closing argument

[Glenn Hampson]

Hi Folks,

 

I have two more comments on the open vs. open access debate and then I’ll rest my case. If someone wants to argue against this, please do. Would it then be helpful to then vote to see where we stand on this as a community?

 

1. With regard to public perceptions, here’s a comment I received yesterday off-list (the author didn’t want to inflame passions but makes some good points): “I have never in nearly 20 years in publishing EVER seen or heard OA interpreted as 'just free access' … I always use the Suber shorthand 'free to read AND reuse', and in all the legal documentation publishers use with their customers, creative commons licensing is the cornerstone of any OA elements included … However, I completely get that in some areas OA is confused with free to read/access, and OSI should lead on making the distinction as clear as possible, so I support the move toward that.”
2. You’ve heard my case about why making a distinction between open and open access would be helpful for the research, advocacy, funding and policy communities. Here’s the argument for why this would be helpful for the future of open. I’ve spent years of my life searching for funding in this space. This funding is either absent altogether, or biased---granted under the condition that “open” means CC-BY, no embargo, no commercial publishers, and so on. This tail wagging the dog approach is, I think, part of why the past 20 years of open has been slow and mired in acrimony. Most of the world outside this tiny bubble of ours doesn’t want what’s being sold---they are excited about the prospects of “open,” but don’t see “open” the same way these funders do, as has been noted by Joe, Karin, Rick and others. So we have a situation here where many people want more open, but maybe a broader, more inclusive kind of open. Embracing the open spectrum can help us here---the rising tide will lift all boats. By showing how “open access” is just one of many different kinds of open (maybe the most aspirational kind), we can focus instead on the real challenges ahead, such as what to do with open and how. We can begin building the Open Renaissance instead of staying stuck in the trenches debating whose data needs to be released immediately and whose paper can be licensed CC-BY-NC-ND. These details will sort themselves out over time as people actually start using open and demanding more. And we can all help move the needle toward the right of the spectrum over time---better reusability, transparency, sustainability, and so on. The first step in this journey, though, is to start thinking more in terms of open (writ large), followed by flexible and adaptable systems for getting there. By re-envisioning the open movement as a broad challenge instead of a challenge that is narrowly focused on achieving very prescriptive outcomes, we can get the research community behind this effort much more vigorously and vibrantly, and this engagement will result in a robust future for open that far exceeds anything we’ve seen to-date. That’s the big picture vision buried under all this---I hope I’ve explained it clearly enough (I’m happy to take questions/comments off-list).

 

Thanks for your time and patience with this conversation---it’s wordy, but pretty important stuff.

 

Best regards,

 

Glenn

 

 

Glenn Hampson
Executive Director
Science Communication Institute (SCI)
Program Director
Open Scholarship Initiative (OSI)

[Joyce Ogburn]

I asked for clarification on a couple of things: the purpose of the guidelines and who they are for. I believe I heard mixed things in response so I don't have clarity on these two questions. The purpose seems to be beyond research to extend to advocacy. I made a simple suggested that people conducting research define OA if indeed that is a part of their research. Although it seems simple that only one definition wuill do, the definition might be situational or cultural or dependent on the focus of the research. For example. if one were researching different ideas or expectations of OA in different contexts or held by different audiences then the research itself is compromised by the limitations imposed by the proposed OSI guidelines. Saying someone is wrong to use any other definitions for the purposes of their research runs counter to academic freedom and freedom of inquiry. Please note I am not taking issue with or for that matter taking any stand on the definition.

The audience also seems to be unclear if we extend both the purpose and the audience to advocates/activists/funders and others. I can see the reason to think that how we evaluate and use the research is important. That is an entirely different question from guidelines for researchers. 

Is it too much to ask for clarity on these 2 questions? If the guidelines are for conducting research then let's keep them that way and craft the best ones for researchers that don't compromise or constrain the ability to actually conduct the research. Guidelines "creep" isn't helpful and may be counterproductive assisting researchers. So number one I would say is that the purpose to assist researchers in conducting their research. Then we can evaluate whether the guidelines actually accomplish this. Number two, the audience is researchers with the understanding that others may choose to adopt or disregard these guidelines entirely or partly. If by researchers we mean any group or organization that supports research is bound by these guidelines I would still argue that the purpose of the research is of paramount concern and that guidelines should be helpful but not constraining. 

If we can't answer these two questions very simply than the guidelines are meaningless. If guidelines for advocacy or other purposes or audiences are desired, create those separately. 

Glenn, your number one comment seems to be about legal terms and of course they need to be clear. That's a different issue. As for comment number two, again I argue that being firm on a definition for one purpose is not the same as being firm for another. I think it is very important that people define OA when conducting research but I'm arguing for academic freedom and freedom of inquiry for people to define it within the context of their research. If people don't like how the research is used downstream, that again is a different issue. Think of poor Darwin - if people had insisted that he anticipate all uses and abuses of his theory of natural selection he would have been even more paralyzed about sharing his theory than he was, which delayed sharing of his ideas by decades. He did, however, define his terms and modify and refine his work over time as his ideas and understanding changed.

I am not arguing just to argue - clarity and transparency of purpose should be a bedrock principle of any organizations documents. 

Joyce

Joyce L. Ogburn

Principal, Farview Insights

@libjoyce

Lifelong learning requires lifelong access 

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[Lisa Hinchliffe]

I've been on vacation and so trying to catch up. There is a long standing "libre access" compared to "gratis access" subdivision of open access. Yes, some advocates of OA say that only libre  is really open access. On the other hand, we have some OA advocates who coined the term "bronze open access" to refer to things that might be free to read at some time and revert to closed at again (https://peerj.com/articles/4375/) so OA-must-be-gratis is apparently not universal in the advocacy community either.  Which leads me to the other point, it seems highly problematic to me to have principle that says you must cite the scholarly literature and then also say you can't use the terminology that is found in the scholarly literature. I'm also not so big on dismissed the quality information that appears outside of the scholarly literature ... for example, financial filings would be great to cite over a piece in the scholarly literature that makes general comments about profits. Lisa

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Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe
lisali...@gmail.com

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