Now, it is the generation of information. People can get all information, from jumbled information to professional advice, through only a keyword. Also, the information about science is spread through the Internet with the system of Open Access Publishing to Access. In 2000, the Public Library of Science (PLoS) was founded by people including Harold Varmus, the ex-president of the National Institute of Health (NIH), and that year, it attracted public attention by founding the Internet sites PubMed Central (PMC) and BioMed Central (BMC) in earnest. However, it was given a mixed perception to “It contributes to the spread and development of science knowledge.”
Open-Access Publishing & Journal to Science?
Different from the traditional printed-journal which is estimated with the basis of the profit from subscription fees, it is an on-line journal which is spread freely to readers, and the fee for estimating and publishing it is on the author.
Lim Kwang Ill
Professor,
Department of Medical & Pharmaceutical Science.
klim@sookmyung.ac.kr
Conventional non-open access journals have greatly contributed to advance of our knowledge in various academic fields by providing systems where research articles are peer-reviewed, reported to the relevant academic societies, and archived for future readers. However, the systems are mostly operated based on the pay-foraccess policy, which can significantlylimit the chance of a large fraction of researchers to access others’ latest research results. This serious drawback has led to the emergence of open access journals. The new publication model targets making research articles to be freely accessed, thereby more read and more cited, beneficial to both academic readers and authors of the articles. Vigorous interchange and immediate sharing of existing knowledge, which can be fueled by free access to the latest findings from research will eventually further facilitate the generation of new knowledge. In addition, the rise of new open access on-line journals can lead to holding the excessive power of prestigious conventional journals in check, which was recently highlighted by the case that the University of California at Berkeley asked its faculty members to boycott submitting and peer-reviewing research articles and playing main roles in editorial processes relevant to journals of the Nature Publishing company right after it suddenly quadrupled its journal access fee for the university. However, the launching of open access journals does not have only bright sides. They still need some concrete business models to maintain their unique systems alive and functional. Unfortunately, the financial instability of such journals that rely on payment of authors has triggered a concern about that they may take a loosened evaluation process for submitted papers to increase the publication number of articles. The success of the ambitious trial of launching open access journals will depend upon how they can maintain a healthy financial state without sacrificing the appropriate extent of strictness of their peer-review process for submitted papers. Both their financial state and the quality of articles they publish will be important to entice academic readers as well as potential authors.
School of English '10
All people have the right-to-know. This is the main reason for the Open-Access Journal. Internet is an effective and fast way to give the right to know to all people, and it is also the easiest way to approach the knowledge for people who are not scientists. Except the right-to-know, openaccess journals have merits in various fields. Open-access journals influence science development seriously. These journals allow far greater use of their articles, by allowing readers to analyze and reuse the texts under the condition for a Creative Commons License. These degrees of freedom are possible because the approach and use do not reduce profits, and it makes another opportunity to develop the journal through others. It also shows the new market for the library of science which had fallen behind. Actually, it is true that the open-access journal was seen as a well-meaning movement from progressive people. However, the number of open-access journals, which were reviewed by experts and published on the Internet, is over 190,000 in 2009 and it has increased tenfold over the past decade. It shows that the open-access journals are growing at a rapid pace and they have a possibility to spread easily like media which is followed by the trend. It also reflects that the scientists have started to use the power of the Internet and people have had the need of knowledge which comes from the professional journals.
CON
Department of Statistics '11
Open-access journal’s growth is good to libraries and readers by reason of saving the fees for subscription, but that’s not all. Openaccess journal is covered by the fee for submission and estimating from the author. Hence, the scientist should assign the research fund including the fee for submission and the poor scientist will be in trouble more than in the past. Also, it doesn’t have the limitation of pages, so it would can lead to low-quality journals. It is one of reasons to publish lower quality journals because of open-access with submission fees increased consistently, which is the main source of income and operation costs for open-access journals, instead of the fees for subscriptions, as the subscription fee had been increased, which had been criticized because of commercial viability. Another reason is that open-access publishing has the possibility to be exposed without any limitation to the dangerousness of the contents. Recently, the Dutch press insisted that Dutch and Japanese scientists had made a fatal varietal AI virus, so the United States Government banned the publishing of the research results about the virus, which is risky and highly contagious. Some criticized that it was the pre-censorship to the result of the scientific study. However, the study about a virus such as AI would threaten public health and security. Of course, I agree with the right-to-know about the results of a study. However, without any limitation to the dangerousness and any system to make up for the disadvantages to scientists, I disagree with the open-access publishing.
