Prevailing publishing system is irrevocably broken

doi:10.1136/bmj.330.7501.1211-b

BMJ 2005;330:1211 (21 May), doi:10.1136/bmj.330.7501.1211-b

Letter

Prevailing publishing system is irrevocably broken

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR—A group of researchers in Indonesia searches theonline literature in preparation for a research project. Exorbitantjournal subscription and download fees put the articles theyneed out of their reach.¹ The director of the Wellcome Trusttries to read the results of an African study that the charityfunded and is astonished to find that his access to the relevantarticle is denied.² Libraries the world over, held hostage bycommercial publishers who have had a monopoly over authors'work, are cancelling subscriptions to many journals, faced withannual price increases substantially above inflation. Patientswho altruistically volunteered to be in trials, and who fundedthe studies with their own taxes, must battle to make the resultsfreely available.³

Could this really be the "better system" of publishing thatAronson describes⁴—a system in which the results of theglobal research enterprise are a commodity, owned by . . . [Full text of this article]

Gavin Yamey, senior editor, PLoS Medicine

gyamey@plos.org
Public Library of Science, 185 Berry St, Suite 1300, San Francisco, CA 94107, USA

Andy Gass, policy adviser

Public Library of Science, 185 Berry St, Suite 1300, San Francisco, CA 94107, USA