3 ms·

But see, researchers just don't care. In biology, you want to publish in Nature, Science or Cell. Barring that, you grab one of the second tiers (Nature Neuro

But see, researchers just don't care. In biology, you want to publish in Nature, Science or Cell. Barring that, you grab one of the second tiers (Nature Neuroscience, etc). Barring that, you take a third tier like Molec Human Genetics or J Neurosci. If that paper is closed access, the average research does not give two shits. He just wants his paper in a quality journal that will gain him prestige and career advancement. He is not considering how easily data-miners will access the literature, or if researchers in Bulgaria can access it. I'm sorry if this sounds terrible (it is), but it is also the truth. For the record, I'm very pro-open-science. And all "he" can easily be replaced with "she" in this post :)

zerostar07 15y ago
That's the point ; there's a whole system behind (grants, career advancement) that depends on "journal prestige"; that mechanism is based on "prestige factors" that were built decades or centuries ago. It's a self-reinforcing circle, authors-> journals -> author prestige that doesn't even have to do with the quality of review (i believe all well known journals are equally good at reviewing science, what differentiates them is politics, and a careful selection of what subjects they publish). I 'd go as far as to say that this model is an impediment to science since most articles don't publish their research data (or simulation code) along with the articles. [And i must say that biologists and other life scientists seem really attached to that old model, unlike physics or maths]. Taking a step back you have to ask: Why are these publishing companies given such power by governments and universities (the power to determine grants and promotions). Why don't governments and universities instead actively promote open science? I argue that the benefits will be greater if we switch, but it's gonna take a quantum leap that's currently unlikely due to inertial forces. Another thing is that when research article text is as open as a blog post text, you can create aggregators, get scientists to work in online communities. In the past i tried to start maybe something like that, but not having the content to search for is making it almost a non-starter (if interested check out http://pubcentral.net http://pubcentral.net or http://noteplz.com http://noteplz.com)
- polyfractal 15y ago
  I'm not disagreeing with you at all. I think all your points are accurate (with the exception of all peer-review being good - some journals really do have bad peer-review). The life sciences would be a better place if everything was open-access. My point is that there is zero incentive for those "in the power" to change. Scientists just want to keep running on the prestige hamster wheel, journals want to get money, universities pay the money because their scientists need the journals. To break the cycle you need someone to get off the wheel first. Journals obviously won't. Universities can't (imagine a university cutting all of their scientists off from the data....). Government doesn't really play a role in this, they just hand out grant money. And they do require data to be open-access after a certain period of time if funded through the NIH. So that leaves scientists. And very few are willing to stake their employment, livelihood and reputation on a "cause". The only people who realistically can do that are tenured faculty - and most of these are old PIs that like the system just the way it is, damnit. So yeah, I agree with you. But I don't see it changing any time soon. Where is the incentive? Edit: As an aside, you can lease the Medline abstract database from the NIH for free (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/databases/license/license.html http://www.nlm.nih.gov/databases/license/license.html). You can also dowload Biomed Central full text archive too (http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/datamining http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/datamining)
  - brianprogrammer 15y ago
    This reminds me of the debate in the media about high-frequency trading after the flash crash. The media and general public were pounding the table demanding data and analysis and solutions, and on the inside of the industry, no one cared. Even the SEC did not have the tools or expertise to do a proper analysis. The demands for change have to come from outside, and they have to be forceful. I would go further than this article and demand that not only should the papers be available to the public, but so should all of the data from which the conclusions were drawn. And furthermore there should be some open repository of all the data, along with the analysis, with api's etc... If taxpayers are paying for research then why not also pay for a way to actually consume that research?
- andreadallera 15y ago

zerostar07 15y ago

That's the point ; there's a whole system behind (grants, career advancement) that depends on "journal prestige"; that mechanism is based on "prestige factors" that were built decades or centuries ago. It's a self-reinforcing circle, authors-> journals -> author prestige that doesn't even have to do with the quality of review (i believe all well known journals are equally good at reviewing science, what differentiates them is politics, and a careful selection of what subjects they publish). I 'd go as far as to say that this model is an impediment to science since most articles don't publish their research data (or simulation code) along with the articles. [And i must say that biologists and other life scientists seem really attached to that old model, unlike physics or maths]. Taking a step back you have to ask: Why are these publishing companies given such power by governments and universities (the power to determine grants and promotions). Why don't governments and universities instead actively promote open science? I argue that the benefits will be greater if we switch, but it's gonna take a quantum leap that's currently unlikely due to inertial forces. Another thing is that when research article text is as open as a blog post text, you can create aggregators, get scientists to work in online communities. In the past i tried to start maybe something like that, but not having the content to search for is making it almost a non-starter (if interested check out http://pubcentral.net http://pubcentral.net or http://noteplz.com http://noteplz.com)

polyfractal 15y ago
I'm not disagreeing with you at all. I think all your points are accurate (with the exception of all peer-review being good - some journals really do have bad peer-review). The life sciences would be a better place if everything was open-access. My point is that there is zero incentive for those "in the power" to change. Scientists just want to keep running on the prestige hamster wheel, journals want to get money, universities pay the money because their scientists need the journals. To break the cycle you need someone to get off the wheel first. Journals obviously won't. Universities can't (imagine a university cutting all of their scientists off from the data....). Government doesn't really play a role in this, they just hand out grant money. And they do require data to be open-access after a certain period of time if funded through the NIH. So that leaves scientists. And very few are willing to stake their employment, livelihood and reputation on a "cause". The only people who realistically can do that are tenured faculty - and most of these are old PIs that like the system just the way it is, damnit. So yeah, I agree with you. But I don't see it changing any time soon. Where is the incentive? Edit: As an aside, you can lease the Medline abstract database from the NIH for free (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/databases/license/license.html http://www.nlm.nih.gov/databases/license/license.html). You can also dowload Biomed Central full text archive too (http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/datamining http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/datamining)
- brianprogrammer 15y ago
  This reminds me of the debate in the media about high-frequency trading after the flash crash. The media and general public were pounding the table demanding data and analysis and solutions, and on the inside of the industry, no one cared. Even the SEC did not have the tools or expertise to do a proper analysis. The demands for change have to come from outside, and they have to be forceful. I would go further than this article and demand that not only should the papers be available to the public, but so should all of the data from which the conclusions were drawn. And furthermore there should be some open repository of all the data, along with the analysis, with api's etc... If taxpayers are paying for research then why not also pay for a way to actually consume that research?
andreadallera 15y ago