Dear Katie Mantell:

As you requested, I have transmitted widely your announcement about
SciDevNet's coverage of open access:
http://www.scidev.net/ms/open_access/

As you also ask for my comments, Here they are:

(1) The SciDevNet's coverage is very helpful and welcome, but at the
moment it is *extremely* lop-sided, covering only one of the two roads
to open access -- open-access journal publication -- but not the other
road: open-access self-archiving of toll-access journal publications:
http://www.nature.com/nature/debates/e-access/Articles/harnad.html

(2) You do cite the Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI) but you do
not note that the BOAI consists of *two* open-access strategies, of
which the second (BOAI-2) is open-access journal publication but the
first (BOAI-1) is open-access self-archiving:
http://www.soros.org/openaccess/read.shtml

(3) This is an important omission, because in actual numbers, open-access
self-archiving is generating far more open access articles per year than
open-access journal-publishing, and open-access via this road is also
able to grow much sooner and faster. In fact, in all likelihood, the
"green" road of open-access self-archiving is itself also the surest
way to reach the "golden" road of open-access journal-publishing!

http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0026.gif
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0021.gif
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0024.gif
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0028.gif
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0022.gif
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving_files/Slide0030.gif

Complete series:
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving.htm
or
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/self-archiving.ppt

(4) This is why it is so important not to represent "open-access" as 
merely being synonymous with "open-access-publishing"!

(5) In your key reports and documents, you have mostly BOAI-2 reports and
documents. May I suggest adding the following BOAI-1 reports and
documents:
 
    (i) The BOAI-1 (self-archiving) FAQ:
    http://www.eprints.org/self-faq/

    (ii) The original self-archiving proposal (Okerson & ODonnell 1995)
    http://www.arl.org/scomm/subversive/toc.html

    (iii) The University self-archiving policy model:
    http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/archpolnew.html

    (iv) The Research-Funder open-access policy model:
    http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue35/harnad/

    (v) The Berlin Open Access Declaration:
    http://www.zim.mpg.de/openaccess-berlin/berlindeclaration.html

    (vi) SPARC Institutional Repository Checklist & Resource Guide
    http://www.arl.org/sparc/IR/IR_Guide.html

(6) Among "Open Access Initiatives" could I suggest adding

    (i) The SHERPA Project
    http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/

    (ii) The DARE Project
    http://www.surf.nl/en/themas/print/index2.php?oid=7

   (iii) The Australian initiative
   http://alia.org.au/publishing/incite/2002/10/eprints.html

   (iv) French initiatives:
    http://www.tours.inra.fr/tours/doc/comsci.htm

   (v) The cross-institutional archive, OAIster
    http://oaister.umdl.umich.edu/o/oaister/

(7) To "Open Access Literature" I suggest adding:

    Harnad, S. (2001) The self-archiving initiative
    http://www.nature.com/nature/debates/e-access/Articles/harnad.html

    Pinfield et al (2002) "Setting up an institutional e-print archive"
    http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue31/eprint-archives/intro.html

And to links I would add:
    
    Core metalist of open access eprint archives
    http://opcit.eprints.org/archive-core-metalist.html

as well as the following resources:

    Very large harvested cache of open-access arcticles in Computer
    Science: http://citeseer.nj.nec.com/cs

    GNU Open-Source Self-Archiving Software:
    http://www.eprints.org/

    Citation-Impact-Measuring Search Engine for Open-Access Achives:
    http://citebase.eprints.org/cgi-bin/search

    Citation-Seeking Engine (looks for open-access full-texts)
    http://paracite.eprints.org/

    American Scientist Forum (discussion of open access since 1998)
    http://amsci-forum.amsci.org/archives/september98-forum.html

    Open Archives Initiative
    http://www.openarchives.org/

    Powerpoints for promoting open access:
    http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/berlin.ppt
    http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/berlin.htm
    http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/openaccess.ppt
    http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/openaccess.htm

These recommendations are all intended so as to make the SciDevNet
site's contribution to open-access complete, rather than being, as it is
now, merely a review of the open-access journal-publishing portion of
the overall movements and initiatives toward open access.

Sincerely,

Stevan Harnad

On Wed, 5 Nov 2003, Katie Mantell wrote:

> Dear Stevan Harnad
> 
> Many thanks for your email in response to the editorial on communicating
> science in an electronic era.
> 
> We have posted it on our letters to the editor page
> (http://www.scidev.net/EditorLetters/) and have also taken the opportunity
> to post it on a special section of the website that we are launching today
> on "Open Access and Scientific Publishing" under 'Feedback and Debate'.
> 
> In this section (http://www.scidev.net/open_access) we have drawn together
> resources on access to scientific information in the developing world. 
> 
> It includes:
> ·  Up-to-date news, features and opinion articles on the issues
> surrounding open access and scientific publishing
> ·  Descriptions of (and links to) current open access initiatives 
> ·  Access to free scientific literature
> ·  Links to key reports  
> ·  Comprehensive events section with the latest meeting proceedings and
> future events. 
> ·  An opportunity for you to comment and give your views 
> 
> We hope that this guide will be a useful and important resource for all
> those interested in open access to scientific information, and will provoke
> further critical thinking and discussion on the key issues. 
> 
> I would therefore be grateful if you could pass this message on to
> colleagues and friends who might be interested (www.scidev.net/open_access).
> Also, do let me know if you have any comments on the section.
> 
> Best regards
> 
> Katie Mantell
> 
> ============================================
> Katie Mantell
> News Editor
> 
> SciDev.Net
> 11 Rathbone Place
> London
> W1T 1HR
> United Kingdom
> 
> Tel: +44 (0)20 7291 3695
> Fax: +44 (0)20 7291 3697
> ============================================
> SciDev.Net - found at www.scidev.net - is a free-access website providing
> news, views and information on science, technology and the developing world.


NOTE: Complete archive of the ongoing discussion of providing open
access to the peer-reviewed research literature online is available at
the American Scientist September Forum (98 & 99 & 00 & 01 & 02 & 03):
    http://amsci-forum.amsci.org/archives/september98-forum.html
    http://www.cogsci.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/index.html
    Posted discussion to: [log in to unmask] 

Dual Open-Access Strategy:
    BOAI-2: Publish your article in a suitable open-access journal
            whenever one exists.
    BOAI-1: Otherwise, publish your article in a suitable toll-access
            journal and also self-archive it.
    http://www.soros.org/openaccess/read.shtml
    http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Temp/berlin.htm