SocraticGadfly: NIH calls for Web publishing of funded research studies

February 03, 2005

NIH calls for Web publishing of funded research studies

This is an excellent idea whose time has come.

The National Institutes of Health has called for researchers receiving NIH grants to post their studies on the Internet.

"With the rapid growth in the public's use of the Internet, NIH must take a leadership role in making available to the public the research that we support. Scientists have a right to see the results of their work disseminated as quickly and broadly as possible, and NIH is committed to helping our scientists exercise this right, " NIH director Dr. Elias Zerhouni said.

"My goal is to change the landscape of scientific publishing, which is paid for by the public," he told reporters.

Open-source science publishing has been gaining momentum since the turn of the century. It is an excellent antidote to both outright fraud and “scratch my back” pseudo-peer review at lesser journals, especially involving issues such as intelligent design.

And, both conservatives and liberals should find full agreement with Zerhouni’s observation that we the people have paid for this research, and therefore should be able to see it for free.

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