SPARC - SPARC Blog

Sign the White House Petition on Open Access to Research Today!

Heather Joseph — Mon, 21 May 2012 13:10:06 UT

We now have a brief, critical window of opportunity to demonstrate that we as a community firmly believe should be a high priority for the Administration to act on right now. To help accomplish this, today, May 21st, a petition calling for Public Access to all Federally Funded Research has been posted to the White House's "We the People" Website. If the petition garners 25,000 signatures within 30 days, it will be reviewed by White House staff, and considered for action.

Tags: obama, Open access, research, white house

Bipartisan Federal Research Public Access Act (FRPAA) Continues to Gain Support in Congress

Andrea Higginbotham — Tue, 01 May 2012 18:45:20 UT

Good news for supporters of open access to the results of taxpayer funded research this week, as Members of Congress continue to express their support for the proposed legislation.

FPRAA takes Center Stage at Congressional Hearing

Andrea Higginbotham — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 18:57:08 UT

Open access issues are clearly on the minds of U.S. lawmakers. Yesterday, the U.S. House of Representatives Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight conducted a hearing on the topic “Examining Public Access and Scholarly Publication Interests.” The hearing was designed to generate information regarding open access in general, but quickly turned into a discussion of the recently-reintroduced Federal Research Public Access Act (FRPAA).

FRPAA in the Spotlight: Public Access Bill featured in Congressional Briefing, Two Dozen Bipartisan Co-sponsors add their Support.

Heather Joseph — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 19:24:48 UT

Fresh on the heels of yesterday’s well-attended Congressional briefing on the issue of public access to the results of taxpayer funded research, 24 new bipartisan co-sponsors have officially been added to the roster of supporters for H.R. 4004, The Federal Research Public Access Act.

SPARC’s First Open Access Meeting a Success

Andrea Higginbotham — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 18:12:00 UT

SPARC just wrapped up a very successful first-ever Open Access (OA) Meeting in Kansas City, MO. This meeting built on the foundation established by the popular SPARC Digital Repositories meeting, and its expanded focus included information on institutional OA policies, author rights, and OA publishing. The 250 (very active!) participants represented librarians, researchers, publishers, and technologists from around the globe. The meeting program was designed to inspire the community and foster opportunities for collaborative action on all issues relating to open access.

Sponsors and Supporters back away from Research Works Act

Heather Joseph — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 22:36:31 UT

Earlier today, Elsevier issued a statement withdrawing its support of the Research Works Act (RWA), a bill designed to overturn the popular NIH Public Access Policy, and prohibit the adoption of similar policies by other federal agencies.

Prime Time for Public Access

Heather Joseph — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 23:11:27 UT

Over the past several months, a remarkable series of events have conspired to bring the issue of access to publicly funded research squarely to the forefront of the public consciousness.

Take Action: Oppose H.R. 3699, a new bill to block public access to publicly funded research

Heather Joseph — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 16:24:57 UT

A new bill, The Research Works Act (H.R.3699), designed to roll back the NIH Public Access Policy and block the development of similar policies at other federal agencies has been introduced into the U.S. House of Representatives. Supporters of public access to the results of publicly funded research need to speak out against this proposed legislation. Contact Congress to express your opposition today, or as soon as possible.

Do you use the SPARC Web site a lot? Help us update it! 2011 redesign underway

Jennifer McLennan — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 16:19:18 UT

It’s that time again. The five-year calendar has rolled over and we’re looking to bring the SPARC site into the new digital era (how things have changed!). We’ve got plenty of usage statistics and technology trends to help guide us, but your direct input would be even better. If you can spare a minute, please share your thoughts.

Open-access titles hit #2 for usage at UNCG

University of North Carolina—Greensboro (SPARC member) — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 20:07:11 UT

Call for OA Research and Data as Humanitarian Assistance to Japan (from the SPARC blog)

Heather Joseph — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 13:32:07 UT

As we continue to collectively look for ways to support our colleagues in Japan as they work to recover from the unprecedented events of earlier this month, SPARC would like to reinforce a request made by Peter Suber this past weekend. We are collecting -- and posting to the SPARC Open Access Forum (SOAF) -- information on any initiatives that are offering free online access to research or data as humanitarian assistance to Japan. The initiatives may be gold, green, gratis, libre, partial, temporary, or any variation on the theme.

Tags: humanitarian assistance, Japan

Publishers accommodate NIH-funded authors

Peter Suber — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 19:13:05 UT

For years, I've been saying (in my blog, the newsletter, public talks) that "all" or "virtually all" publishers accommodate NIH-funded authors. But it was hard to point to evidence. This problem is now solved.

Tags: NIH, public access

3rd Anniversary of the NIH Public Access Policy: Call for Stories

Heather Joseph — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 18:14:49 UT

April 7, 2011 will mark the 3rd Anniversary of the implementation NIH Public Access Policy. With more than 2 million full-text articles reporting on the latest NIH-funded research now contained in PubMed Central, researchers, developers, and entrepreneurs now have a rich new resource at their disposal. With nearly a *half a million* individuals accessing the database each and every day, we'd like to know what *your* experience has been with it.

Tags: NIH, public access