Friends: Here is something interesting from Peter Suber's blog. Arun --------- OA Working Group comment on the RCUK policy The Open Access Working Group has publicly released its August 23 comment on the draft RCUK policy. Excerpt: We believe that open-access research dissemination is an indispensable part of the overall remedy to the serious problems now facing the system of scholarly communication. Moreover, open access is a necessary ingredient in any plan to fully realize the social benefits of scientific advances. While these advantages are important no matter the source of the funding, it is particularly critical when the research is publicly funded and the resulting output is a public good....Implementation of [the draft] policy will result in taxpayers gaining immediate, full and direct access to the research for which they have already paid. Moreover, such a policy will increase the return on the government's investment in this research; as a result of deposit the research becomes more accessible, discoverable, sharable, and for these reasons, more useful, than toll-access research....We are particularly pleased to note that the Research Council's policy requires grantees to deposit final published articles, greatly enhancing the policy's chances for successfully achieving these important goals and ensuring maximum participation....To further ensure the success of this policy, we would suggest that the Research Councils consider revising the section of the policy that specifically relates to the timing of the deposit of research materials. [The current language in paragraph 14.b] seems to allow publishers, in cases where they have become the copyright-holder, to object to deposit or to demand long delays or embargoes prior to deposit or public release. We encourage the Research Councils to close this loophole before the final draft is finished to ensure that deposit does indeed occur at the desired point, at or around the time of publication. We note that the draft policy exempts researchers from the requirement to deposit their research in instances where they do not have access to an institutional or disciplinary repository. We hope that the Research Councils will implement strategies to encourage the development of repositories in the U.K. in a manner that makes deposit available to all researchers. The OAWG members who signed this comment are the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL), the American Library Association (ALA), the Association of Academic Health Sciences Libraries (AAHSL), the Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL), the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), the Medical Library Association (MLA), Public Knowledge (PK), and the Scholarly Publication and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC). I participated in the drafting of this comment. Friends: Here is something interesting from Peter Suber's blog. Arun --------- OA Working Group comment on the RCUK policy [A] The http://www.arl.org/sparc/oa/oawg.html Open Access Working Group has publicly released its August 23 http://www.arl.org/sparc/oa/RCUK.html comment on the http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/access/index.asp draft RCUK policy . Excerpt: We believe that open-access research dissemination is an indispensable part of the overall remedy to the serious problems now facing the system of scholarly communication. Moreover, open access is a necessary ingredient in any plan to fully realize the social benefits of scientific advances. While these advantages are important no matter the source of the funding, it is particularly critical when the research is publicly funded and the resulting output is a public good....Implementation of [the draft] policy will result in taxpayers gaining immediate, full and direct access to the research for which they have already paid. Moreover, such a policy will increase the return on the government's investment in this research; as a result of deposit the research becomes more accessible, discoverable, sharable, and for these reasons, more useful, than toll-access research....We are particularly pleased to note that the Research Councils policy requires grantees to deposit final published articles, greatly enhancing the policys chances for successfully achieving these important goals and ensuring maximum participation....To further ensure the success of this policy, we would suggest that the Research Councils consider revising the section of the policy that specifically relates to the timing of the deposit of research materials. [The current language in paragraph 14.b] seems to allow publishers, in cases where they have become the copyright-holder, to object to deposit or to demand long delays or embargoes prior to deposit or public release. We encourage the Research Councils to close this loophole before the final draft is finished to ensure that deposit does indeed occur at the desired point, at or around the time of publication. We note that the draft policy exempts researchers from the requirement to deposit their research in instances where they do not have access to an institutional or disciplinary repository. We hope that the Research Councils will implement strategies to encourage the development of repositories in the U.K. in a manner that makes deposit available to all researchers. The OAWG members who signed this comment are the American Association of Law Libraries ( http://www.aallnet.org/ AALL ), the American Library Association ( http://www.ala.org/ ALA ), the Association of Academic Health Sciences Libraries ( http://www.aahsl.org/ AAHSL ), the Association of College & Research Libraries ( http://www.ala.org/acrl/ ACRL ), the Association of Research Libraries ( http://www.arl.org/ ARL ), the Medical Library Association ( http://www.mlanet.org/ MLA ), Public Knowledge ( http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/Public Knowledge PK ), and the Scholarly Publication and Academic Resources Coalition ( http://www.arl.org/sparc/ SPARC ). I participated in the drafting of this comment.