Access Denied | I, Science

“Giving the public access to the research that they fund is about much more than eliminating journal pay-walls...   For months, academics have been taking an uncharacteristic interest in the detailed financials of the publishing world, and, for many scientists, the fight for our right to party – no, sorry, to access largely incomprehensible journal articles – has taken on a revolutionary tone. Rumour has it, the mathematicians are revolting. (Against Dutch publisher Reed Elsevier, that is.) ... I do think we’re in danger of losing sight of the bigger picture on this one. Please, hear me out.  At the beginning of May, the Minister for Science and Universities, David Willetts, promised to put ‘more data and power in the hands of the people’ by making selected journal articles accessible to anyone free of charge. According to Mr Willetts, ‘giving people the right to roam freely over publicly funded research will usher in a new era of academic discovery and collaboration’. All very noble, in theory... First, the obvious one: if access to an article is going to be free, who’s going to cover the costs of publishing it? While it’s true that publishing costs in an increasingly digital world are lower than they used to be, they are still substantial. The major academic players, such as Reed Elsevier and Wiley, rely on sophisticated – and very expensive – IT platforms to deliver their content, and while the papers themselves are written for free, administering the editorial and peer review process for 240,000 articles a year is not cheap. Elsevier employs nearly 7000 people and spends over £1bn per year ensuring that peer reviewed publications reach their intended audience. (Interestingly, whilst Elsevier earns a healthy but not astronomical profit margin of 37%, their competitor, Wiley, earns an even healthier 42% but has nevertheless so far avoided the wrath of the mathematicians). First, the obvious one: if access to an article is going to be free, who’s going to cover the costs of publishing it? While it’s true that publishing costs in an increasingly digital world are lower than they used to be, they are still substantial. The major academic players, such as Reed Elsevier and Wiley, rely on sophisticated – and very expensive – IT platforms to deliver their content, and while the papers themselves are written for free, administering the editorial and peer review process for 240,000 articles a year is not cheap. Elsevier employs nearly 7000 people and spends over £1bn per year ensuring that peer reviewed publications reach their intended audience. (Interestingly, whilst Elsevier earns a healthy but not astronomical profit margin of 37%, their competitor, Wiley, earns an even healthier 42% but has nevertheless so far avoided the wrath of the mathematicians).  Open access then, certainly doesn’t come cheap. But who exactly are we paying to grant access to? Are we really expecting Josephine Bloggs (or Dr J. Bloggs, for that matter) to browse the International Journal of Quantum Chemistry in their lunch break? Who are these ubiquitous ‘people’ that Mr Willetts keeps referring to? And can they really be expected to ‘usher in a new era of academic discovery and collaboration’?  It seems to me that two separate issues are being confused here. Certainly, the scientific community would benefit from more open streams of communication – who wouldn’t? But, quite frankly, the idea of spoon-feeding science to the public went out with the Spice Girls. Today it’s all about public dialogue... According to The Royal Society, ‘the approach of some organisations to the ‘open access debate’ is threatening to hinder rather than promote the exchange of knowledge between researchers’. I can’t help but agree. Large publishers, with all their resources, could and should play an important role in developing the technologies and platforms that will enable greater collaboration across the academic community.  As for communicating the results of tax-funded research to the public, let’s get creative. Making sure that journalists have access to what should be their primary source material would pay far greater dividends than some of the other options being bandied about, potentially leaving some spare cash for other engagement activities...”