Re: Forthcoming OA Developments in France

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

I suppose Professor Harnad thinks that if he constantly 
promulgates the idea (see below) that the only difference between 
the accepted paper and the final published version is a matter of 
formatting he will get those not involved in publishing to accept 
this as a "fact". In fact there is something called 
"copyediting". There are some publishers who do very little 
copy-editing or even none at all. However many publishers, 
especially those who have important journals, do a lot of 
copy-editing which is not just a matter of house style but can 
pick up serious errors. The difference between the versions can 
be significant and this difference is (I understand) being 
recognised by the current NISO groups working on version. Journal 
editors of course know this very well too.

Anthony Watkinson

----- Original Message -----
From: "Stevan Harnad" <harnad@ecs.soton.ac.uk>
To: <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, July 05, 2006 12:10 AM
Subject: Re: Forthcoming OA Developments in France

> On Sat, 1 Jul 2006, Richard Feinman wrote:
>
>> I meant that I didn't see why it is considered a step forward. 
>> Without some consistent link from a search engine, I suspect 
>> researchers don't see the point.  (Are there data on how often 
>> archived papers are accessed?).
>
> (1) All major search engines harvest OA Institutional and 
> Central Repository content.
>
> (2) There are also OAI-compliant harvesters and search engines 
> specialising in the OA content (OAIster, Citebase, CiteSeer, 
> Scirus, Scopus, Google Scholar)
>
> (3) OA is not a search engine problem, it is an access problem.
>
> (4) For data on how OA increases citations and downloads, see: 
> http://opcit.eprints.org/oacitation-biblio.html
>
>> If a paper isn't accessible, researchers tend to write to the 
>> authors who will send you a pdf (legally or otherwise).
>
> Correct, but that is incomparably more time-consuming and 
> inefficient -- hence much less functional -- than a click, for 
> browsing and usage, no search for author email address, no 
> wait, and no dependence on whether author has or will email the 
> PDF. OA would provide that for all papers, instantly, with one 
> click. (OA Institutional Repositories do have a semi-automatic 
> email-eprint-request button which speeds the process: 
> https://secure.ecs.soton.ac.uk/notices/publicnotices.php?notice=902).
>
>> Also, I think the idea that you can't post the final version 
>> seems ridiculous to most people but, of course, that gets back 
>> to the global question.
>
> Who says one can't post the final version? The final version is 
> the author's refereed, accepted final draft. No need for the 
> publisher's PDF. Or are you referring to the 24% of journals 
> that have so far only endorsed the self-archiving of the 
> unrefereed preprint, not the final refereed draft? With 70% 
> endorsing the self-archiving of the final draft, I think the 
> semi-automatic email-eprint-request button will do for the time 
> being, for the remaining 24% (plus the 6% for which even 
> preprint self-archiving has not been endorsed by the 
> publisher), if the preprint plus corrections is found too 
> ridiculous (I agree), or the author is foolish enough to comply 
> with a *pre-submission* requirement not to self-archive the 
> preprint.
>
>      http://romeo.eprints.org/stats.php
>      http://www.eprints.org/openaccess/self-faq/#publisher-forbids
>
> The spread of OA self-archiving mandates and the growth of the 
> systematic practice of self-archiving both text and metadata 
> upon acceptance for publication will ensure that all 
> ridiculousness and foolishness will phase itself out in short 
> order, as nature takes its course.
>
> Stevan Harnad
>
>
>> On Wed, 28 Jun 2006, Richard Feinman wrote:
>>
>>> I don't understand self-archiving.
>>
>> Please let me explain it to you: It is researchers making the
>> final refereed drafts of their own published articles freely
>> accessible on the web for those would-be users who cannot afford
>> access to the publisher's version.
>>
>>      Self-Archiving FAQ
>>      http://www.eprints.org/self-faq/
>>
>>> Isn't that another bizarre practice of having the author assume
>>> a task which should be done by the publisher.
>>
>> Not in the least. The publisher implements the peer review,
>> performs the copy-editing, markup, composition, printing and
>> distribution, in print and on paper.  In exchange, he receives
>> subscription revenue. It is not the publisher's task to provide
>> access to those who cannot afford his product. If the author
>> wants those potential users to have access too, he needs to
>> provide it. But all it costs is a few minutes and keystrokes per
>> paper, and what it brings is substantially more usage and impact:
>>
>>      Carr, L. and Harnad, S. (2005) Keystroke Economy: A Study of the
>>      Time and Effort Involved in Self-Archiving.
>>      http://eprints.ecs.soton.ac.uk/10688/
>>
>>      Bibliography of Findings on the Open Access Impact Advantage
>>      http://opcit.eprints.org/oacitation-biblio.html
>>
>>> Does it not highlight the intent of publishers to reduce access
>>> to the author's article.  Are they not saying: sure we'll
>>> publish it but if you want everybody to be able to read it you
>>> have to take care of that.
>>
>> Nothing of the sort. The head-shaker is not that publishers won't
>> do it for authors. (It's more than enough if publishers simply
>> give author self-archiving their green light, as the publishers
>> of 94% of journals already do -- and if they do not lobby against
>> research-funder self-archiving mandates.)
>>
>>      http://romeo.eprints.org/stats.php
>>
>> The real head-shaker is that, despite the substantial benefits to
>> them, only 15% of researchers self-archive spontaneously. This is
>> why self-archiving mandates were needed. Fortunately, the
>> mandates are coming, at long last:
>>
>>      Swan, A. (2005) Open access self-archiving: An Introduction.
>> Technical
>>      Report, JISC.
>>      http://eprints.ecs.soton.ac.uk/11006/
>>
>>      UK (RCUK): http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/access/
>>      EC:
>>
http://europa.eu.int/comm/research/science-society/pdf/scientific-publicatio
n-study_en.pdf
>>
>>      US (FRPAA):
>> http://cornyn.senate.gov/doc_archive/05-02-2006_COE06461_xml.pdf
>>
>> Stevan Harnad