Seven benefits of OA
Paul Chiao and Christian Schmidt, Open Access gains attention in scholarly communication, Molecular Cancer, September 6, 2004. An editorial describing the OA policy of this OA journal, published by BioMed Central, and enumerating seven benefits of OA. Excerpt: “[1] All articles become freely and universally accessible online; so an author’s work can be read by anyone at no cost. [2] The authors hold copyright for their work and grant anyone the right to reproduce and disseminate the article….[3] A copy of the full text of each Open Access article is permanently archived in an online repository separate from the journal, such as PubMed Central….[4] Authors are assured that their work is disseminated to the widest possible audience….[5] The information available to researchers will not be limited by their library’s budget….[6] Open Access could help to increase public interest in, and support of, research….[7] A country’s economy will not influence its scientists’ ability to access articles.” (Thanks to Charles W. Bailey, Jr.)