Shahrzad Roohy Gohar
PhD Candidate
Business Process Management Group
Information Systems Discipline
Queensland University of Technology
Level 5, 126 Margaret Street
Brisbane, QLD 4000
Email: [log in to unmask]
skype:shahrzadrg
________________________________________
From: Evidence based health (EBH) [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Ahmed Abou-Setta, M.D. [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Saturday, 24 March 2012 1:47 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Perils of open access
Forgot my disclaimer:
• Deputy Editor – Evidence based Women’s Health Journal (Traditional-Access)
• Editor – Middle East Fertility Society Journal (Traditional-Access)
• Editor – ISRN Obstetrics and Gynecology (Open-Access)
• Editor – The Open Medical Devices Journal (Open-Access)
• Editor – World Journal of Methodology (Open-Access)
Ahmed
From: Ahmed Abou-Setta, M.D. [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Friday, March 23, 2012 10:43 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: RE: Perils of open access
This is a very interesting discussion and I would like to weigh in on two points:
1) Business models: Open Access vs. Traditional Publishing
Obviously the Open Access model is lucrative and is making a good profit or else you wouldn’t see journals sprouting up right left that are Open Access. They may publish lower quality articles or articles that are more biased (for pharm-sponsored articles), but at the end of the day they are another route of research dissemination. I personally have published in Open Access journals, but only when I didn’t have to pay (usually free submission periods). I don’t believe that researchers should pay for publishing their work out of pocket. If agencies like the US government make it mandatory for government-sponsored trials then obviously they will offer researchers a way to put this as part of their operating costs. For the rest of us, I don’t see why we should pay??? The argument for Open Access, other than everyone can access the research for free, is that the author maintains the copyright. Well, in most cases, that means little since the author will probably not be re-publishing their work again in any other form (e.g. book chapter) and if even if they wanted they run the risk of self-plagiarism. At the end of the day, if publishing companies want to charge $100, $1000 or $10,000 then that’s fine with me since I have no obligation to pay these fees. Through natural selection, the weak journals will fade away (and probably everyone who published there will not have any way to link back to their work because the online presence will disappear with the money they paid to get published in these journals). Only the strong will remain (e.g. established publishers, government-sponsored organizations, etc.).
2) Effect on systematic reviews:
NONE.
You may think that I say that with arrogance, but the contrary, I say that with experience. I have been doing systematic reviews for almost 10 years now and covered from a single included article to over 200 included articles in multiple languages, publication types (e.g. journal, FDA, conference). Any descent systematic review has to have access to online databases (e.g. Medline, Embase, Central, etc.), and a multitude of journals. When I was first starting out in a developing country, I have to ask favors of friends and colleagues to get me access, contacted authors in the hopes they would send me reprints and made photocopies from the local library of articles that were available. Once I moved to Canada, I could immediately see the stark difference… because the library system automatically gives you access to more journals than you can read, more databases than you would need to search and interlibrary loan services to help locate articles that are not immediately accessible. That made the process much faster, but the end result was pretty much the same. Also systematic reviewers can opt to conduct Cochrane reviews, in which case the Cochrane entity can help them greatly in getting access to materials that they are after. Therefore in my mind, there is absolutely no impact on systematic reviews in relation to the evolution from traditional publishing to Open Access publishing.
Ahmed
From: Evidence based health (EBH) [mailto:[log in to unmask]]<mailto:[mailto:[log in to unmask]]> On Behalf Of Susan Fowler
Sent: Friday, March 23, 2012 9:32 AM
To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Perils of open access
There has always been bias in research to those with more money, long before Open Access business models. You have to have a publish worthy paper in the first place and that happens when research is funded. It takes money to provide the resources necessary to apply for and get grants in the first place.
I hope there is not the implication that Open Access is especially appealing to libraries because of cost. Libraries are paid for by their institutions. Really, the money is all coming from the same pot but Open Access allows more people to access the information and thus stretches the impact of that money.
--
Susan Fowler, MLIS
Medical Librarian
Evidence at Becker:
http://beckerguides.wustl.edu/ebm
Mobile Resources Guide:
http://beckerguides.wustl.edu/mobileresources
Becker Medical Library, Washington University in St. Louis
314-362-8092
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
On Fri, Mar 23, 2012 at 8:47 AM, Joy MacDermid <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
I started publishing in bmc with great enthusiasm for the concept of open access in the early days of its inception. At that time my institution had a membership so I did not need money to publish. After the first cycle of contracts the fees increased exponentially and almost all universities switched to "supporter" where the institution authors get a small discount. I, like others, find fees of about $2000/paper are a barrier to many authors and have been disappointed with this. I cannot understand why the fees need to be this high; but suspect this is related to both expenses and the business model. The business model of open access means I can only consider this venue for papers where I have grant funding, which leaves out many of my projects and any papers beyond the primary paper from each grant. Having said that for those considering this venue
1. Grant agencies do allow adding this to your budget--especially the ones that mandate you publish the work they fund in open access ( although many traditional journals now have policies to "open" these types of papers up electronically if requested by authors)
2. I have found that some journals have waived fees for graduate trainees based on financial need; but you need to ask and it is one off- but this can be important for trainees to get published early
Joy C MacDermid PT PhD
Email: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>; OR [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
-----Original Message-----
From: Evidence based health (EBH) [mailto:[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>] On Behalf Of Suhail Doi
Sent: Friday, March 23, 2012 3:03 AM
To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Perils of open access
Amy,
When we talk of OA, we mean "open" simply in terms of money ... nothing else. Now how can it be OA if he restriction in terms of money is simply shunted from users to authors? Its simply reverse restricted access
(RRA) not OA at all. So just as conventional journals restrict access to non-prosperous readers, OA journals restrict access to non-prosperous researchers. Both access models claim that they have pathways for "poor"
authors or "poor" readers but we know they do not work.
The much more dangerous aspect of OA is there is now a mechanism to foster confirmatory bias since opinions backed by money (that differ from the mainstream) will have a greater potential to see the light of day as publishers are no longer making money from readers
Suhail
On 3/23/2012 11:45 AM, Amy Price wrote:
> Suhail,
>
> Are you saying that OA is not what it seems because the researchers
> will end up eating the costs so it is not OA at all because it
> reduces accessibility to all but quite prosperous researchers? Are
> you opposed for other reasons as well?
>
> Amy
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