[Vision2020] We Paid for the Research, So Let’s See It

[Art Deco]

  [image: The New York Times] <http://www.nytimes.com/>

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February 25, 2013
We Paid for the Research, So Let’s See It

The Obama administration is right to direct federal agencies to make
public, without charge, all scientific papers reporting on research
financed by the government. In a memorandum issued on Friday, John Holdren,
the president’s science adviser, directed federal agencies with more than
$100 million in annual research and development expenditures to develop
plans for making the published results of almost all the research freely
available to everyone within one year of publication.

The agencies must submit plans to the White House Office of Science and
Technology Policy
<http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/eop/ostp>within the next six
months that will apply to both peer-reviewed scientific
papers and digital manuscripts and supporting data.

Under current procedures, much of the federally financed research is
published in scientific and medical journals that can cost thousands of
dollars a year for a subscription and $30 or more for an individual copy.
That is simply too much for many people and small businesses to afford.

The principle that must be upheld, as Mr. Holdren described it, is that
Americans “deserve easy access to the results of research their tax dollars
have paid for.” He added that “the logic behind enhanced public access is
plain” because broad dissemination of scientific findings will increase
innovation and promote economic growth.

The National Institutes of Health, the government’s chief supporter of
medical research, already makes papers available in a common database
within a year of publication. Other agencies should create similar
centralized repositories for papers.

Both the new directive and the N.I.H. policy allow delays of a year before
making papers freely available. That may be too long. Federal agencies
should keep any delays as short as possible.


-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
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