Friends: Here is a report from Peter Suber's blog written by Judea Franck of the Colorado State University. Please read it carefully and tell me should we delay formation of an Alliance for Taxpayer Access in India and fight for people's rights for open access to the results of taxpayer-funded research. Should we not persuade our parlimentarians to legislate open access to all publicly-funded research? Arun [Subbiah Arunachalam] --------------------------------- The public interest in OA and FRPAA Judea Franck, Who should have access to federally funded research? Inside the 2006 Federal Research Public Access Act, Library Connection (from Colorado State University), Fall 2006. (Thanks to Jennifer McLennan.) Excerpt: Who should have access to federally funded research? Researchers? Professors? Students? Taxpayers? Should research findings be freely available on the Internet? What would be the impact if colleagues in all fields could exchange information with the click of a mouse and without the barriers of membership, subscriptions, or dues? These questions have recently been brought to the forefront by the introduction of the Federal Research Public Access Act (FRPAA).... After his experiences on the battlefields of World War I, Alexander Fleming made a shocking discovery-bacteria could be an even deadlier force than enemy artillery. In the startling conditions of trench warfare, infection caused 15 percent of war-related fatalities, or roughly 5.5 million out of 37 million total deaths. Fleming returned to his London laboratory driven to find some way to prevent these deaths. His pursuit eventually led to the discovery that mold, specifically penicillin, could kill bacteria....[W]hen Fleming published his findings in the British Journal of Experimental Pathology in 1928, his work raised little interest and was nearly lost to scientific obscurity. It was not until 1938, ten years later, that British scientist Ernst Chain and Australian scientist Howard Florey rediscovered Fleming's article.... [I]n today's world, with information increasingly at one's fingertips, it is amazing to note that some of the very same barriers that resulted in the ten-year delay of penicillin research and countless other discoveries still exist.... Just imagine if Fleming could have sat down at a computer and told colleagues in England and beyond about the miracle mold that could knock out staph bacteria. In fact, the number of visitors to digital content on Web sites so far outnumbers traditional journal circulations that the potential to broadly, widely, and immediately impact the scientific community via publishing online is nearly limitless. Take, for example, the journal Science. Science is one of the most commonly cited journals and boasts 130,000 print subscriptions. Yet its Web site, which contains a mix of free and subscription-required portions, receives 1.8 million weekly visits.... [There] is a growing movement to grant taxpayers access to research that is funded with taxpayer dollars. Led largely by the Alliance for Taxpayer Access, an organization in which CSU is a founding member, the movement insists on developing open, online access to federally funded research. Its main advocates include universities, libraries, consumer groups, and perhaps most notably a long list of patient advocate groups including the Genetic Alliance, a coalition of 600 disease-specific organizations that advocates for better healthcare treatments. Sharon Terry became the coalition's president after she and her husband encountered astounding barriers to research literature that would help them understand the debilitating genetic disorder from which both of their children suffered. The Terrys worked around those barriers by volunteering at a hospital and gaining access to the hospital's library. Armed with the research that they were first denied, the Terrys became experts on their children's disorders and, working with a network of scientists, became co-discoverers of the gene responsible for the disorder. Although it is uncommon for lay individuals to make such a significant impact in the research community, 80 percent of taxpayers, according to a recent Harris interactive poll, support a right to "open access" and have a strong desire not necessarily to view research findings themselves, but rather to feel the real-world benefits reflected when their own doctors, pharmacists, and other practitioners have better access to cutting-edge discoveries.... Peter Suber's comment: This is one of the best articles I've seen on the public interest (as opposed to the self-interest of researchers as authors and readers) in OA and FRPAA. Friends: Here is a report from Peter Suber's blog written by Judea Franck of the Colorado State University. Please read it carefully and tell me should we delay formation of an Alliance for Taxpayer Access in India and fight for people's rights for open access to the results of taxpayer-funded research. Should we not persuade our parlimentarians to legislate open access to all publicly-funded research? Arun [Subbiah Arunachalam] --------------------------------- The public interest in OA and FRPAA Judea Franck, http://lib.colostate.edu/about/news/library_connection/fall06.pdf Who should have access to federally funded research? Inside the 2006 Federal Research Public Access Act , Library Connection (from Colorado State University), Fall 2006. (Thanks to Jennifer McLennan.) Excerpt: Who should have access to federally funded research? Researchers? Professors? Students? Taxpayers? Should research findings be freely available on the Internet? What would be the impact if colleagues in all fields could exchange information with the click of a mouse and without the barriers of membership, subscriptions, or dues? These questions have recently been brought to the forefront by the introduction of the Federal Research Public Access Act (FRPAA).... After his experiences on the battlefields of World War I, Alexander Fleming made a shocking discoverybacteria could be an even deadlier force than enemy artillery. In the startling conditions of trench warfare, infection caused 15 percent of war-related fatalities, or roughly 5.5 million out of 37 million total deaths. Fleming returned to his London laboratory driven to find some way to prevent these deaths. His pursuit eventually led to the discovery that mold, specifically penicillin, could kill bacteria....[W]hen Fleming published his findings in the British Journal of Experimental Pathology in 1928, his work raised little interest and was nearly lost to scientific obscurity. It was not until 1938, ten years later, that British scientist Ernst Chain and Australian scientist Howard Florey rediscovered Flemings article.... [I]n todays world, with information increasingly at ones fingertips, it is amazing to note that some of the very same barriers that resulted in the ten-year delay of penicillin research and countless other discoveries still exist.... Just imagine if Fleming could have sat down at a computer and told colleagues in England and beyond about the miracle mold that could knock out staph bacteria. In fact, the number of visitors to digital content on Web sites so far outnumbers traditional journal circulations that the potential to broadly, widely, and immediately impact the scientific community via publishing online is nearly limitless. Take, for example, the journal Science . Science is one of the most commonly cited journals and boasts 130,000 print subscriptions. Yet its Web site, which contains a mix of free and subscription-required portions, receives 1.8 million weekly visits.... [There] is a growing movement to grant taxpayers access to research that is funded with taxpayer dollars. Led largely by the http://www.taxpayeraccess.org Alliance for Taxpayer Access , an organization in which CSU is a founding member, the movement insists on developing open, online access to federally funded research. Its main advocates include universities, libraries, consumer groups, and perhaps most notably a long list of patient advocate groups including the http://www.geneticalliance.org Genetic Alliance , a coalition of 600 disease-specific organizations that advocates for better healthcare treatments. Sharon Terry became the coalitions president after she and her husband encountered astounding barriers to research literature that would help them understand the debilitating genetic disorder from which both of their children suffered. The Terrys worked around those barriers by volunteering at a hospital and gaining access to the hospitals library. Armed with the research that they were first denied, the Terrys became experts on their childrens disorders and, working with a network of scientists, became co-discoverers of the gene responsible for the disorder. Although it is uncommon for lay individuals to make such a significant impact in the research community, 80 percent of taxpayers, according to a recent Harris interactive poll, support a right to open access and have a strong desire not necessarily to view research findings themselves, but rather to feel the real-world benefits reflected when their own doctors, pharmacists, and other practitioners have better access to cutting-edge discoveries.... Peter Suber's comment: This is one of the best articles I've seen on the public interest (as opposed to the self-interest of researchers as authors and readers) in OA and FRPAA.