NIH Proposes to Open Tax-Funded Research

Johnny Mnemonic writes "The Washington Post is reporting that the NIH "has proposed a major policy change that would require all scientists who receive funding from the agency to make the results of their research available to the public for free." Scientific magazines are screaming, fearing that their subscriptions would diminish--but the common sense nature of the proposal is hard to refute. Why should Americans who funded the research with their tax dollars have to pay again to read the research? Particularly since the web makes pubishing said information inexpensive."

Comments

Go science

[CGP314]

You know it's a good idea when companies start screaming, "But that would put us out of business!"

What about patents?

[michaelmalak]

U.S. taxpayers pay $700m for Taxol wonder cancer drug; Bristol-Myers reaps $1700m profit

This is already happening sometimes!

[calebb]

I published a paper in the Journal of Chemical education last December, but I also posted in on our own website for anyone to download...

Re:Just to play devil's advocate here...

[Kohath]

Please explain the precise benefits of the UN-involvement you propose. It might also help to cite examples of similar endeavors where the UN's involvement has proved beneficial.

This question is genuine. A lot (a majority?) of the American people are sceptical of the UN, including myself. Here's an opportunity to show how the UN can help with something.

(It might also help to show what the benefit is to the United States. It's easy to show that one side benefits in a completely one-sided arrangement.)

Cosmo for scientists?

[mmmmmhotpants]

I don't think your average person is going to put down their Glamour/Cosmo/Time/Maxim/Newsweek so they can read about immunoglobin class switch recombination for $30. If your family member is sick with cancer in the hospital, you will not be beside table interpreting the western blots from the latest Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
The current, scientifically educated, audience of the NIH funded publications have enough trouble understanding the research. What makes them think the general non-science public will.