Responses to the Canadian Tri-Agency Draft Open Access Policy (Mine included) – Confessions of a Science Librarian

"Many of my readers may recall that back in October I published a post announcing the Draft Open Access Policy consultation process launched by the Canadian Tri-Councils — Social Sciences & Humanities Research Council, Natural Sciences & Engineering Research Council and Canadian Institutes of Health Research. The deadline for submissions was December 13th. Since the deadline was just before the holidays I thought it best to wait awhile before compiling all the publicly posted responses. And that was probably a good idea, as many of the responses were published in the new year. I imagine that a few more may trickle in, but I’ll add those to the list. As you can see from the list below, there are a wide range of responses, from people, from societies, from institutions and even from a publisher. My institution also gave a response which is included below. I was on the working group that consulted the campus community and composed the response. I also sent the Tri-Agencies my own personal response, which is immediately below. What do I think of the responses themselves? Mostly they are all very positive and supportive. There are some misconceptions, there is a bit of perhaps misplaced caution and a tiny hint of fear, uncertainty and doubt but overall I am quite pleased by the responses. I think the Tri-Agencies have a lot of digest and I definitely look forward to seeing what they have to offer. The challenge will be to move the conversation beyond a certain deference for the cadre of entrenched incumbents that are leery of any change. The best way for the Tri-Agencies to do that is to make sure that legitimate concerns are addressed and to make available the resources that are needed to ease the transition of all those entrenched interests to a more open world. In other words, have a plan, lay it out clearly with precise expectations for all involved and put the systems and resources in place to make it happen without anyone feeling they’ve been voted off the island.  Here is my response ..."