Re: Green Angels and OA Extremists
On 2 Dec 2008, at 15:47, Michael Eisen wrote: OF COURSE Elsevier can have objections to libraries assisting individuals in self-archiving their work, because Elsevier does not want self archiving to succeed! No-one wants to split unnecessary hairs, but there does seem to be a genuine distinction to be drawn between author-self-archiving and institutional-systematic-downloading. These at least were the terms to which Karen Hunter referred: As our longstanding policy permits authors to voluntarily post their own author manuscripts to their personal website or institutional repository, we responded that we would not object to an author downloading this version. However, our broader policy prohibits systematic downloading or posting. Therefore, it is not permitted for IR managers or any other third party to download articles ... and post them. Discussion on the other side of the fence (the library side), seems to indicate that there is little enthusiasm anyway for this kind of assistance (in Michael's terms) or systematic downloading (Elsevier's). I think that the library position is that they have no resources available to do this work for the author, even if it were acceptable to the publisher. -- Les Carr
Re: Green Angels and OA Extremists
On 02 December 2008 18:31 Jean-Claude Guédon wrote: Commercial presses will do all they can to keep self-archiving at some artisanal, confusing level while lobbying like mad wherever they can (this means governmental agencies such as NIH and other similar agencies). The artisanal dimension I am talking about refers to constraints such as preventing the use of the publisher's pdf. Why does it matter that, on the whole, publishers restrict the use of the final PDF? I would argue that the most value a publisher adds is during the peer review process, not in the post-acceptance production processes (copyediting, typesetting and proofreading) and therefore we should be grateful that the peer-reviewed (value-added) version is available for self-archiving. Ok, so the final version looks nicer, but the technical content is there - surely this is the most important thing? (Copyediting is a dying trade, with many of the large commercial publishers outsourcing this to companies operating from non-native English-speaking countries that can offer cheap prices for a `full supplier service'. A lot of the pride that used to exist in making the final version of a paper consistent and accurate has been lost in recent years as publishers seek to drive down costs. For example, it always used to be the case that the proof of a paper would be sent to both the author and an independent freelance proofreader for checking, with the corrections collated before publication. Many publishers no longer use freelance proofreaders, putting the onus entirely on the author to proofread their paper. This is all very well if the author is a native English speaker; but if not, and the paper has been copyedited by a non-native English-speaker beforehand, what you end up with is a final version of a paper that has had very little value added to it over and above the final accepted manuscript version). Jean-Claude's point was that having to explain to authors they can only deposit a particular version of their paper is a constraint, imposed the policies of publishers, aimed at slowing down the development of Green OA. Whether or not this is true, there is, in my opinion, a simple solution that goes a long way towards removing this constraint: When advocating your repository to your academics, your message should simply be `always provide your final accepted peer-reviewed manuscript'. If it then transpires that it is one of those rare occasions when the published version can be used, library staff can replace it; if an embargo is needed, library staff can add it; if the full text can't be used at all, library staff can discard it, or lock it. I don't believe this message is difficult to understand. Ok, you could argue that having to deliver this message in the first place is in itself a constraint, but as long as the message is simple it should eventually prevail. Colin Smith Research Repository Manager Open Research Online (ORO) Open University Library Walton Hall Milton Keynes MK7 6AA Tel: +44(0)1908 332971 Email: c.j.sm...@open.ac.uk http://oro.open.ac.uk From: American Scientist Open Access Forum [mailto:american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org] On Behalf Of Jean-Claude Guédon Sent: 02 December 2008 18:31 To: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org Subject: Re: Green Angels and OA Extremists I support Michael's analysis. Commercial presses will do all they can to keep self-archiving at some artisanal, confusing level while lobbying like mad wherever they can (this means governmental agencies such as NIH and other similar agencies). The artisanal dimension I am talking about refers to constraints such as preventing the use of the publisher's pdf. Making it difficult for libraries to stock their own IR's with the articles of their faculty in some bulk fashion is another way to slow down archiving. When publishers impose their own particular constraints on self-archiving, they make things more confusing for the researchers, and this slows down progress. In short, they act in such a way that they cannot be directly and clearly faulted for opposing OA, but they make sure progress will be slow, difficult, reversible and temporary. While allowing self-archiving is indeed a step forward, it is accompanied by so many side issues that the step is small, hesitant, and not always pointed in the right direction. Of course, one can always invent some work around, add yet another button, or whatever, but this ends up making things only a little more complex and a little more confusing for the average researcher and it only reinforces the elements of confusion sought by at least some of the publishers. In short, it is a very clever strategy. To achieve OA, we do need self-archiving, all the difficulties thrown into its path by publishers notwithstanding, including the devious strategies I just referred
Re: Green Angels and OA Extremists
At 15:47 02/12/2008, Michael Eisen wrote: Les Carr wrote: HAVING SAID THAT, the library is in no way adverse to finding mechanisms that assist individuals and ease their tasks, and I guess that Elsevier can have no objections to that either! How about a notification email to be sent to authors of In Press papers that contains a Deposit this paper button that initiates the user's deposit workflow on the ScienceDirect Submitted Manuscript PDF. You guys are such suckers. OF COURSE Elsevier can have objections to libraries assisting individuals in self-archiving their work, because Elsevier does not want self archiving to succeed! What do they have to do to actually prove this to you? Stevan, Les and others seem to think that Karen Hunter's recent email was some kind of bureaucratic error, rather than realize it for what it clearly is - a direct statement from Elsevier that they do not want self-archiving to actually take off. This is not borne out by the evidence nor, intuitively, is it likely to be in the minds of publishers like Elsevier. What the TA publishers want to do is moderate the pace of change towards OA to suit them. Hence the resistance to mandates rather than to green self-archiving. On this basis then Jean-Claude's assessment that publishers would like to keep self-archiving 'at some artisanal, confusing level' is closer to the truth. Yes it is clever, and as Jean-Claude would recognise, has characterized publisher strategies throughout the transition from print to electronic journals, not just the current phase of the transition to OA, always moving just enough to delay the revolution. But that is not the same as opposing OA. To pick up on Jean-Claude's second point, that green and gold should unite in a pincer movement, yes of course both are unambiguously for full OA, but it's not quite so simple. If OA is about providing access to published peer reviewed papers, then we have to recognise that while gold OA is about publication, green OA is a pivot with other published sources. Therefore TA publishers have an interest in reaching an accommodation on green OA, whereas gold OA is in competition with TA publishers. That, I suspect, is the reason that Michael, as an active proponent of gold OA, wishes to draw a clear line that publishers such as Elsevier oppose OA when the reality is not so clear. Steve Hitchcock IAM Group, School of Electronics and Computer Science University of Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK Email: sh...@ecs.soton.ac.uk Tel: +44 (0)23 8059 7698Fax: +44 (0)23 8059 2865 It's a ploy (an apparently successful ploy) on their part to diffuse moves towards effective universal open access by a) making them seem like good guys and b) fostering the illusion that we can have universal green OA without altering the economics of publishing. And Stevan, rather than the typical retort about how green OA can be achieved now, with a few keystrokes, can you please instead explain how the policy statement from your friends at Elsevier does not indicate that they are really opposed to real OA.
Re: Green Angels and OA Extremists
[ The following text is in the utf-8 character set. ] [ Your display is set for the iso-8859-1 character set. ] [ Some characters may be displayed incorrectly. ] Le mercredi 03 décembre 2008 à 05:54 +, Leslie Carr a écrit : Discussion on the other side of the fence (the library side), seems to indicate that there is little enthusiasm anyway for this kind of assistance (in Michael's terms) or systematic downloading (Elsevier's). I think that the library position is that they have no resources available to do this work for the author, even if it were acceptable to the publisher. -- Les Carr I wonder what the exact situation is. My own impression is that many libraries are willing to do the job for the authors, and do so. Furthermore, in my humble opinion, libraries should be doing this work, thereby becoming the publishers of their institution. Furthermore, they should declare that the version of the article in their repository, because it has been vetted, is a reference version just as good as that of the publisher. And if anyone adds that this is a publishing reform, I will fully and heartily agree... :-) Jean-Claude Guédon Université de Montréal
Re: Green Angels and OA Extremists
Les Carr wrote: HAVING SAID THAT, the library is in no way adverse to finding mechanisms that assist individuals and ease their tasks, and I guess that Elsevier can have no objections to that either! How about a notification email to be sent to authors of In Press papers that contains a Deposit this paper button that initiates the user's deposit workflow on the ScienceDirect Submitted Manuscript PDF. You guys are such suckers. OF COURSE Elsevier can have objections to libraries assisting individuals in self-archiving their work, because Elsevier does not want self archiving to succeed! What do they have to do to actually prove this to you? Stevan, Les and others seem to think that Karen Hunter's recent email was some kind of bureaucratic error, rather than realize it for what it clearly is - a direct statement from Elsevier that they do not want self-archiving to actually take off. It's a ploy (an apparently successful ploy) on their part to diffuse moves towards effective universal open access by a) making them seem like good guys and b) fostering the illusion that we can have universal green OA without altering the economics of publishing. And Stevan, rather than the typical retort about how green OA can be achieved now, with a few keystrokes, can you please instead explain how the policy statement from your friends at Elsevier does not indicate that they are really opposed to real OA.
Re: Green Angels and OA Extremists
On Tue, Dec 2, 2008 at 10:47 AM, Michael Eisen mbei...@gmail.com wrote: You guys are such suckers... Elsevier does not want self archiving to succeed!... Eyes wide open: We never asked publishers to support (Green) OA (or to wish it success), just not to oppose it. And in adopting the Green policy of formally endorsing immediate self-archiving of the peer-reviewed final draft by the author, thereby removing the single biggest obstacle to Green OA and Green OA mandates, Green publishers have done exactly that: not opposed OA. [Elsevier's Green policy on author self-archiving is] a ploy (an apparently successful ploy) on their part to diffuse moves towards effective universal open access by... fostering the illusion that we can have universal green OA without altering the economics of publishing. How does endorsing immediate Green OA self-archiving diffuse moves towards effective universal open access? And why does universal Green OA self-archiving require altering the economics of publishing? (Don't forget that, unlike you, Mike, I believe -- on a wealth of evidence and analysis -- that universal Green OA [and hence universal OA itself] can and will and must precede Gold OA publishing. Reiterating the belief that it has to happen the other way round for some unstated reason or other does not strengthen the empirical or logical case for Gold first!) And Stevan...can you please... explain how the policy statement from your friends at Elsevier does not indicate that they are really opposed to real OA. They may be well be subjectively opposed to it, in their hearts, but their Green policy on OA self-archiving objectively removes one of the biggest barriers to real OA. So I would say that Green publishers, in removing this barrier, are not-opposing OA, and non-Green publishers, not removing this barrier, are opposing OA. (The rest -- including the unsuccessful publisher lobbying against Green OA mandates -- is of no great importance. If all publishers were, like Elsevier, Green, then the worldwide university community's dithering on the adoption of Green OA mandates would be all the more evident -- and readily remediable.) Stevan Harnad
Re: Green Angels and OA Extremists
[ The following text is in the utf-8 character set. ] [ Your display is set for the iso-8859-1 character set. ] [ Some characters may be displayed incorrectly. ] I support Michael's analysis. Commercial presses will do all they can to keep self-archiving at some artisanal, confusing level while lobbying like mad wherever they can (this means governmental agencies such as NIH and other similar agencies). The artisanal dimension I am talking about refers to constraints such as preventing the use of the publisher's pdf. Making it difficult for libraries to stock their own IR's with the articles of their faculty in some bulk fashion is another way to slow down archiving. When publishers impose their own particular constraints on self-archiving, they make things more confusing for the researchers, and this slows down progress. In short, they act in such a way that they cannot be directly and clearly faulted for opposing OA, but they make sure progress will be slow, difficult, reversible and temporary. While allowing self-archiving is indeed a step forward, it is accompanied by so many side issues that the step is small, hesitant, and not always pointed in the right direction. Of course, one can always invent some work around, add yet another button, or whatever, but this ends up making things only a little more complex and a little more confusing for the average researcher and it only reinforces the elements of confusion sought by at least some of the publishers. In short, it is a very clever strategy. To achieve OA, we do need self-archiving, all the difficulties thrown into its path by publishers notwithstanding, including the devious strategies I just referred to. But we also need OA publishing. Not to say that OA publishing should come before self-archiving, but to point out a very simple fact: a pincer strategy on the scientific communication system is better than a strategy based on a single method. OA needs self-archiving, but it also needs some reform in scientific publishing. Rather than opposing green and gold strategies, it is better to see how they can support each other. Jean-Claude Guédon Le mardi 02 décembre 2008 à 07:47 -0800, Michael Eisen a écrit : Les Carr wrote: HAVING SAID THAT, the library is in no way adverse to finding mechanisms that assist individuals and ease their tasks, and I guess that Elsevier can have no objections to that either! How about a notification email to be sent to authors of In Press papers that contains a Deposit this paper button that initiates the user's deposit workflow on the ScienceDirect Submitted Manuscript PDF. You guys are such suckers. OF COURSE Elsevier can have objections to libraries assisting individuals in self-archiving their work, because Elsevier does not want self archiving to succeed! What do they have to do to actually prove this to you? Stevan, Les and others seem to think that Karen Hunter's recent email was some kind of bureaucratic error, rather than realize it for what it clearly is - a direct statement from Elsevier that they do not want self-archiving to actually take off. It's a ploy (an apparently successful ploy) on their part to diffuse moves towards effective universal open access by a) making them seem like good guys and b) fostering the illusion that we can have universal green OA without altering the economics of publishing. And Stevan, rather than the typical retort about how green OA can be achieved now, with a few keystrokes, can you please instead explain how the policy statement from your friends at Elsevier does not indicate that they are really opposed to real OA. Jean-Claude Guédon Université de Montréal
Green Angels and OA Extremists
On 26 Nov 2008, at 21:08, Michael Eisen was goaded to write: I will proudly claim the mantle of an OA extremist No, I'm Spartacus! It seems to me that institutions have attempted Green Open Access through various means: (a) self-archiving - the individual author does all the work (b) proxy self-archiving - a personal assistant acts on behalf of the author, with the author's authority and at the author's instigation and with the author's full knowledge (in the same way that the assistant might buy plane tickets for the author on his/her credit card). There is no sensible way of telling the difference between (a) and (b). (c) mediated archiving - the author starts the deposit process by uploading or identifying the full text and entering some rudimentary metadata; the library finishes the process off. It seems that the process to which Elsevier are objecting is (d) bulk archiving - the library initiates the deposit process through access to bulk sources of full text material (publisher holdings). There are variations of this process, particularly (d2) imported keystrokes with catchup archiving - the library uses a third-party database to import bibliographic metadata into the repository and a full text is sought from (appropriately licensed) online sources or from the author's hard disk. Both (d) and (d2) are initiated by staff other than the authors. The first is content led, the second metadata led. Both of these approaches look attractive as a solution to the legacy problem (how to deposit the last decade of research output), especially in environments where there has been little progress towards addressing the current content problem (how to deposit today's research output). I think that the ultimate issue for achievable and sustainable OA is cultural change: how can individuals start to take responsibility for their intellectual assets in such a way as to maximise their visibility and (re)use for science, scholarship and learning as well as marketing and promotion (insert agenda here). The conclusion that our institutional repository team has come to after a number of years of mediated service is that any approach that sidesteps self-archiving works against the kind of cultural change that they are trying to engender and is ultimately self-defeating. HAVING SAID THAT, the library is in no way adverse to finding mechanisms that assist individuals and ease their tasks, and I guess that Elsevier can have no objections to that either! How about a notification email to be sent to authors of In Press papers that contains a Deposit this paper button that initiates the user's deposit workflow on the ScienceDirect Submitted Manuscript PDF. -- Les Carr
