[Taxacom] Paywall our taxonomic tidbit
Elena Kupriyanova
Elena.Kupriyanova at austmus.gov.au
Sat Jan 16 22:35:15 CST 2016
Dear Geoff and et al.,
I have a strange feeling that as a hypothetical 30 year old long-distance truck driver fascinated by beetles you would be looking for a well-illustrated BOOK (not a Zootaxa article) on beetles of New Zealand. It is unlikely that you would be complaining when you learn that you either would need to buy such a book or to drive (walk) to a library to borrow it. Would this be a case of restricting what people can read because it's not directly relevant to their current job or place in society? We all buy books, don't we? Why is it ok for us to buy or borrow book, but at the same time we are convinced that scientific journals should be available to us instantly at a mouse click? I am confused now...
Lena
Dr. Elena Kupriyanova
Senior Research Scientist
Marine Invertebrates
Associate Editor,
Records of the Australian Museum
Australian Museum Research Institute
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-----Original Message-----
From: Taxacom [mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu] On Behalf Of Geoffrey Read
Sent: Friday, 15 January 2016 4:53 PM
To: Stephen Thorpe
Cc: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Paywall our taxonomic tidbit
I admire your persistence Stephen!
Let's say I'm a 30 year old long-distance truck driver. It's okay, but as a child I collected beetles and I still dream of becoming a biologist.
Maybe it won't happen but I'm planning to go to university when I've saved up. Meantime I'm fascinated by the articles on beetles at Zootaxa, and need them to identify what I see in my garden. I contribute to Naturewatch too on my days off. Damn, so many of the articles are paywalled! It's really frustrating.
Well Stephen, I reckon truck drivers too should be able to read Zootaxa articles gratis and without begging for them if it's easy enough for us to make it so. And I believe in not restricting what people can do or read because it's not directly relevant to their current job or place in society.
Geoff
On Fri, January 15, 2016 6:10 pm, Stephen Thorpe wrote:
> But Geoff, you are a taxonomist and therefore not a member of the
> public (in the relevant sense). The public should not have to pay so
> that you just might find something interesting in articles that aren't
> directly relevant to your work (or at least they should be given the
> informed choice of whether or not to pay). Don't think about it just
> from your perspective. Think instead of how much demand their really
> is for many taxonomic papers, stacked against the cost of making all
> of them freely available to everybody. There is a difference between
> "hiding information away" versus using public money to make it
> available to everyone, when only a handful of specialists are remotely interested in reading it.
>
> Stephen
>
> --------------------------------------------
> On Fri, 15/1/16, Geoff Read <gread at actrix.gen.nz> wrote:
>
> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Paywall our taxonomic tidbit
> To: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
> Received: Friday, 15 January, 2016, 5:17 PM
>
> Stephen,
>
> You say " absolutely no point in paying publishers up front to make
> the publications available freely to everybody in the world"
>
> The idea that we should restrict access, hide away information from
> the public, and make it difficult to read our works is abhorrent to
> me.
> Fortunately we've come a long way in my lifetime towards open
> exchange and discussion - the internet as the shining example, and
> special mention to the access via BHL which has revolutionized our
> work as taxonomists more recently.
>
> Every paper published in Zootaxa today was paywalled. I don't have a
> subscription, so I don't have the access to Zootaxa that I know you
> do, but I'm interested in dipping into a wide range of taxonomy when
> I see something on the spot that just might be worth reading but is
> outside my narrow specialty. It helps me with my own work and it's
> good to see other ways of doing things, interpretations of the code,
> and the new techniques used. To do that today I need to write ten
> begging letters, and wait. Or pay 140 dollars ($14 per paper). So
> I'll look at none of them.
>
> Yesterday was short paper day at Zootaxa - every one of those six
> was paywalled (including one from a colleague at Elena's institute),
> but could have so easily have been open access and read much more
> widely for just lunch money for most of the authors, or around a taxi
> fare if their employer pays. Hence my amazement that people would
> not do that when they had the chance.
>
> Geoff
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Taxacom [mailto:taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu]
> On Behalf Of
> Stephen Thorpe
> Sent: Friday, 15 January 2016 2:46 p.m.
> To: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu;
> Elena Kupriyanova
> <Elena.Kupriyanova at austmus.gov.au>
> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Paywall our taxonomic tidbit
>
> Dear Elena,
>
> I like your post because I am trying to get people to think this
> matter through, and your post shows that you are starting to do just
> that. There appears to be a significant group who are lobbying for
> open access, even though, as you correctly point out, it is usually
> not very hard to get hold of publications for free, even when they
> are not open access. What matters is that the people who need to
> read the publications can read them. There is absolutely no point in
> paying publishers up front to make the punlications available freely
> to everybody in the world, given that only a few people will ever
> need to read most of them!
> Somthing very dodgy
> is going on here - those who stand to gain financially from open
> access are lobbying hard in favour of it! No surprises there, really
> ...
>
> Stephen
>
> --------------------------------------------
> On Fri, 15/1/16, Elena Kupriyanova <Elena.Kupriyanova at austmus.gov.au>
> wrote:
>
> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Paywall our taxonomic tidbit
> To: "taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu"
> <taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu>
> Received: Friday, 15 January, 2016, 1:07 PM
>
> Dear colleagues,
>
> I am really confused by now re what the point of this
> discussion is. Should we make our taxonomic papers open
> access or should we use our grant money to do so instead of
> paying for it out our own pockets? I honestly cannot see any
> paywall - whenever I need a paper, I just write to the
> author and ask for a pdf. I am happy to send my own papers
> to anybody who cares to read them (gosh, where is a chance
> they might even cite me ;) Besides, there is
> Researchgate...
> Best,
> Lena
>
> Dr. Elena Kupriyanova
> Senior Research Scientist
> Marine Invertebrates
>
>
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