Open Access and the Origin of the Research University

" I have been thinking of the RWA in historical context. The modern research university was originally created to allow professors to research any topic they wanted, pursue the results of the research wherever they might lead, and to publish the research for the world to share. (You can read all about this development and how it led to the foundation of modern academic libraries in my forthcoming book, Libraries and the Enlightenment.) There’s a lot of support for open access in the ideas of those who founded research universities. One of the most influential, Daniel Coit Gilman, was the first president of the Johns Hopkins University. He believed that research universities should be “devoted to the discovery and promulgation of the truth,” and that “It is one of the noblest duties of a university to advance knowledge, and to diffuse it not merely among those who can attend the daily lectures–but far and wide.” ...The creation of open access directives by the faculty at universities like Harvard and Princeton show that most professors still value the original motivation to share the results of their research widely...."