(A print version of this eBook is available here)
When news broke early in 2019 that the University of
California had walked away from licensing negotiations with the world’s largest
scholarly publisher (Elsevier), a wave of triumphalism spread
through the OA Twittersphere.
 |
The talks had collapsed because of Elsevier’s failure to offer UC what it demanded: a new-style
Big Deal in which the university got access to all of Elsevier’s
paywalled content plus OA publishing
rights for all UC authors – what UC refers to as a “Read and Publish” agreement.
In addition, UC wanted Elsevier to provide this at a reduced
cost. Given its size and influence, UC’s decision was hailed as “a shot heard around the academic world”.
The news had added piquancy coming as
it did in the wake of a radical new European OA initiative called Plan S. Proposed in
2018 by a group of European funders calling themselves cOAlition S, the aim of Plan S is to make all publicly
funded research open access by 2021.
Buoyed up by these two developments open
access advocates concluded that – 17 years after the Budapest Open Access
Initiative (BOAI) – the goal
of universal (or near-universal) open access is finally within reach. Or as the
Berkeley librarian who led the UC negotiations put it, “a tipping
point” has been reached. But could defeat be snatched from the
jaws of success?
For my take on this topic please download the attached pdf.
For my take on this topic please download the attached pdf.
Please note that this document is more eBook than essay. It is very long. I know, I know, people will complain, but that is what I do.
Any brave soul willing to give it a go but who (like me) does not like to read long documents on the screen may like to print it out as a folded book. I have long used the Blue Squirrel software ClickBook to do this. Alternatively, you can print booklets directly from word processing software like Word, and I am happy to send over a Word file to anyone who would like to do that.
Meanwhile, the eBook is available as a pdf file here.
Any brave soul willing to give it a go but who (like me) does not like to read long documents on the screen may like to print it out as a folded book. I have long used the Blue Squirrel software ClickBook to do this. Alternatively, you can print booklets directly from word processing software like Word, and I am happy to send over a Word file to anyone who would like to do that.
Meanwhile, the eBook is available as a pdf file here.
