From Gutenberg to Open Science: An Unfulfilled Odyssey

ABSTRACT With the almost global availability of the Internet comes the expectation of universal accessibility to knowledge, including scientific knowledge‐particularly that generated by public funding. Currently this is not the case. In this Commentary we discuss access to this knowledge, the politics that govern peer review and publication, and the role of this knowledge as a public good in medicine. With the almost global availability of the Internet comes the expectation of universal accessibility to knowledge, including scientific knowledge‐particularly that generated by public funding. Currently this is not the case. In this Commentary we discuss access to this knowledge, the politics that govern peer review and publication, and the role of this knowledge as a public good in medicine.  Gutenberg's invention of the printing press in 1440 opened an avenue for the distribution of scholarly information to the entire world. The scientific literature first appeared in 1665 with Le Journal des Sçavans followed in the same year by Philosophical Transactions. Today there are more than 5000 scientific publishing companies, 25,000 journals and 1.5 million articles published/year generating revenue of $25 billion USD.  The European Union and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development have argued for open access (OA) to scientific data for all publicly funded research by 2020 with a similar initiative in the USA via the Fair Access to Science and Techno...
Source: Drug Development Research - Category: Drugs & Pharmacology Authors: Tags: Research Commentary Source Type: research