Category: Legislation and Government Regulation

"Public Knowledge Applauds FCC for Delivering Strong Open Internet Rules"

Public Knowledge has released "Public Knowledge Applauds FCC for Delivering Strong Open Internet Rules."

Here's an excerpt:

Today, the Federal Communications Commission published its Open Internet Report and Order. The order details strong rules designed to prevent Internet Service Providers from blocking, throttling or using paid prioritization to control how Americans use the internet. . . .

An initial review shows that the order uses Title II to deliver the strong rules the Chairman promised and consumers expect. It includes simple and clear bright-line rules of no blocking, no throttling, and no paid prioritization. It prohibits unreasonable interference with consumer Internet use and strengthens transparency requirements. The Order also shows that the decision is rooted in the opinions, arguments, and legal reasoning of almost 4 million people in the extensive record gathered through this transparent process. . . .

The Order does not create new fees and taxes for consumers. It does not create rate regulation or tariffs. The FCC was careful to forbear from 27 provisions of Title II and over 700 rules and regulations. This effort creates strong protections for consumers without harming the investment that has driven the growth of the Internet into the essential communications tool for the 21st century. It is no wonder that it has such broad support from technology companies big and small, non-tech companies, racial justice and public interest groups, some Internet Service Providers, venture capitalists and investors.

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"FCC Adopts Strong, Sustainable Rules to Protect the Open Internet"

The FCC has released "FCC Adopts Strong, Sustainable Rules to Protect the Open Internet."

Here's an excerpt:

Today, the Commission—once and for all—enacts strong, sustainable rules, grounded in multiple sources of legal authority, to ensure that Americans reap the economic, social, and civic benefits of an Open Internet today and into the future. These new rules are guided by three principles: America's broadband networks must be fast, fair and open—principles shared by the overwhelming majority of the nearly 4 million commenters who participated in the FCC's Open Internet proceeding. Absent action by the FCC, Internet openness is at risk, as recognized by the very court that struck down the FCC's 2010 Open Internet rules last year in Verizon v. FCC. . . .

Bright Line Rules: The first three rules ban practices that are known to harm the Open Internet:

  • No Blocking: broadband providers may not block access to legal content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
  • No Throttling: broadband providers may not impair or degrade lawful Internet traffic on the basis of content, applications, services, or non-harmful devices.
  • No Paid Prioritization: broadband providers may not favor some lawful Internet traffic over other lawful traffic in exchange for consideration of any kind-in other words, no "fast lanes." This rule also bans ISPs from prioritizing content and services of their affiliates.

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"AHRQ, NASA, USDA Release Plans for Public Access to Funded Research"

ARL has released AHRQ, NASA, USDA Release Plans for Public Access to Funded Research.

Here's an excerpt:

Three US Government agencies-the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA)-recently released their plans for increasing public access to federally funded research in response to the 2013 White House Office of Science & Technology Policy (OSTP) directive. The OSTP memorandum directed federal agencies with R&D budgets of $100 million or more to develop plans to make the published results of federally funded research freely available to the public within one year of publication.

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Archival Electronic Records: President Barack Obama Signs the Presidential and Federal Records Act Amendments of 2014

President Barack Obama has signed H.R. 1233, the Presidential and Federal Records Act Amendments of 2014.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

Major updates to the Presidential and Federal Records Acts include:

  • Strengthening the Federal Records Act by expanding the definition of Federal records to clearly include electronic records. This is the first change to the definition of a Federal record since the enactment of the act in 1950.
  • Confirming that Federal electronic records will be transferred to the National Archives in electronic form.
  • Granting the Archivist of the United States final determination as to what constitutes a Federal record.
  • Authorizing the early transfer of permanent electronic Federal and Presidential records to the National Archives, while legal custody remains with the agency or the President.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

President Obama Releases Net Neutrality Statement

President Obama has issued a statement about net neutrality.

Here's an excerpt:

The FCC is an independent agency, and ultimately this decision is theirs alone. I believe the FCC should create a new set of rules protecting net neutrality and ensuring that neither the cable company nor the phone company will be able to act as a gatekeeper, restricting what you can do or see online. The rules I am asking for are simple, common-sense steps that reflect the Internet you and I use every day, and that some ISPs already observe. These bright-line rules include:

  • No blocking. If a consumer requests access to a website or service, and the content is legal, your ISP should not be permitted to block it. That way, every player—not just those commercially affiliated with an ISP—gets a fair shot at your business.
  • No throttling. Nor should ISPs be able to intentionally slow down some content or speed up others—through a process often called "throttling"—based on the type of service or your ISP's preferences.
  • Increased transparency. The connection between consumers and ISPs—the so-called "last mile"—is not the only place some sites might get special treatment. So, I am also asking the FCC to make full use of the transparency authorities the court recently upheld, and if necessary to apply net neutrality rules to points of interconnection between the ISP and the rest of the Internet.
  • No paid prioritization. Simply put: No service should be stuck in a "slow lane" because it does not pay a fee. That kind of gatekeeping would undermine the level playing field essential to the Internet's growth. So, as I have before, I am asking for an explicit ban on paid prioritization and any other restriction that has a similar effect.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

UK Launches New Licensing Program for 91 Million Orphan Works

The UK has launched a new licensing program for orphan works that will cover around 91 million works.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

A new licensing scheme launched today (29 October 2014) could give wider access to at least 91 million culturally valuable creative works-including diaries, photographs, oral history recordings and documentary films.

These works are covered by copyright, but rights holders cannot be found by those who need to seek permission to reproduce them. Under the new scheme, a licence can be granted by the Intellectual Property Office so that these works can be reproduced on websites, in books and on TV without breaking the law, while protecting the rights of owners so they can be remunerated if they come forward.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

International Trade Commission and Digital Data Regultation: "Brief of PK and EFF in ClearCorrect v. ITC"

The EFF has released "Brief of PK and EFF in ClearCorrect v. ITC."

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

In the sweeping and unprecedented decision below, the International Trade Commission found that its authority to regulate trade extends to pure "electronic transmission of digital data" untied to any physical medium. Generally, by statute, the Commission's jurisdiction is limited to oversight of "importation . . . of articles." However, the Commission expansively construed the term "articles" to potentially include anything "bought and sold in commerce," thereby leading to its conclusion that digital data was an article of importation. This broadly sketched statutory construction fails to indicate clearly any limiting principles on the Commission's power.

Among other things, the Commission's decision leaves open the question of whether all transmissions of telecommunications data are within the scope of its authority.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

"Codifying Collegiality: Recent Developments in Data Sharing Policy in the Life Sciences "

Genevieve Pham-Kanter et al. have published "Codifying Collegiality: Recent Developments in Data Sharing Policy in the Life Sciences " in PLOS ONE.

Over the last decade, there have been significant changes in data sharing policies and in the data sharing environment faced by life science researchers. Using data from a 2013 survey of over 1600 life science researchers, we analyze the effects of sharing policies of funding agencies and journals. We also examine the effects of new sharing infrastructure and tools (i.e., third party repositories and online supplements). We find that recently enacted data sharing policies and new sharing infrastructure and tools have had a sizable effect on encouraging data sharing. In particular, third party repositories and online supplements as well as data sharing requirements of funding agencies, particularly the NIH and the National Human Genome Research Institute, were perceived by scientists to have had a large effect on facilitating data sharing. In addition, we found a high degree of compliance with these new policies, although noncompliance resulted in few formal or informal sanctions. Despite the overall effectiveness of data sharing policies, some significant gaps remain: about one third of grant reviewers placed no weight on data sharing plans in their reviews, and a similar percentage ignored the requirements of material transfer agreements. These patterns suggest that although most of these new policies have been effective, there is still room for policy improvement.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

Legal Analysis: Technology, Equality and Accessibility in College and Higher Education Act (TEACH Act)

The EDUCAUSE Policy Office has released Technology, Equality and Accessibility in College and Higher Education Act (TEACH Act).

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

This analysis, however, demonstrates that the TEACH Act would actually create de facto enforceable standards for digital instructional materials and related technologies, and that in the process it would severely limit the ability of colleges and universities to effectively use technology to advance learning for all students.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

"Bill Introduced in Congress to Let You Actually Own Things, Even if They Contain Software"

Kit Walsh has published "Bill Introduced in Congress to Let You Actually Own Things, Even if They Contain Software in Deeplinks."

Here's an excerpt:

At last, someone in Congress has noticed how "intellectual property rights" are showing up in unexpected places and undermining our settled rights and expectation about the things we buy. Today, Representative Farenthold announced the introduction of the You Own Devices Act (YODA). If a computer program enables a device to operate, YODA would let you transfer ownership of a copy of that computer program along with the device. The law would override any agreement to the contrary (like the one-sided and abusive End-User License Agreements commonly included with such software). Also, if you have a right to receive security or bug fixes, that right passes to the person who received the device from you.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

"Keeping Up With… Net Neutrality"

ACRL has released "Keeping Up With… Net Neutrality".

Network neutrality, a term coined by Columbia Law School professor Tim Wu in 2003[1], is the idea that an internet service provider (ISP) should treat all the data that travels through its network equally, regardless of the source, destination, or content of that data. In practice, this means that the data packets that make up streaming video, images from a digital archive, massively multiplayer online games, and class material in a course management system are all delivered from server to user indiscriminately, with minor modifications for network optimization. Discriminating against or blocking content from reaching an end user (e.g. slowing down certain websites like Netflix or blocking access to a service like Apple's FaceTime) violates the principle of net neutrality.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

Digital Legal Deposit, An IPA Special Report

The International Publishers Association has released Digital Legal Deposit, An IPA Special Report.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

A new IPA report reveals how policies and processes are being developed and implemented which allow digital content, whether in the form of e-books, journals, blogs or website content, to be collected and archived. It contains in-depth analysis of schemes in Germany, the Netherlands, the UK, France and Italy, as well as details from Japan, China, Brazil, the United States, Australia and Canada.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

Judiciary Committee Hearing on Moral Rights, Termination Rights, Resale Royalty, and Copyright Term

The U.S. House Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing on moral rights, termination rights, resale royalty, and copyright term.

Here's an excerpt from "Congress Takes On Copyright Term, Moral Rights, and More":

How is this going to work? It's hard to say. Probably not very well. The hearing structure allows a handful of witnesses to give very brief explanations of their views, but the question-and-answer format hasn't always been very productive. In the past, we've seen lawmakers in the committee raise pet issues instead of focusing on the topics on the agenda—take for example last month's hearing on the first sale doctrine, which included numerous questions about the unrelated issue of "piracy."

Moreover, in the absence of real public feedback during these hearings, the committee has sought to represent the public interest by inviting testimony from "both" sides of an imagined dichotomy. Hearings include witnesses from, say, a big company and a small company, a telecom and a publisher, or a copyright licensor and a licensee. This sometimes provides a good impression of balance, but on a panel addressing four separate issues, the odds seem long. It is also often the case that these "sides" don't include anyone who represents the public interest.

But let's not pass judgment before the hearing even takes place. For those who are watching the hearing, here is a primer on the four issues up for discussion:

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

Open Access: Markup of Innovation, Research, Science, and Technology Act Reduces Embargo Period

The House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology has marked up the Frontiers in Innovation, Research, Science and Technology Act (FIRST Act), significantly reducing the embargo period for making works open access.

Here's an excerpt from "FIRST Act Amended to Make Open Access Provision Actually Pretty Good":

Calling this [Section 303 in the prior version of the bill] a "public access" section is a charitable reading: it extended embargo periods to up to three years, it allowed for simple linking to articles rather than the creation of an archive, and it delayed implementation unnecessarily long. (We've ranted about this bill time and again.)

But a glimmer of hope appeared at yesterday's markup. Reps. Jim Sensenbrenner and Zoe Lofgren, introduced an amendment that radically changed Section 303. The new amendment [pdf] maps closely onto Sensenbrenner's Public Access to Public Science Act (H.R. 3157). It sets the embargo period at 12 months (like the NIH's current policy), though it allows stakeholders to extend this by 6 months if they can show a "substantial and unique harm." The amendment was also designed to facilitate long-term preservation, broad analysis of works, and closer investigation of broad copyright licenses. The current version is not perfect, but it is much improved—huge kudos to Sensenbrenner and Lofgren for standing up for open access.

Read more about it at "Revised FIRST Bill Would Give Science Agencies 1 Year to Make Papers Free."

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HEFCE and Three Other UK Funding Bodies Enact Open Access Mandate

The Higher Education Funding Council for England and three other UK funding bodies (the Scottish Funding Council, the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales and the Department for Employment and Learning) have enacted an open access mandate.

Here's an excerpt:

5. The core of this policy is as follows: to be eligible for submission to the post-2014 REF, outputs must have been deposited in an institutional or subject repository on acceptance for publication, and made open-access within a specified time period. This requirement applies to journal articles and conference proceedings only; monographs and other long-form publications, research data and creative and practice-based research outputs are out of scope. Only articles and proceedings accepted for publication after 1 April 2016 will need to fulfil these requirements, but we would strongly urge institutions to implement the policy now. The policy gives a further list of cases where outputs will not need to fulfil the requirements.

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"Finch 18 Months On: A Review of Progress"

Michael Jubb has published "Finch 18 Months On: A Review of Progress: Based on a Paper Presented at the UKSG One-Day Conference, 'Open Access Realities', London, November 2013" in Insights: the UKSG Journal.

Here's an excerpt:

When the Finch Report was published in June 2012, it represented for me the culmination of nine months of intensive work as secretary to the Finch Group. But I was not allowed to rest on my laurels. The Group recognized that the task of implementation would be complex, involving work from many different stakeholders, and it pointed to the need for an implementation strategy that would involve all of them. Perhaps it should have been firmer in recommending how such a strategy should be developed and implemented. Nevertheless, the Group decided that it should as its final act meet in a year's time to assess progress. I was slightly apprehensive when I was asked to prepare a report for the Group to consider at that meeting. This paper—based on a presentation made at the UKSG conference in November 2013—considers the findings of that report, which was published the following week.

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Open Access: SPARC Opposes Frontiers in Innovation, Research, Science and Technology Act

SPARC has released a statement opposing the Frontiers in Innovation, Research, Science and Technology Act.

Here's an excerpt:

Specifically, Section 303 would:

  • Slow the pace of scientific discovery by restricting public access to articles reporting on federally funded research for up to three years after initial publication. This stands in stark contrast to the policies in use around the world, which call for maximum embargo periods of no more than six to 12 months.
  • Fail to support provisions that allow for shorter embargo periods to publicly funded research results. This provision ignores the potential harm to stakeholders that can accrue through unnecessarily long delays.
  • Fail to ensure that federal agencies have full text copies of their funded research articles to archive and provide to the public for full use, and for long-term archiving. By condoning a link to an article on a publisher's website as an acceptable compliance mechanism, this provision puts the long term accessibility and utility of federally funded research articles at serious risk.
  • Stifle researchers' ability to share their own research and to access the works of others, slowing progress towards scientific discoveries, medical breakthroughs, treatments, and cures.
  • Make it harder for U.S. companies — especially small businesses and start-ups — to access cutting-edge research, thereby slowing their ability to innovate, create new products and services, and generate new jobs.
  • Waste further time and taxpayer dollars by calling for a needless, additional 18-month delay while agencies "develop plans for" policies. This is a duplication of federal agency work that was required by the White House Directive and has, in large part, already been completed.
  • Impose unnecessary costs on federal agency public access programs by conflating access and preservation policies as applied to articles and data. The legislation does not make clear enough what data must be made accessible, nor adequately articulate the location of where such data would reside, or its terms of use.

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Copyright Office Seeks Comments on Orphan Works and Mass Digitization

The US Copyright Office is seeking comments on orphan works and mass digitization and it will hold public roundtable discussions on these topics.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

The United States Copyright Office will host public roundtable discussions on potential legislative solutions for orphan works and mass digitization under U.S. copyright law on March 10-11, 2014, in Washington, D.C. Requests to participate should be submitted by February 24, 2014. For a participation request form, go to http://www.copyright.gov/orphan/participation-request-form.html.

The Office is also seeking public comments on potential legislative solutions for orphan works and mass digitization under U.S. copyright law. A comment form will be posted on the Copyright Office website at http://www.copyright.gov/orphan/ no later than March 12, 2014. Comments are due by April 14, 2014, and will be posted on the Copyright Office website.

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Net Neutrality: FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler Issues Statement on FCC’s Open Internet Rules

FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler has issued a statement on the FCC's open internet rules.

Here's an excerpt from Public Knowledge's Sherwin Siy's analysis:

In short, the FCC is keeping all of its possible tools in play. From a legal standpoint, the obvious answer would be to follow the roadmap laid out by the D.C. Circuit's opinion and reclassify broadband as a telecommunications service. That would give the FCC all the authority it needs to preserve net neutrality. But the D.C. Circuit also acknowledged that section 706 gives the FCC broad power to do lots of other things, so long as they will encourage the deployment of broadband. . . .

Speaking of what you can do with section 706, the D.C. Circuit's opinion makes it pretty clear that, while you might not be able to do something that looks too much like traditional common carrier regulation with it, there's a heck of a lot you can do with it. For instance, Wheeler notes, the FCC would seem to have the power overturn state laws that ban communities from setting up their own broadband networks—laws passed with the lobbying muscle of ISPs that don't want the competition. The outer bounds of section 706 are now open for discussion—and they may provide a scope of regulatory power as broad as Title II might have (in some ways, potentially broader). That's another reason to have proceedings on section—ensuring that its authority is used to encourage deployment and competition, and not stray into more troubling areas like censorship or copyright filtering. This, too, should be a clue to the path ahead—one where Title II isn't a political polarizer, but instead a simple, direct application of the FCC's job to protect an open internet.

Read more about it at "FCC Thinks It Can Overturn State Laws That Restrict Public Broadband."

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"The Open Internet Preservation Act"

Several Democratic Senators have introduced "The Open Internet Preservation Act" in the House.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

Today, Senators Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Ct.), Al Franken (D-Minn.), Tom Udall (D-N.M.), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) introduced S. 1981, "The Open Internet Preservation Act", with House Energy and Commerce Committee Ranking Member Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) and Communications and Technology Subcommittee Ranking Member Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) introducing companion legislation H.R. 3982, to protect consumers and innovation online. Last month, the D.C. Circuit struck down the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) Open Internet rules preventing broadband providers from blocking or discriminating against content online. The bill would restore these rules until the FCC takes new, final action in the Open Internet proceeding.

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Congress Madates Open Access for Labor, Health, and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies

The passage of the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2014 mandates open access for federal agencies under the Labor, Health, and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies Senate subcommittee with research budgets of $100 million or more.

Here's an excerpt from the bill:

SEC. 527. Each Federal agency, or in the case of an agency with multiple bureaus, each bureau (or operating division) funded under this Act that has research and development expenditures in excess of $100,000,000 per year shall develop a Federal research public access policy that provides for—

  • the submission to the agency, agency bureau, or designated entity acting on behalf of the agency, a machine-readable version of the author's final peer-reviewed manuscripts that have been accepted for publication in peer-reviewed journals describing research supported, in whole or in part, from funding by the Federal Government;
  • free online public access to such final peer-reviewed manuscripts or published versions not later than 12 months after the official date of publication; and
  • compliance with all relevant copyright laws.

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Net Neutrality, RIP?

While it could be appealed, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit's Verizon v. FCC ruling may well be the death knell of net neutrality given that an unfavorable Supreme Court ruling could make the situation worse by eliminating its last legal vestiges.

What now? In my 1996 "Strong Copyright + DRM + Weak Net Neutrality = Digital Dystopia?" paper, I had this to say about the prospects of net neutrality's demise:

There are many unknowns surrounding the issue of Net neutrality, but what is clear is that it is under assault. It is also clear that Internet services are more likely to require more, not less, bandwidth in the future as digital media and other high-bandwidth applications become more commonplace, complex, and interwoven into a larger number of Internet systems.

One would imagine that if a corporation such as Google had to pay for a high-speed digital lane, it would want it to reach as many consumers as possible. So, it may well be that libraries' Google access would be unaffected or possibly improved by a two-tier (or multi-tier) Internet "speed-lane" service model. Would the same be true for library-oriented publishers and vendors? That may depend on their size and relative affluence. If so, the ability of smaller publishers and vendors to offer innovative bandwidth-intensive products and services may be curtailed.

Unless they are affluent, libraries may also find that they are confined to slower Internet speed lanes when they act as information providers. For libraries engaged in digital library, electronic publishing, and institutional repository projects, this may be problematic, especially as they increasingly add more digital media, large-data-set, or other bandwidth-intensive applications.

It's important to keep in mind that Net neutrality impacts are tied to where the choke points are, with the most serious potential impacts being at choke points that affect large numbers of users, such as local ISPs that are part of large corporations, national/international backbone networks, and major Internet information services (e.g.,Yahoo!).

It is also important to realize that the problem may be partitioned to particular network segments. For example, on-campus network users may not experience any speed issues associated with the delivery of bandwidth-intensive information from local library servers because that network segment is under university control. Remote users, however, including affiliated home users, may experience throttled-down performance beyond what would normally be expected due to speed-lane enforcement by backbone providers or local ISPs controlled by large corporations. Likewise, users at two universities connected by a special research network may experience no issues related to accessing the other university's bandwidth-intensive library applications from on-campus computers because the backbone provider is under a contractual obligation to deliver specific network performance levels.

Although the example of speed lanes has been used in this examination of potential Net neutrality impacts on libraries, the problem is more complex than this, because network services, such as peer-to-peer networking protocols, can be completely blocked, digital information can be blocked or filtered, and other types of fine-grained network control can be exerted.

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Net Neutrality: ALA Issues Statement on U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Verizon v. FCC Ruling

ALA has issued a statement by Barbara Stripling on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Verizon v. FCC ruling.

Here's an excerpt:

The court's decision gives commercial companies the astounding legal authority to block Internet traffic, give preferential treatment to certain Internet services or applications, and steer users to or away from certain web sites based on their own commercial interests. This ruling, if it stands, will adversely affect the daily lives of Americans and fundamentally change the open nature of the Internet, where uncensored access to information has been a hallmark of the communication medium since its inception.

Public libraries have become leading providers of public Internet access, providing service to millions of students, elderly citizens, people seeking employment and many others every single day. Approximately 77 million people use public library Internet access every year. These users of libraries' Internet services, and people all across the country, deserve equal access to online information and services.

The ability of the Internet to spread and share ideas is only getting better. With modern technology, individuals and small groups can produce rich audio and video resources that used to be the exclusive domain of large companies. We must work to ensure that these resources are not relegated to second-class delivery on the Internet—or else the intellectual freedoms fostered by the Internet will be seriously constrained. ALA will work with policy-makers and explore every avenue possible to restore the long-standing principle of nondiscrimination to all forms of broadband access to the Internet.

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"Supporting Public Access to Research Results"

P. Scott Lapinski, David Osterbur, Joshua Parker and Alexa T. McCray have published "Supporting Public Access to Research Results" in College & Research Libraries.

Here's an excerpt:

We posed the question of what services an academic library can best provide to support the NIH Public Access Policy. We approached the answer to this question through education, collaboration, and tool-building. As a result, over the last four years we have engaged over 1,500 participants in discussions of public access to research results, forged alliances with dozens of partners, and built online tools to ease the process of complying with the NIH policy. We conclude that librarians working in collaboration with other key constituencies can have a positive impact on improving access to the results of scientific research.

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"The Political Economy of Federally Sponsored Data"

Bart Ragon has published "The Political Economy of Federally Sponsored Data" in the latest issue of the Journal of eScience Librarianship.

Here's an excerpt:

Librarian involvement in the Open Access (OA) movement has traditionally focused on access to scholarly publications. Recent actions by the White House have focused attention on access on the data produced from federally sponsored research. Questions have emerged concerning access to the output of federally sponsored research and whether it is a public or private good. Understanding the political battle over access to federally funded research is closely tied to the ownership of the peer review process in higher education and associated revenue streams, and as a result, interest groups seeking to influence government regulation have politicized the issues. As a major funder of research in higher education, policies from the federal government are likely to drive change in research practices at higher education institutions and impact library services. The political economy of federally sponsored research data will shape research enterprises in higher education and inspire a number of new services distributed throughout the research life cycle.

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