** 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
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is available at:
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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/