Open access

Abstract

The main thing, it seems to me, is to remember that technology manufactures not gadgets, but social change, ' declared science historian and broadcaster James Burke in a lecture given in 1985 (Burke, 2005). This was several years before the rise of the personal computer and the internet. But history's knack of repeating itself means that the words are no less true of the digital transformation of the world in the last two decades. The recasting of information into digital forms that can be replicated and transmitted instantly across the globe has changed our relationship with it in myriad ways. This poses commercial challenges in some industries-music, film and newspapers, for example-but at the same time has given rise to whole new businesses such as search engines, social networking and online retailing. It has also created opportunities for the public to access public information, which is changing the provision of government services and opening up new avenues for democratic dialogue. The effects have been no less profound within academia, even if they have been slower to work through the system. Our relationship with research papers and data is changing because it is easier and cheaper than ever before to put these scientific outputs into the public domain. In the era of printed journals this possibility had never arisen because of the costs of production and distribution. Now that these have largely disappeared, the question is: why not make all scientific research publicly available? However, this simple question does not have a simple answer. There remains considerable debate about the extent to which open access