, said Dr. Michael B. Eisen, a co-founder of the library, and a
biologist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. The bill also calls on
federal agencies to improve access to their research results.

Representative Martin Olav Sabo, Democrat of Minnesota, is to introduce
the measure, called the Public Access to Science Act. A spokesman said
that Mr. Sabo was concerned about patients' access to the latest medical
research and that he would seek co-sponsors for the bill.

American taxpayers invest about $45 billion a year in scientific and
medical research, and the results should be readily available to them, Mr.
Sabo said.

"It defies logic to collectively pay for our medical research, only to
privatize its profitability and availability," he said in a statement.

Dr. Harold E. Varmus, president of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer
Center in New York and chairman of the Public Library of Science, said the
legislation would help get out the message that scientific results should
be more easily available to more people.

"Privately owned journals can't tie up scientific information, and people
should begin discussing this issue," Dr. Varmus said.

The Public Library of Science, with the help of a $9 million grant from
the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, will begin publishing an online,
peer-reviewed journal on biology in October, followed by a medical science
journal early next year.

Access to the journals is to be free, and the operating expenses are to be
financed by $1,500 fees charged to researchers whose papers appear. Most
research grants are large enough to include payments for publishing
results, proponents say.

Traditional journals like Nature and Science publish papers at no charge
to researchers but recoup costs and sometimes make profits with
advertising and paid subscriptions, on paper and online.

Dr. Alan I. Leshner, chief executive of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science, which publishes the journal Science, said everyone
concerned with scientific publishing was looking for the best way to
improve assess to information on the Internet and elsewhere.

"We are all looking for the best model to assure access to quality
scientific information," Dr. Leshner said, "We're experimenting with
different methods to do the same thing."

Science magazine, for instance, is giving free online access to
institutions in developing countries and providing site licenses to
hundreds of universities so that everyone on those campuses has free
access.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/26/politics/26LIBR.html?ex=1057632519&ei=1&en=a2d520c95132f689

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