Publishing Reform

I do not quite understand all the fuss about the American Anthropological Association's switch in publishers from the University of California Press to Wiley/Blackwell. Yes, Wiley/Blackwell is a commercial publisher, and UC Press is a university press. But both are "Green" on author Open Access self-archiving, meaning they have both endorsed immediate self-archiving of the author's final, accepted draft (postprint) in the author's Institutional Repository, providing immediate Open Access to the article [but see FOOTNOTE].

The time to raise a hew and cry would be if and when Wiley/Blackwell ever contemplated changing their green self-archiving policy. But green policies (62% of journals currently) are growing in number, not shrinking, and this is largely because university and research-funder Green OA mandates, requiring their researchers to deposit their postprints, are growing in number.

So let the research community focus its voice and its will on Green OA policies for its publishers, as well as for its institutions and funders, rather than on spurious distinctions among commercial, university and learned-society publishers (all of which have their share of both green and non-green publishers!).

FOOTNOTE: There is one substantive point, however, about the AAA's transition to Wiley/Blackwell, which is that some of Blackwell's journals impose embargos on the date at which access to the deposit can be set as Open Access.

If the AAA membership wishes to raise objections to something, then objecting to any OA embargos would be a good target.

But even that is far less important that ensuring that all postprints are immediately deposited, and that immediate-deposit mandates are adopted by all universities and research funders. For universal deposit is the surest guarantor that universal immediate OA will soon follow. OA itself is its own best incentive and reward. The 62% of deposits that are immediately made OA will soon draw the 38% that are Closed Access deposits over to their ranks under the natural pressure of research usage and impact alone; the critical thing is that 100% of them should be deposited immediately upon acceptance for publication. And meanwhile, the Institutional Repositories' semi-automatic "Fair Use" (email eprint request) Buttons will provide almost-immediate almost-OA to tide over all access needs during any publisher embargo.

Stevan Harnad
American Scientist Open Access Forum