Peter
You wrote:
'On the publisher side, the government funding equals censorship also has a
grain of truth. We are living with the most secretive and manipulative
administration in U.S. History. It's a serious question to ask whether
government funding of publishing gives politicians undue control over
scientific communications. It's media messaging to suggest that such funding
automatically equals "censorship."'
Do you believe that there is anything in the proposed Federal Research
Public Access Act (in essence, that a copy of peer-reviewed papers resulting
from government-funded research be made available without charge online
within 6 months of publication) that would lead to politicians gaining undue
control of the publishing process?
(And I assume that you are not really suggesting that it was 'unethical' to
quote Dezenhall's comments reported in Nature without having read his book,
are you?)
Best wishes
David
David C Prosser PhD
Director
SPARC Europe
E-mail: david.prosser_at_bodley.ox.ac.uk
Tel: +44 (0) 1865 277 614
Mobile: +44 (0) 7974 673 888
http://www.sparceurope.org
-----Original Message-----
From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
[mailto:AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG] On
Behalf Of Peter Banks
Sent: 31 January 2007 13:41
To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
Subject: Re: Stop fighting the inevitable - and free funds for open access!
Nice try, but I haven't made that argument (primarily because I well
remember trying the "He started it first!" tactic on my mother when I was a
boy and her being quite unconvinced.)
I repeat what I did say: It's unfortunate when serious matters of policy
policy get reduced to slogans. It's bad when OA advocates do it, it's bad
when publishers do it.
I on the OA side, the "Taxpayers have a right to read what they've paid for"
has a grain of truth. It's a serious question to ask how much and what form
of access the public should have to the fruits of their investment in
research. It's media messaging to suggest that publishers have somehow
pirated away that public resource, when obviously the public never paid for
the value the publisher added. (If you think the publisher adds no value,
then the simple solution is to mandate the posting of preprints.)
On the publisher side, the government funding equals censorship also has a
grain of truth. We are living with the most secretive and manipulative
administration in U.S. History. It's a serious question to ask whether
government funding of publishing gives politicians undue control over
scientific communications. It's media messaging to suggest that such funding
automatically equals "censorship."
The odd thing about all of this is that those excoriating Dezenhall seem
never to have read his book, only the Business Week account of it. (Let me
guess, David: "Nail 'Em" is not on your bookshelf.) When I was in graduate
school, it was considered unethical to cite references you hadn't actually
read. No matter. No one seems to have noted that Dezenhall's endorsers are
not just a who's who of corporate scoundrels, but include such people as
former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, not exactly an enemy of science. And
while I don't agree with many of the positions Dezenhall has taken, he has
sometimes been on the side of defending solid science against "media
messaging."
Life offers such wonderful ironies if you stop to appreciate them.
Cheers,
Peter
On 1/31/07 4:40 AM, "David Prosser" <david.prosser_at_BODLEY.OX.AC.UK> wrote:
> It's interesting that one of the things the Nature article quotes Eric
> Dezenhall, the PR 'pit bull' as saying is that 'if the other side is on
the
> defensive, it doesn't matter if they can discredit your argument'. Over
the
> past week Peter has attempted the 'open access advocates are worse'
strategy
> ('They say Pat Schroeder attacks the disabled!') and the 'open access
> advocates are mad' strategy (Senator Cornyn has apparently gone 'batty'').
>
> This all to divert attention from the revelation that the best argument
> there is against open access appears to be the Orwellian concept that
> freeing the literature equals censorship. I'm sure Mr Dezenhall would be
> impressed.
>
> Best wishes
>
> David
>
> David C Prosser PhD
> Director
> SPARC Europe
>
> E-mail: david.prosser_at_bodley.ox.ac.uk
> Tel: +44 (0) 1865 277 614
> Mobile: +44 (0) 7974 673 888
> http://www.sparceurope.org
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
> [mailto:AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG] On
> Behalf Of Peter Banks
> Sent: 30 January 2007 22:40
> To: AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
> Subject: Re: Stop fighting the inevitable - and free funds for open
access!
>
> It's unfortunate when serious and complex matters of public policy get
> reduced to slogans. But, having treated themselves to a week of righteous
> indignation--"media messaging, oh, the horror, the horror!"--OA advocates
> may want to take a peek in the mirror.
>
> Case in point: The OA public relations effort very cleverly pits this as a
> battle of greedy publishers against sick and dying patients. Here's how
Rick
> Weiss of the Washington Post, feeding with abandon from the OA
> media-messaging trough, put it last week:
>
> "The venerable association of scholarly publishers, headed by former
> Colorado congresswoman Patricia Schroeder, has for years waged an
> intellectually nuanced battle against medical associations and advocates
for
> the ill."
>
> Pat Schroeder attacks the disabled. Who knew? She seems so nice in person.
>
> It turns out that "medical associations and advocates for the ill,"
however,
> means primarily ONE association--the Genetic Alliance, the umbrella group
of
> organizations representing genetic disorders and headed by OA ally Sharon
> Terry. I admire Ms. Terry greatly, but she by no means represents more
than
> a tiny fraction of "medical associations and advocates for the ill." In
> fact, among the members of the National Health Council, which represents
the
> major U.S. health associations, only one large organization, the Arthritis
> Foundation, has endorsed OA (and that just might be because one of OA's
top
> lobbyists is a former Foundation executive).
>
> So, sorry, much as I dislike media oversimplification, I can't get too
> worked up about pit bulls trying to correct the impression that Pat
> Schroeder beats up sick children.
>
>
> Peter Banks
> Banks Publishing
> Publications Consulting and Services
> 10332 Main Street #158
> Fairfax, VA 22030
> (703) 591-6544
> CELL (703) 254-8862
> FAX (703) 383-0765
> pbanks_at_bankspub.com
> www.bankspub.com
> www.associationpublisher.com/blog/
>
>
>
>
> On 1/26/07 8:31 AM, "Richard Poynder" <richard.poynder_at_BTINTERNET.COM>
> wrote:
>
>> Rather than watch him fence with those who find the news depressing,
>> I would be *much* more interested in hearing Peter's views (as a
>> publisher) on the Nature article
>>
>
(
http://app.e2ma.net/app/view:CampaignPublic/id:5584.488570120/rid:e3e4a8b51
> 81
>> 1b488325833e38df79bc5),
>> and the apparent decision by some of his colleagues to hire Eric
>> Dezenhall (http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Eric_Dezenhall)
>> to engage in "media massaging" -- with the aim of trying to ward off
>> the relentless march of Open Access.
>>
>> I would also be very keen to hear the views of the AAP, Elsevier,
>> Wiley and ACS, all of whom Nature reports as being involved in the
>> decision to hire Dezenhall, and all of whom have employees who appear
>> to monitor this list.
>>
>> Richard Poynder
>> Freelance Journalist
>> www.richardpoynder.com
>> http://poynder.blogspot.com
>>
>>
>> At 12:49 26/01/2007, you wrote:
>>> How many journals could PLoS have started with the $436,760 it
>>> lists on "marketing and advertising" on its 2004 IRS 990 form?
>>>
>>> Peter Banks
>>> Banks Publishing
>>> Publications Consulting and Services
>>> pbanks_at_bankspub.com
>>> www.bankspub.com
>>> www.associationpublisher.com/blog/
>>>
>>>
>>> On 1/25/07 7:17 PM, "Heather Morrison" <heatherm_at_eln.bc.ca> wrote:
>>>
>>>> There are some in the publishing community who are spending
>>>> significant sums fighting open access - for example, Nature
>>>> recently reported that AAP spent $300,000 - $500,000 in 2006, as
>>>> reported in their article, PR's "pitbull" takes on open access -
>>>> January 25, 2007.
>>>>
>>
>
Peter Banks
Banks Publishing
Publications Consulting and Services
10332 Main Street #158
Fairfax, VA 22030
(703) 591-6544
CELL (703) 254-8862
FAX (703) 383-0765
pbanks_at_bankspub.com
www.bankspub.com
www.associationpublisher.com/blog/
Received on Thu Feb 01 2007 - 17:01:57 GMT