The Federal Research Public Access Act - What it is and why Sexy Archaeology supports it

“The Federal Research Public Access Act (FRPAA) is a hot topic in the news... allow me to provide a quick summary of this bill... FRPAA would mandate that each Federal agency with extramural research expenditures of over $100,000,000 shall develop a Federal research public access policy that is consistent with and advances purposes of the Federal agency. In layman's terms, each year, the federal government funds billions of dollars in basic and applied research. Most of this funding is concentrated within 11 departments/agencies. The research results typically are reported in articles published in a wide variety of academic journals. FRPAA proposes to make manuscripts reporting on federally funded research publicly available within 6 months of publication in a journal...  Passage of this bill would result in enhanced access to information by millions of scientists, professionals, and individuals, and will deliver an accelerated return on the taxpayers' investment...  But would you believe the American Anthropology Association this week took a public stand on open access?... You can help promote FRPAA by taking these steps: [1] Contact Congress now to express your support... [2] Issue a public statement of support from your organization and share it widely... [3] Join the Alliance for Taxpayer Access... [4] Spread the word on social media sites like Twitter and Facebook.  Use creative hashtags like #PassFRPAA, #SupportOpenAccess or #AAAFail. Or take it a step further by following in the footsteps of Jeremy Trombley who announced on his blog this week he is willing to put his career on the line in support of this bill by only publishing in open access journals...”