Open Access and Data Management - A winning combination

“Today is officially Open Access Monday or #OAMonday. This is because a petition set up by John Wilbanks, Heather Joseph, Mike Carroll, and Mike Rossner requiring 'free access over the internet to scientific journal articles arising from taxpayer-funded research' has passed the required number of signatures in order to ascertain a US governmental response.  Peter Murray-Rust has been quoting Churchill in reference to the fact that we appear to be at a tipping point with open access: ‘this is not the end. This is not even the beginning of the end. But it is perhaps, the end of the beginning.’  At the RSP event last week 'New Developments in Open Access', Alma Swan quoted Ghandi in a similar manner, ‘First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.’ It appears the inevitability of open access is unstoppable now, a point emphasised further by David Willetts recent announcement that the UK would be making all publicly funded research openly available to all.  Also out today is a video from the Digital Curation Centre focussing on the problems with providing access to research data, which features figshare. This is key ...  DCC describe the video as offering: ‘a unique insight into the importance of providing access to research data and the risks of not managing data effectively. It also explains how the DCC could help researchers, research support staff and HE institutions by offering guidance, training and tools.’ These two ideas of data management and open access overlap to form a need for open access to all research data. This is something that figshare is looking to help researchers achieve with a free open access service for research data. If you have research data, share it on figshareand help the academic community move towards this goal, which is not only good for society but also good for your career prospects.”