Summary of the discussions with commentary

Abstract

The transcriptions of the talks given at this meeting show that many aspects of “open access” were covered. The central theme was how STM (Scientific, Technical and Medical) information might be better distributed and accessed. The commercial concern of the meeting was how the STM community can reduce the costs of STM information. But the emotion of the meeting rotated around the fact that most scientists deposit their scientific data into scientific papers, which then form scientific journals, for no financial reward; and they increasingly resent having to pay to re-access their own and other scientific materials. This emotion has been exacerbated into something approaching bitterness by the cost of STM information, as well as the new information technologies, which mean people can access huge amounts of important “raw data” “for free”. We can search across information located in different sites across the world. We can analyse individual papers or even sections of papers. We can link from one article to another or from one theme in a paper to a table of data in a databank somewhere else. At the same time, the scientific paper is still published “as a paper”, and in journals which, more or less, adhere to a scientific theme aimed at a group of scientific users. This is increasingly inefficient and expensive, and might now be putting a brake on the flow and use of STM information. Paul Uhlir outlined the importance this topic has been given in the USA. He also sketched the present changes in information law, which have strengthened the intellectual property rights of information producers. At the same time, increased economic pressures have meant that some bodies are making less information available in the public domain while the Internet is allowing those who do wish to make their information public to do so. Open Access policies are therefore evolving in many areas of the public sector and many commercial organisations are also using the Internet to make their information available – very often for free. The growth of “information for free” on the Internet is in line with the common belief, or expectation, that the Internet IS free. This attitude was clearly shown in the presentations of many of the other speakers and, while there is little doubt that “market forces” could mean that many services which are presently free will one day be charged for, scientists are already well used to accessing huge quantities of addedvalue information on the web for nothing. Furthermore, this is an expected right – after all, the data has been freely deposited in the data banks by the scientific community and so they should be able to use it without paying a fee as well. Until recently, this belief was attached mainly to “raw data” the precept being that the value added to this data might be charged for. However, as modern day science increasingly depends, allows, and promotes, links between databanks and databases and the written scientific paper, the boundaries as to where something is actually stored are becoming blurred. The scientific paper is no longer a static article,