** Apologies for cross-posting ** Original American Scientist Open Acces Forum Thread began: "Self-Archiving the Refereed Journal Literature" (Apr 1999) http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/0203.html Below is an excerpt from Peter Suber's Open Access News http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/2006_08_27_fosblogarchive.html#115703264696631993 summarizing OhioLINK's very welcome recommendation to self-archive. What is missing from the otherwise useful information that OhioLINK lists, curiously, is a link to the BOAI Self-Archiving FAQ, in place since 2002! http://www.eprints.org/openaccess/self-faq/ And whereas it is always good to negotiate the retention of rights if an author can and wishes, it is erroneous to imply that that is a *necessary* precondition for self-archiving. With 94% of journals already endorsing immediate (non-embargoed) OA self-archiving http://romeo.eprints.org/stats.php and the readily available option, for articles published in the remaining 6%, of depositing their full-texts and metadata too, immediately upon publication, but making only their metadata immediately accessible webwide, while provisionally setting access to their full-text as "Closed Access" during any embargo period: http://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/91-guid.html Meanwhile almost-immediate, almost-OA for each individual would-be user can still be provided by the author on an individual basis, via the semi-automatic EMAIL EPRINT REQUEST button now being added to the principle Institutional Repository (IR) softwares: https://secure.ecs.soton.ac.uk/notices/publicnotices.php?notice=902 Hence it is now possible to self-archive 100% of the final drafts of peer-reviewed journal articles whether or not the author can or wishes to successfully negotiate the retention of rights. *Do not wait for successful rights negotiation before self-archiving -- or before mandating self-archiving*. Self-archive now, for the sake of research impact and progress (and negotiate after, if you wish). And on no account feel that you need to switch journals in order to do this! Stevan Harnad ------------ Excerpt from Peter Suber's Open Access News http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/2006_08_27_fosblogarchive.html#115703264696631993 Retain the rights to self-archive and then self-archive OhioLINK is recommending that Ohio scholars retain the rights they need for self-archiving and then that they actually self-archive. From its important statement of recommendations (approved in May, released yesterday): http://www.ohiolink.edu/journalcrisis/intellproprecsaug06.pdf There is a growing national and international movement for authors of peer-reviewed journal articles to self-archive their work in repositories that are openly accessible. Open access archiving has major advantages over sole reliance on the traditional publishing model. It substantially increases all researchers' access to the research literature. There is strong evidence http://opcit.eprints.org/oacitation-biblio.html that articles that are made openly accessible have substantially more research impact than articles that are available only through subscriptions and licenses....OhioLINK is building the Digital Resource Commons (DRC) for [the] purpose [of self-archiving by Ohio scholars].... If traditional publication policies are followed, Ohio authors will not retain the rights to disseminate their own works in electronic form....If this continues, the academic community foregoes the ability to maximize access and to control the economic costs of an expanding knowledge base which under the current system is increasingly unaffordable.... 1. Faculty are encouraged to publish in journals that have responsible assignment of rights policies. In instances where faculty have a choice among journals, access to scholarship will improve if they choose publishers that, as a matter of practice, have favorable polices towards author self-archiving in open access vehicles. In addition, new journals are emerging that publish according to full open access models. 2. Whether as allowed by a publisher's standard author agreement or by amendment, authors/copyright holders must retain the NON-EXCUSIVE right to make their work openly accessible and to use it for their own non-commercial educational and research purposes. This can best be accomplished by retaining copyright and only granting the publisher first publication rights. It can also be accomplished within current common practice where copyright transfers to the publisher by the proper retention of self-archiving and use rights.... By altering an author's agreement with a publisher certain key rights can be secured that will be advantageous for the author, the institution, and potential readers without harming the publisher....[A]n Author's Addendum to the publisher's agreement can be used to ensure the author has retained a bundle of key rights. A template to do so from which a final addendum can be created is attached.... We recommend that faculty members, if the copyright owner, and institutions, if the copyright holder, retain author self-archiving and access rights in one form or another. The template illustrates the basic rights that should be retained. Several optional provisions are suggested which the author or institution can elect to incorporate. As noted below, a great number of publishers are receptive to author self-archiving rights and so a basic addendum may suffice in most cases.... 3. In parallel with individual author action, OhioLINK will seek to add a clause to its licenses with publishers in its Electronic Journal Center. This clause will seek to automatically provide the recommended self archiving and access rights to all personnel of Ohio higher education institutions. 4. With the retention of rights, we strongly recommend that works in both Published and Unpublished works categories be deposited in the OhioLINK DRC or a campus repository that links to it. Comments [by Peter Suber:. 1. There are four important things going on here. First, OhioLINK is encouraging Ohio scholars to retain the rights they need for OA archiving. Second, it's providing its own Author Addendum to help authors retain those rights. Third, it's adding its weight as the licensing agent for member institutions to persuade publishers to agree to these terms. (It knows that most publishers already agree and is focusing on the remainder.) And finally, it's encouraging Ohio scholars to self-archive their preprints and postprints in their institutional repository or in OhioLINK's own repository. 2. OhioLINK is a consortium of 85 academic libraries in Ohio representing more than 600,000 faculty, students and staff. It doesn't set campus policies on self-archiving, but it can facilitate them (by creating its own repository, by writing an Author Addendum, by pressuring publishers to drop permission barriers) and it can encourage member institutions to set policy. Here it is doing all that it can. It deserves all our thanks for that. 3. The OhioLINK Author Addendum (pp. 7-8 of the new recommendations) joins those already crafted by SPARC, MIT, and Science Commons. Permanent link to this post Posted by Peter Suber at 8/31/2006 09:22:00 http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/2006_08_27_fosblogarchive.html#115703264696631993 AM. ------- Peter Suber has also listed the following additional signatories to the list of US Provosts endorsing the US Federal Research Public Access Act (FRPAA) that proposes to mandate self-archiving: * Peter Lange, Provost at Duke University * Alfred F. MacKay, Provost at Oberlin College * Robert L. McGrath, Provost. Stony Brook University * Arthur T. Johnson, Provost at University of Maryland - Baltimore County * Bruce L. Mallory, Provost and Executive Vice President U. New Hampshire * Dana Dunn, Provost at the University of Texas at Arlington * Abe Harraf, Provost of Southern Utah University * Brad Born, Interim Vice President for Academic Affairs, Bethel College * Rita Cheng, Provost and Vice Chancellor, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee * Stephen D. Gottfredson, Provost, Virginia Commonwealth University http://www.arl.org/sparc/advocacy/frpaa/institutions.html http://www.arl.org/sparc/advocacy/frpaa/highered.html Needless to say, there is absolutely no need for these or the other signatories to wait for the passage of the FRPAA they endorse in order to adopt an immediate self-archiving mandate at their own universities! http://www.eprints.org/openaccess/policysignup/ Stevan Harnad AMERICAN SCIENTIST OPEN ACCESS FORUM: A complete Hypermail archive of the ongoing discussion of providing open access to the peer-reviewed research literature online (1998-2005) is available at: http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/ To join or leave the Forum or change your subscription address: http://amsci-forum.amsci.org/archives/American-Scientist-Open-Access-Forum.html Post discussion to: american-scientist-open-access-forum@amsci.org UNIVERSITIES: If you have adopted or plan to adopt an institutional policy of providing Open Access to your own research article output, please describe your policy at: http://www.eprints.org/signup/sign.php UNIFIED DUAL OPEN-ACCESS-PROVISION POLICY: BOAI-1 ("green"): Publish your article in a suitable toll-access journal http://romeo.eprints.org/ OR BOAI-2 ("gold"): Publish your article in a open-access journal if/when a suitable one exists. http://www.doaj.org/ AND in BOTH cases self-archive a supplementary version of your article in your institutional repository. http://www.eprints.org/self-faq/ http://archives.eprints.org/ http://openaccess.eprints.org/