NASA Public Access Plan Available: Uses NIH’s PMC Platform | SPARC

"Today, NASA announced its plan for a policy ensuring public access to articles and data resulting from the approximately $3 billion it invests annually in basic and applied research, as required by the February 2013 White House directive.  NASA has provided a detailed timeline for the final policy to be fully developed, and is slating October 2015 as the goal for full implementation to begin. NASA’s plan includes provisions for making both articles and data resulting from its funded research publicly available. Most notably, the Agency commissioned a full independent analysis of implementation options available to provide effective compliance with the article requirements of the White House directive. The analysis compared the merits of the NIH PubMed Central (PMC) database, the DOE’s Public Access Gateway for Energy and Science (PAGES) system, and the Clearinghouse for the Open Research of the United States (CHORUS) platform proposed by the publishing industry.  Ultimately, NASA opted to work with NIH’s PMC database.  The plan specifically notes that, 'Based on the criteria listed in the OSTP memo dated February 22, 2103 and the need for flexibility in incorporating future upgrades, NASA has chosen the NIH PMC platform.  The NIH has led in information retrieval for many years, and the PMC is a capable, mature, and low-risk platform that has evolved over time.'  The provisions of NASA’s policy on articles track with those in the current NIH Public Access policy, and will require NASA-funded researchers to deposit articles into the PubMed Central database, to be made accessible with no more than than a 12 month embargo.  However, the NASA plan notes that, “publishers may petition for longer embargo periods, but strong evidence of the benefits would be needed.” This language is notable, as it seems to suggest that any determination of changes in embargo length will be measured against the public good, rather than specific industry concerns ..."