Forwarding excerpts from an important exchange with Michael Eisen
     about NIH Policy on the American Scientist Open Access Forum

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sat, 26 Jul 2008 01:01:42 -0400
From: Stevan Harnad <amsciforum@GMAIL.COM>
To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM@LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG

On Fri, Jul 25, 2008 at 6:00 PM, Michael Eisen <mbeisen@lbl.gov> wrote:

> I would like to shift the discussion a bit to something a bit more
> practical. Now that the NIH policy is in place, how can we most
> effectively leverage it to advance open access?

...How can we most effectively leverage NIH policy to advance open access
most effectively -- across disciplines and institutions, globally:

         [A]dd IR deposit with automated export to PMC as the preferred
         Method of deposit.

This is not a change in policy, just a change in an
implementational detail: http://publicaccess.nih.gov/

> I have been trying here at the University of California to do just
> this by proposing that the University:
>
> a) require author deposition in an institutional archive...
> c) handle the deposition of material from the IR to PMC (which may, or
>    may not, require additional steps)

That's it! And what's needed to facilitate it -- not just at UC but
worldwide -- is for NIH to add this as its preferred Method of deposit
(as an addition to the other 4 Methods ): Deposit via IR and export to
NIH: http://publicaccess.nih.gov/

> b) require that authors amend copyright agreements with publishers to
> not only allow deposition in the IR, but to allow redistribution and
> reuse of the content (so, for example, the full-text could be ingested
> into PMC, thereby satisfying the NIH mandate)

This could be added to the Harvard mandate, with optional opt-out,
as now -- as long as the Harvard mandate's own small but likewise
fundamental flaw is also fixed, which is:

         to add a mandatory immediate-deposit clause, with no
         opt-out, but with the option to set access to that deposit as
         Closed Access (plus the Button) in cases where the author opts
         out of the rights-retention clause.

http://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/364-guid.html

Then the combination of (1) the upgraded NIH policy model and (2) the
upgraded Harvard policy model would be the optimal model for emulation
by both funders and institutions worldwide, and the most likely to
maximize both OA mandate growth and OA growth across all disciplines
and institutions globally.

http://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/369-guid.html

> ...I'm going to keep trying and would love some thoughts from the group
> about HOW to do this... and what other steps we might take make this
> a teachable/actionable moment.

Lobby for (1) the addition of the preferred IR deposit + export
Method to the four current NIH implementation Methods and (2) for the
addition of the enhanced rights-retention clause with opt-out plus the
immediate-deposit clause without-opt out to the current Harvard mandate
model.

Both of these small but extremely consequential changes are teachable,
actionable, practical, and politically feasible, and many other OA
advicates can work toward promoting the same two points worldwide.

Above all, never resign yourself to "it ain't gonna happen for
both practical and political reasons."

> There are some interesting threads in the discussion about whether the
> NIH should have mandated deposition into institutional archives. But
> the discussion is really kind of pointless, because, as we like to say
> in these parts "it ain't gonna happen" - for both practical and
> political reasons.

If we had been ready to resign ourselves to "it ain't gonna happen for
both practical and political reasons," a lot of the OA developments
about which people were skeptical, pessimistic or opposed in the past
decade and a half would never have happened.

Since what is at issue is not a change in the NIH policy but merely a tiny
implementational detail -- adding a further Method of deposit to NIH's list
(preferential deposit via automated IR export), along the very lines
you are proposing for UC below -- at no loss to anyone or anything,
and with great promise of gain in global OA growth, it is certainly
not pointless to keep trying to get an otherwise splendid NIH policy,
with a needless implementation flaw, fixed.

Stevan Harnad
American Scientist Open Access Forum
http://amsci-forum.amsci.org/archives/American-Scientist-Open-Access-Forum.html

Chaire de recherche du Canada		Professor of Cognitive Science
Institut des sciences cognitives	Electronics & Computer Science
Universite du Quebec a Montreal		University of Southampton
Montreal, Quebec			Highfield, Southampton
Canada  H3C 3P8				SO17 1BJ United Kingdom
http://www.crsc.uqam.ca/		http://users.ecs.soton.ac.uk/harnad/