eResearch: meeting people and a closed/open story

#eres2011

So it’s great to be at eResearch Melbourne. Sitting with Alex wade and Nico Adams (we are giving a semantic workshop on Thursday). And forget about Open stuff for a while.

At the get-together I’ve met many old acquaintances. There is a real sense of friendliness and collaboration. Australia has got its act together for eResearch – it’s country-wide – it’s learnt from the UK eScience experience and US cyberinfrastructure. And one of those lessons is that there are no easy answers in eReserach and its data. It’s hard work and requires skills and flexibility.

Except I can’t forget about Open.

I met A (from a university I had visited. Names and genders have been anonymised, though we may be able to publish them later). I asked where B was

A: she had had cancer. A rare type, that her doctors hadn’t seen. The doctors wanted to see the literature. But they were in a small town which didn’t have a University.

P: The scholarly poor.

A: Yes but because she was at a University she could read the literature

P: How many papers?

A: hundreds.

P: that would have cost several thousand dollars if she hadn’t been university staff.

A: Oh! Hadn’t realised that. Anyway she is recovering.

P (getting into normal rant): Did you know that we are forbidden by publisher contracts to index “their” publications. [Note: these are “our” publications, appropriated by the publishers]

A (who is a librarian): No I didn’t

P: and that I am forbidden to text-mine the literature.

A: No I didn’t

P: and that if I read too much literature too rapidly the publishers will cut off the whole university.

A: No!!!

P: Yes. They did that to me. Because they think I am a thief.

A: well B has kept a record of her use of the literature and may well publish it as a scholarly paper

P: under an Open licence?

…. And we will wait to find out …

So:

PMR has now one more anecdote that patients have a critical need to read the literature.

Because otherwise they die. [Yes, these are simple words but necessary]

So I will rephrase my dictum:

“Patients assert that (closed access means people die)”

(I have a sample of about 5 patient stories. That’s good enough for me.)

If this still make you uncomfortable, you can truly state:

“PMR asserts that
(patients assert that (closed access means people die))”

That’s a true statement (because I am PMR).

Here is one person who has many many statements from cancer patients about the need for open access:

Gilles Frydman in real life and his avatar

At least people outside academia care. And I hope to help them find a semantic voice