On Fri, 9 Dec 2005, Bob Ward (Press and Public Relations, Royal Society) wrote:
BW:
Dear Stevan,
If this was "a rather disinterested contribution of BMC toward OA", why was its involvement not openly declared in the letter, or in the prominent piece that BioMed Central devoted to the letter on the home page of its website? My understanding is that some of the signatories did not even know about BMC's involvement when they signed.
Dear Bob,
For the very same reason that my own (minor) efforts to inform Fellows of the Royal Society about the Royal Society Statement and its implications were not openly declared: Because neither my efforts, nor those of Peter Suber, nor those of BMC, nor those of PLoS are of any consequence or relevance in this fundamental matter. (And they are already well-known.)
What is at stake is access to scientific research. We are not competing for revenues. There are no commercial interests involved. The only pertinent interests we are all representing are the interests of research, researchers, their institutions, their funders, and the tax-paying public that funds the funders and in whose ultimate interest research itself is being done.
And those interests are prominently declared in every word we say on behalf of Open Access -- which, to repeat, is not a competing economic model, serving commercial interests (as I am beginning to think that the publishing wing of the Royal Society might truly and innocently believe it to be!): Those interests are genuinely and solely in "
the widest possible dissemination of research outputs" -- as you yourself put it, in describing the position of the Royal Society.
So I actually think the shoe is on the other foot. It is not BMC whose efforts on behalf of the RCUK proposal need to be openly declared. The RCUK proposes to require its fundees to self-archive their published research articles in their own institutional repositories for "
the widest possible dissemination of research outputs" (by making them OA). That RCUK self-archiving policy is not in fact in BMC's commercial interest: If anything, it is contrary to it, for, as I noted in my posting, the incentive for publishing papers in an OA rather than a non-OA journal (and paying to do so) is that the journal provides OA: Yet the self-archiving of articles published in non-OA journals provides the very same benefit.
So the disinterested efforts of BMC and others on behalf of OA speak for themselves. What require a franker and more open declaration and examination are the interests and efforts of those in the Royal Society who influenced the drafting of the Royal Society statement on OA and the RCUK policy. For those interests are not only
not those of the RS Fellowship as a whole (as the still growing number of FRS signatories to the Open Letter dissenting from the RS statement declares quite openly), but apparently the FRSs were not informed or consulted about the RS statement at all, or not nearly sufficiently.
http://www.frsopenletter.org/
In sum, there is indeed a conflict of interest here. But it is not a conflict between the commercial interests of BMC and the competing financial interests of the publishing operations of the Royal Society. It is a conflict between what is in the best actual interests of research and what is in the best perceived interests of some research publishers. The Royal Society needs to do some open soul-searching in order to sort out and declare openly where it stands.
BW: I think it would be best for contributors to the debate on open access to openly declare their interests. The Royal Society has openly acknowledged that, as a registered charity, it uses its surplus from the publication of its journals to fund meetings, lectures and other activities for the benefit of the science, engineering and technology communities, and for the public.
And now the four questions that the Royal Society needs to face equally
openly are these:
(1) Why is the RS trying to further delay the application of 15 years' worth of positive experimental results on the benefits of OA self-archiving to research and researchers in the absence of any evidence of negative effects on publishers and publishing? and to delay the application of those experimental results, and the further extension of this successful experiment, in the name of seeking still further "experimental results"? What further experiments? Experiments on what? And why?
(2) Why does the RS keep treating the RCUK proposal to require OA self-archiving of non-OA journal articles as if it were a proposal to require OA publishing? All evidence to date is that OA self-archiving leads neither to OA publishing nor to non-OA journal cancellations. Is the RS's advocacy of delaying the RCUK for further experimental evidence itself based on experimental evidence, or is it a delay based on speculation, and giving greater weight to imaginable risk to publishing revenues than to demonstrable and demonstrated benefits to research impact and progress?
And now the hardest and most soul-searching question of all:
(3) Even if the imaginable risks were eventually to prove to be real, and self-archiving were to lead to cancellations and a transition to the OA publishing model, would
that be grounds for renouncing the demonstrated benefits to research impact and progress?
To put (3) still more graphically:
(4) Are the benefits currently funded by the RS's "surplus from the publication of its journals" -- i.e., "meetings, lectures and other activities for the benefit of the science, engineering and technology communities, and for the public" -- are those benefits to continue to be subsidised, at all costs, by researchers' lost impact and progress? Is there no other, more direct way to fund "meetings, lectures, and other activities for the benefit of the science, engineering and technology communities, and for the public" than at the cost of lost research access and impact? Are research reports a commodity whose main purpose is to subsidise something else through its sales revenue? Or is research an end in itself for the Royal Society?
Research is certainly an end in itself for RCUK. And what the RCUK is proposing to require is not a change in publishing model or practices at all. It is proposing to maximise the usage and impact of the research that it funds, for the benefit of the public that funds the research -- by self-archiving it.
RCUK is not requiring the RS or any publisher to become an OA publisher. RCUK is not requiring RCUK fundees to publish in OA journals (such as BMC's or PLoS's). RCUK is only requiring RCUK fundees to self-archive their own RCUK-funded research, for the sake of "
the widest possible dissemination of research outputs" -- an objective to which the RS too declares itself to be dedicated.
Where is the concrete evidence of that abstract dedication in the RS's unflagging efforts to filibuster the RCUK policy?
BW: So how about everybody else declaring their interests? After all, it is now standard practice for authors to declare any potential conflicts of interest when they submit papers to journals. So perhaps you could start a trend, Stevan, by declaring your interests.
I think there is not much mystery about mine, but I am happy to declare them: They are the very same as the RS's: "
the widest possible dissemination of research outputs."
And I sent the following letter to about 40 FRSs I knew from their association with the journal I formerly edited.
Behavioral and Brain Sciences:
Date: Tue, 29 Nov 2005 03:17:51 +0000 (GMT)
From: Stevan Harnad
Subject: Royal Society Fellows' Open Letter
Dear ------
A few days ago (November 24) the Royal Society published a position statement on Open Access:http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/news.asp?id=3881
The statement opposed the proposal by the 8 UK research funding councils (RCUK) to require that RCUK fundees provide Open Access to RCUK-funded research findings. http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/access/index.asp
Fellows of the Royal Society who disagree with the Royal Society statement have now drafted an open letter indicating that they do not support the RS statement, and why not: http://frsopenletter.jot.com/
If you agree with the Fellows' open letter I hope you will sign it, and encourage other FRSs to sign.
I am not, by the way, a FRS, but my own critique of the RS Statement in the American Scientist Open Access Forum is accessible at: "Not a Proud Day in the Annals of the Royal Society"
(24 Nov 2005)
American Scientist Open Access Forum
or
Hypermail version of AmSci Forum
Stevan Harnad
Stevan Harnad
