|
They get letters. Maybe.
Peter Suber points out that no members of the AAP/PSP's ill-conceived PRISM "coalition" were ever identified, and that at least nine publishers publicly disavowed or distanced themselves from it; he then asks: Has AAP/PSP ever consulted its members about its position on the NIH policy? Are AAP/PSP members willing to see their dues spent on a lawsuit to delay it? I think it's worth finding that out. Listed at the bottom of this entry are the "green" and "pale green" EPrints/RoMEO publishers listed as members by the PSP (links and names taken directly from the PSP website). On closer inspection, it seems that RoMEO proper lists all of the "pale green" publishers as yellow, and (with one or two caveats concerning journals with long embargo periods) gives them all a "compliant" rating in respect of NIH policy. Here is a draft of the letter I have in mind to send to each of these publishers: Dear [Publisher],The most obvious thing missing from the draft is "who the hell am I, to be asking you this?" Now, I can send the letter as myself -- concerned citizen, professional research scientist, potential client of publishers -- but I am only an egg, and it would have a good deal more impact as an open letter from a variety of interested and concerned parties, and still more if it came from somewhere official (ARL, SPARC, I don't really know who would be appropriate here). So -- anyone up for a multi-author open letter? Any other ideas? Update 080310: decided not to send letters after all; see here, scroll to bottom of post.
Pale green:
Comments I'd be happy to associate myself with that. You can count me in. I'd be willing to sign on (e-mail me for more accurate information), but I have a hard time assessing who would actually be useful to associate with this initiative, so am not making any useful suggestions. Thanks for doing all the work! Post a comment |
RSS Feed
Links: (formerly Malice Aforethought) me spousal unit Bloglines account Simpy account Connotea account OpenWetWare userpage googlebombs for good Roe; Wade; Roe v Wade abortion Jew Seldovia Herald blogroll: Archives: March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 October 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 July 2006 June 2006 May 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006 December 2005 November 2005 October 2005 September 2005 August 2005 July 2005 June 2005 May 2005 April 2005 March 2005 February 2005 January 2005 December 2004 November 2004 October 2004 September 2004 August 2004 July 2004 June 2004 May 2004 April 2004 March 2004 February 2004 January 2004 December 2003 |
The Prismatic Spectrum and Occam's Razor
The reason there is prismatic color-confusion about the Romeo publisher policy color codes is that there are two Romeo sites: The primary one at SHERPA-Romeo and the secondary one at EPrints-Romeo.
And the reason there are two Romeo sites is that the color code of the primary site, SHERPA Romeo, is unnecessary, confusing and dysfunctional. The EPrints site was created to simpify the code (and to provide journal-based rather than only publisher-based statistics for authors and institutions). Most of the features of EPrints Romeo have since be taken on board by SHERPA Romeo, but the color code and its associated statistics have not been, so EPrints Romeo continues to exist as a rationally focused view on SHERPA Romeo.
The only thing an author (a would-be self-archiver) needs to know about a journal (not a publisher: authors do not look up or care about publishers) is (1) does the journal endorse self-archiving the refereed final draft (postprint)? If so, the journal is Green. If not, does the journal endorse self-archiving the preprint? If so, the journal is Pale-Green. If neither, the journal is Gray.
OA is about postprints. Authors can in all cases immediately deposit their postprints and preprints in their IRs, regardless of the journal policy. If the journal is Green, they can make the postprint OA immediately. If the journal is Pale-Green, they can make the preprint OA immediately. Otherwise the author may set access to the deposits as Closed Access during any journal embargo period. For Pale-Green and Gray publishers, both Romeos list the length of the embargo. Only SHERPA Romeo restricts further restrictions. (The further restrictions -- mostly about "allowable" types of repositories or forms of documents [author's final drafts vs. publisher's PDFs] are deliberately omitted by EPrints Romeo because they are arbitrary and irrelevant: Authors can and should always immediately deposit their final drafts in their IRs and ignore any further stipulations.)
The most arbitrary and irrelevant of all, however, are SHERPA Romeo's particolored chormatic distinctions:
SHERPA Green = Green (postprint)
SHERPA Blue = Green (postprint)
SHERPA Yellow = Pale-Green (preprint)
OTHERWISE: neither
Stevan Harnad
American Scientist Open Access Forum