Heather Joseph, Executive Director The Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition THE SCHOLARLY PUBLISHING & ACADEMIC RESOURCES COALITION 21 Dupont Circle NW, Suite 800 Washington, DC (202) The Growing Call for Public Access

Why is Public Access Important? Dissemination of results is an essential, inseparable component of research and of the US Government’s investment in science. It is only through use of findings that funders obtain value from their investment. The research funded by public institutions is simply not widely available. This works against the public interest since federally funded research is not being fully used and applied.

Selected Proposed Policies Worldwide The European Commission Research Councils UK Canadian Institute of Health Research Ukrainian National Parliament South African Research Council German Research Fund (DMG) Chinese Academy of Science U.S. National Institutes of Health U.S Federal Research Public Access Act

Public Access Facilitates Research Recognition of the importance of public access is rapidly expanding. In a letter to the U.S. Congress 25 Nobel Laureates noted: “ Science is the measure of the human race’s progress. As scientists and taxpayers too, we therefore object to barriers that hinder, delay or block the spread of scientific knowledge supported by federal tax dollars – including our own works. “ - Open letter to the US Congress, August 26, 2004

Public Access Spurs Innovation “ Once a critical mass is reached, text mining will enable new facts to be discovered that would not be possible by humans, such as information about gene associations. Data meshing will also start to happen where, for example, you could look at associations between supermarket loyalty cards (to find out what people eat), their health records and gene make up. This will have a huge impact on public health.” --Robert Terry, Senior Policy Advisor, The Wellcome Trust (Research Information, June/July 2006)

Public Access is Central to Higher Education “The broad dissemination of the results of scholarly inquiry and discourse is essential for higher education to fulfill its long-standing commitment to the advancement and conveyance of knowledge. Indeed, it is mission critical.” --25 University Provosts, in an Open Letter to the Higher Education Community, 7/24/06

Public Access is a Market Issue From industry analysts at Credit Suisse First Boston: “ [W]e would expect governments (and taxpayers) to examine the fact that they are essentially funding the same purchase three times: governments and taxpayers fund most academic research, pay the salaries of the academics who undertake the peer review process and fund the libraries that buy the output, without receiving a penny in exchange from the publishers for producing and reviewing the content....We do not see this as sustainable in the long term, given pressure on university and government budgets. “ - (Credit Suisse First Boston, Sector Review: Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishing. April 6, 2004.)

Public Access Is Important to: Taxpayers

Public Access is Important to: Universities and Libraries Even the wealthiest private research institution in the U.S. can afford access to less than 70% of the peer reviewed research, and for thousands of public and private colleges, universities, and research centers in the U.S. the situation is even worse.

Public Access is Important to: Researchers Lawrence, Steve (2001). “Free online availability substantially increases a paper's impact.” Nature, Vol. 411, No. 6837, p. 521

Public Access is Important to: Patients and Health Care Professionals “ When we went to try to find [information on PXE], we discovered that it was very hard to get. We lived in the Boston area at the time and were lucky to be able to go to one of the best medical libraries in the world. We went to the Harvard University library and found that we had to pay $25 to get in the door, which we understood because it's a private university. So we paid the $25, but after about ten trips to the library we decided we couldn't afford to continue that way. ” - Sharon Terry, President, Genetic Alliance and mother of two children with rare genetic disease, PXE

What is the Federal Research Public Access Act? The Federal Research Public Access Act (S. 2695) was introduced on May 2, 2006 by Sens. Cornyn (R-TX) & Lieberman (D-CT). It is a bill designed to ensure that the results of scientific research funded by the public are made accessible to the public in a timely, cost effective manner.

The Federal Research Public Access Act Requires:  Federally funded researchers to submit copy of final manuscript that has been accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal;  Manuscripts be preserved in a stable digital repository that permits free public access, interoperability, and long-term preservation; Free access to each manuscript be available as soon as possible, and no later than six months after the article has been published in a peer- reviewed journal.

What are the Goals of Public Access Policies & S.2695? To expedite, expand and strengthen our national ability to leverage our collective investment in scientific research To provide new avenues to stimulate use of federally funded research results to stimulate new discoveries and new innovations.

S.2695 is Cost Effective Proposed bill recognizes that sharing of research results is part of the research process - progress can be maximized with minimal investment. For example, the NIH estimates its public access program would cost $3.5 million if 100% of its 65,000 eligible manuscripts were deposited annually - an amount equal to 0.01% of the agency's $28 billion budget.

S.2695 is Cost Effective By comparison: NIH’s costs are only a small fraction of the $30 million per year the agency spends on page charges and other subsidies to subscription-based journals. S is structured to minimize development costs. Each agency is not required to develop its own repository, and can achieve economies of scale - by leveraging use of existing platforms and infrastructure, or partnering with other agencies/institutions.

S.2695 is Not a Threat to the Peer Review System S.2695 contains two key provisions that protect journals:  A delay of up to six months in providing access to articles via the public archive (versus immediate access for journal readers).  Inclusion in the public archive of the author’s final manuscript rather than the publisher’s formatted, paginated version preferred for citation purposes.

Public Access can be a Competitive Advantage American Journal of Pathology (American Society for Investigative Pathology) American Journal of Human Genetics (American Society for Human Genetics) Annals of Family Medicine (American Academy of Family Physicians) Annals of Internal Medicine (American College of Physicians) Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy (American Society for Microbiology)* (note ASM has 9 primary journals with 6 month embargos) Applied and Environmental Microbiology (American Society for Microbiology) Canadian Medical Association Journal (Canadian Medical Association) Clinical Medicine & Research (Marshfield Clinic) Clinical and Vaccine Immunology (ASM) Development (Company of Biologists) Diabetes (American Diabetes Association) Genetics (Genetics Society of America) Journal of Cell Biology (Rockefeller University Press) Journal of Clinical Investigation (American Society for Clinical Investigation) Journal of Experimental Medicine (Rockefeller University Press) Journal of Neuroscience (Society for Neuroscience) Molecular Biology of the Cell (American Society for Cell Biology) Nucleic Acids Research (Oxford Univesity Press) Pediatric Research (American Pediatric Society) Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (National Academy of Sciences) RNA (The RNA Society)

S.2695 is Not a Threat to the Peer Review System A recent survey by the Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers clearly shows that a 6- month embargo is not a threat to institutional journal subscriptions: “ Availability of content via delayed open access was not an important factor in journal cancellations…. From examination of all kinds of embargoed content….it is clear that the embargo has to be very short indeed to compete with a subscription: for 82% it had to be 3 months or less…”

S.2695 is Not a Threat to the Peer Review System The ALPSP report concludes: Repositories are clearly not seen by librarians as a substitute for properly managed journal holdings: they point to concerns over long-term availability, stability, completeness and integrity; the faculty want ‘the real journal’; embargoes of even 3 months are a major obstacle; and postprints (let alone preprints) are not seen as an adequate substitute for the journal article.

S.2695 is Not a Threat to the Peer Review System The large majority of librarians do not know whether the content of archives overlaps with their holdings, and most do not plan to introduce systems to measure this. Availability via OA archives was ranked a far behind the needs of faculty, usage and price in determining cancellations. Three times as many respondents thought there would be no impact on holdings compared with those that thought there would be some impact.

Worldwide Trend Towards Greater Access Trend towards considering greater access to research results in general - not just peer reviewed articles, but data Indicative of new understanding of opportunities presented by digital research environment to more fully exploit results of research we collectively fund Viewed as competitive advantage

Further information For more information on progress of these (and other) emerging Open Access policies in the U.S., please see: