The first salvo in the Guardian’s recently published series of articles on academic publishing was delivered by veteran agitator George Monbiot. Journals publish government funded research, written and often edited for free by academics says Monbiot. “But to see it, we must pay again, and through the nose,” he says. The monopolist practices of academic publishers […]
Tag: open access
Tiago Villanueva: The dawn of open access books
It is well known that doctors’ professional roles change throughout their career. A junior doctor is expected to be mainly committed to clinical duties, while the head of department may be mainly dedicated to management duties, with a minor or even no clinical workload. GP trainees usually start off their vocational training program by spending most of their time […]
Liz Wager: Journals that dare not speak their name
There’s a new species of journal lurking in the medical publishing jungle, but it doesn’t seem to have a name. As a zoologist turned writer (ie somebody obsessed by taxonomy and words) this bothers me so I hope somebody will christen them soon. To launch this campaign, I’ll begin by describing what the new type […]
David Payne: Open access and the editor’s choice
A management consultant friend confessed last week that despite advising many media company clients about their digital strategy, he had little interest in Web 2:0 and social networking, shunned the TV when he got home, and ate dinner with his wife while BBC Radio 3 played in the background. […]
Juliet Walker: Going beyond journals
Scientific publishing is no longer just about printing journals but increasingly includes online publishing, broadcasting, and creating online communities. A talk I attended given by Timo Hannay at University College London on 15 July demonstrated just how much scientific publishing has evolved and in how many ways it will still change. It was entitled “The […]
Richard Smith on doing the right thing – but at a snail’s pace
One of the things about being an “old guy” is that you realise how extraordinarily slow we are at doing the right thing. You also see wheels being constantly reinvented. This morning, for example, I heard on the radio how the Health Select Committee had “discovered” that 10% of people suffer harm on being admitted […]
Juliet Walker: Free v. Open Access
Recent changes to the BMJ’s copyright licence and the information it includes in research articles means that they can be formally listed as open access articles in PubMed Central and other repositories. So should we change the labels of open access research articles on our website from “free” to “open access”? […]