Farewell to Aaron Swartz

[Magda Hassan]

US science to be open to all Government mandates that taxpayer-funded research be freely available within 12 months. Richard Van Noorden 26 February 2013 The rumours have been buzzing around Capitol Hill since before last year?s election, and last week, supporters of open-access publication in the United States got most of what they wanted. The White House declared that government-funded research would be made free for all to read, rather than kept behind paywalls. However, those hoping that the government would require papers to be free from the time of publication were disappointed. In a 22 February memo, John Holdren, director of the White House?s Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), gave federal agencies until 22 August to produce plans for making the data and papers from the research they fund more accessible to the public. The move, he says, would ?accelerate scientific breakthroughs and innovation? and boost economic growth. Agencies should aim to make research papers free by 12 months after publication ? a concession to publishers, who say that a year?s delay is needed to maintain their revenue from subscriptions. full: http://www.nature.com/news/us-science-to...ll-1.12512 <http://www.nature.com/news/us-science-to-be-open-to-all-1.12512>