Open Access Archivangelism: The Mechanics Behind the Magic

I like Scott Pluchak's posting. We share a vision... If you're interested in some of the objective evidence on the adoption rate (still too slow) and the effectiveness (quite remarkable, though depending on mandate-type) of OA self-archiving mandates, have a look at ROARMAP and the references below. (You might also have heard of the US OSTP, EU Horizon2020 and UK HEFCE/REF2020 mandates, soon to come.) Scott is certainly right that my thinking has been magical: 1. In 1994: I thought it would be enough to just just say 'self-archive' and next day all researchers on the planet would do it. (Next day came, and nothing happened.) 2. It was magical thinking also to create CogPrints in 1997, in case researchers in my field weren't self-archiving because they didn't have a central place to self-archive (no success). 3. Magical thought too, that creating EPrints in 2000 (from which DSpace too emerged) -- so that all institutions could create their own OA repositories -- would do the trick (no dice). 4. A series of studies inspired by Lawrence 2001 -- demonstrating that OA increases citations -- made no significant difference either. 5. But then in 2003, things began to pick up, with the adoption of the very first Green OA mandate (Southampton ECS), followed by several more (notably QUT in Australia and U Minho in Portugal). ROARMAP launched, but adoptions were still just a trickle: decidedly unmagical. 6. Then in 2004 the UK Select Committee recommended that all UK institutions and funders mandate Green OA. And the trickle became a trend -- but still a very sluggish one. And most of the mandates were weak, ineffective ones. It would have taken magic to make them work. 7. So in 2006, Peter Suber and I independently proposed the immediate-deposit/optional-access mandate (ID/OA) (Peter called it the "dual-deposit-release" mandate), Southampton designed the automated request-a-copy Button for EPrints and Eloy Rodrigues designed its counterpart for DSpace. (Perhaps it was still magical thinking to imagine they would work -- or would even be adopted.) 8. But then in 2007, Bernard Rentier, rector of the University of Liège, became the first to adopt the ID/OA mandate and the Button. 9. We then waited a few years to see whether it would work. 10. And by 2010 it became evident that ID/OA + Button was working, and generating over 80% OA compared to about 30% for the weaker mandates and even less without mandates. And no magic was needed ..."