Controversy in the Open Access Movement

Not all stakeholders in science, technology, and medical publishing consider open access an improvement of the scholarly publishing system. Commercial and for-profit publishers often see open access as a direct threat to their current business models and profit margins. University presses often hold these concerns as well, particularly since their budgets are less able to absorb decreases in profits. Heated debates concerning the perceived benefits and dangers of the open access movement take place on countless blogs and listservs, and the literature published on this topic is relatively large. For more information about the controversy and its key players, see the bibliography at the end of this document.

National Legislation
The NIH Initiative

Congress became involved in the open access debate in 2004, as the U.S. House Appropriations Committee recommended that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) develop a policy that would require free Internet access of any articles from NIH-funded research within six months of publication in a journal. This "requirement" was subsequently changed to a "request". The recommendation was released in February of 2005, and changed the original "within six months" request to "as soon as possible" (and within twelve months) after publication.

Due to low compliance with the NIH request, Congress mandated submitting manuscripts of NIH-funded research to PubMedCentral, a national open access repository. This mandate will be enforced as of April, 2008.

International Open Access Initiatives

From approximately 2000-2004 various bodies held conferences to debate the definitions and policies that shape the development of the open access movement. In 2001, international representatives from all academic disciplines held a conference in Budapest. A statement of principle, strategy, and commitment, called  the Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI), was signed by these conference participants. A continually growing number of individuals and organizations worldwide are signing the BOAI in support various open access initiatives. BOAI supports many of the other initiatives, such as The Bethesda Statement on Open Access Publishing or the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities. These initiatives both developed definitions of open access that ensure that users may freely access and use open access materials as soon as they pass through the peer review process, and that the work must be digitally archived to ensure long-term access.

In 2004, a number of scientific societies' publishers became concerned about the open access movement and how it might affect their economic well-being. The DC Principles evolved from a meeting of these societies here in Washington. This set of principles is slightly different than other open access initiatives: while not supporting the immediate access stated by the Bethesda and Berlin principles, the DC Principles do support open access after an embargo period.