In the US, a new report on Scholarly Publishing Roundtable Report and Recommendations wants to be optimistic about Open Access, but contains, as its recommendation n. 2, the following:

Agencies should establish specific embargo periods between publication and public access. An embargo period of between zero (for open access journals) and twelve months currently reflects such a balance for many science disciplines. For other fields a longer embargo period may be necessary.

This is totally unreasonable, coming from the "Committee on Science and Technology of the United States House of Representatives, in coordination with the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy".

I would suggest that these people, representing The People, reconsider their position: this recommendation simply states, openly and plainly, that the interest of the publisher has diverged completely from the interest of the scientists they are supposed to serve.

I would recommend to read again my old article on Scholarly Publishing, which, by the way, got the best paper award from Novatica in 2006.

Cela fait un certain temps que je ne réagit pas aux projets désastreux de mis à mal de l'Internet ou de taxation abusive qui sont portés par les tenants de l'industrie traditionnelle du disque. Ma dernière prise de position publique à ce sujet remonte à juin 2009 , mais il est bien vrai que je n'ai pas pris le temps d'écrire un deuxième volet de la lettre ouverte à Eddy Mitchell de Janvier 2006.

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