Re: Open Letter about OA to the Royal Society by Fellows of the Royal Society

[Stevan Harnad <harnad@ecs.soton.ac.uk>]

On Wed, 7 Dec 2005, Marc Brodsky wrote:

> I would say a careful reading of the two statements show more balance 
> and openness in the RSC statement than in the response letter cited 
> below by Harnad. I would suggest that we explore new venues for 
> dissemination of information before first setting out to undermine 
> successful existing ones. If the new venues work for authors and 
> readers, we will not need government imposed mandates to make them 
> happen.
>
> Marc H. Brodsky
> Executive Director and CEO		E-mail: brodsky@aip.org
> American Institute of Physics 	                Phone: (301) 209-3131
> One Physics Ellipse 			Fax: (301) 209-3133
> College Park, MD 20740-3843

Having just returned from the DASER meeting in College Park, MD, where the 
two physics Learned Societies, the American Physical Society (APS) and the 
Institute of Physics, took an incomparably more supportive and 
collaborative position on both open access and self-archiving (and the AIP 
rep just sat in glum silence throughout), I find this regressive statement 
from AIP (the separate publisher affiliate of APS), parroting the familiar 
party line of STM, ALPSP and the first RS statement, especially 
instructive. It speaks volumes about the real underlying conflict of 
interest here, and no doubt within the Royal Society too, where it was 
clearly the publishing tail wagging the royal pooch in formulating, 
without consultation, a statement so dissociated from the best interests 
of the RS's members. The RS's shame will be mitigated, once the head 
reasserts sovereignty over its tail. Fortunately, the tail of the APS is 
not even attached to its body...

     DASER 2 IR Meeting and NIH Public Access Policy (Dec 2005)
     http://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/50-guid.html

     Not a Proud Day in the Annals of the Royal Society (Nov 2005)
     http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/4938.html

     Rebuttal of STM Response to RCUK Self-Archiving Policy Proposal (Aug 2005)
     http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/4716.html

     Open Letter to Research Councils UK: Rebuttal of ALPSP Critique (Aug 2005)
     http://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/18-guid.html

Stevan Harnad