Gepubliceerd op dinsdag 8 november 2005
IEF 1174
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Omarm die tijdgeest en publiceer, voorpubliceer, vat samen of publiceer parallel op IEForum.nl: Survey finds rapid increase in number of authors embracing open access. More and more scientists, some 29 per cent of the senior authors questioned, are publishing in open access journals, according to a study by CIBER, an independent publishing think tank based at City University in London, the UK. Significantly, senior authors and researchers believe downloads to be a more credible measure of the usefulness of research than traditional citations, perhaps indicating a commercial opportunity for publishers.

Authors strongly believe that, as a result of open access, articles will become more accessible. They do not believe, however, that quality will improve. A clear majority of authors believes that mass migration to open access would undermine scholarly publishing. Of those who expressed an opinion, half believed this was likely; however, a good proportion of these people thought this would probably be a good thing so there is evidence of considerable dissatisfaction with the status quo.

The study found little evidence of enthusiasm for either the author or the reader paying a fee in order to fund open access publishing. The favoured options were that the burden should be borne by research funders, commercial sponsors or central government (in that order of preference).  Lees rapport hier.