US Research Open Access In Peril 237
luceth writes "Several years ago, the U.S. National Institutes of Health instituted a policy whereby publications whose research was supported by federal funds were to be made freely accessible a year after publication. The rationale was that the public paid for the research in the first place. This policy is now threatened by legislation introduced by, you guessed it, a Congresswoman who is the largest recipient of campaign contributions from the scientific publishing industry. The full text of the bill, H.R. 3699, is available online."
The feds can't mandate openness, but... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:dufus decisions (Score:4, Interesting)
Greed is what inspired the US to be great.
Moderating that greed is what actually makes us great.
We need greed, as sad as that is.
Re:Congresspeople doing favors for donors (Score:5, Interesting)
If we outlaw corporate contributions to candidates, we must also outlaw:
The only source of campaign contributions should be registered voters, and capped. Corporations are not registered voters. Neither are unions, PACs, non-citizen immigrants (legal or otherwise), minors, felons (sorry, Wall Street, sorry, Earth First), or anything else. If you can't vote, why should you be allowed any other influence? That is a privilege reserved for citizens... it is what citizenship is all about. Yeah, sure, that means a whole lot less money floating around for propaganda, but is that bad? Why would replacing glitzy attack TV ads (expensive) with written position statements (cheap) be undesirable? And if someone isn't sufficiently motivated to open their wallets to support their candidates, fuck 'em. The lazy and apathetic will do what the motivated damned well tell them to (I'm looking at YOU, moderates, you lazy couch-dwelling motherfuckers. The national party committees, ALL of them, are owned by Constitution-hating would-be dictators because extremists are the only ones who give a damn enough to do anything other than whine, and the national committees are not about philosophy... they're about money.).
Re:Name and party affiliation (Score:2, Interesting)
Good that you brought it up. Also note that Issa got money from the same group that gave Maloney hers.
Ron Paul isn't my first choice for a candidate, but right now he's the only one guaranteed to shake things up enough for real change.
Shouldn't all work by public employees be open? (Score:4, Interesting)
I work for the government and every once in a while my boss says I should try to patent it. I always refuse because my paycheck comes from the taxpayers so it should be freely available. I have never been able to find if there is an easy way to release my designs in an open way. I don't think the lawyers want to deal with it.
Re:dufus decisions (Score:5, Interesting)
Other than a few rare exceptions, this does not merely describe Obama. It also describes nearly anyone capable of acquiring the funding and the political backing it takes to win a federal election.
What I find so strange is that so many people make this very argument, yet they still go out and vote for the same standard statist candidate. For example probably most tea partiers will vote for the republican nominee and most in the occupy movement will vote for Obama (even though he is the biggest recepient of Wall Street money and all his economic people are closely tied to Wall Street). If one really believes that the mainstream candidates are the same, then one realizes that it is much better to "waste" one's vote on an independent/smaller candidate. And if enough people do this then there will be real change.
Re:The academic publishing scam (Score:4, Interesting)