PRISM

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PRISM stands for Partnership for Research Integrity in Science and Medicine. It is an organization established by the The Executive Council of the Professional & Scholarly Publishing Division of the Association of American Publishers (AAP) to fight the open access movement. While they claim their goal is to "to protect the quality of scientific research",[1] their main activity is lobbying against legislation such as S.2695, which would require tax-funded research to be freely accessible.

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Background

PRISM has hired the lobbyist Eric Dezenhall to help them in their campaign. Some of Dezenhall's strategies were exposed by Nature magazine in January 2007.[2] Quoting this article:

From e-mails passed to Nature, it seems Dezenhall spoke to employees from Elsevier, Wiley and the American Chemical Society at a meeting arranged last July by the Association of American Publishers (AAP). A follow-up message in which Dezenhall suggests a strategy for the publishers provides some insight into the approach they are considering taking.
The consultant advised them to focus on simple messages, such as "Public access equals government censorship". He hinted that the publishers should attempt to equate traditional publishing models with peer review, and "paint a picture of what the world would look like without peer-reviewed articles".
Dezenhall also recommended joining forces with groups that may be ideologically opposed to government-mandated projects such as PubMed Central, including organizations that have angered scientists. One suggestion was the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a conservative think-tank based in Washington DC, which has used oil-industry money to promote sceptical views on climate change. Dezenhall estimated his fee for the campaign at $300,000–500,000.
In an enthusiastic e-mail sent to colleagues after the meeting, Susan Spilka, Wiley's director of corporate communications, said Dezenhall explained that publishers had acted too defensively on the free-information issue and worried too much about making precise statements. Dezenhall noted that if the other side is on the defensive, it doesn't matter if they can discredit your statements, she added: "Media messaging is not the same as intellectual debate".

Dezenhall's strategy of marketing the fight against open access as a fight for "refereed journals" is clearly implemented in PRISM's website[3] and letter-writing campaign.[4] According to Brian D. Crawford, who chairs the AAP's executive council overseeing the scholarly publishing division, Dezenhall was still consulting for the AAP in September 2007; Crawford did not confirm, however, that Dezenhall had been directly involved in forming PRISM.[5]

Jim Giles, author of the Nature article quoted above, later made public the memorandum from Dezenhall containing those recommendations and the half-million-dollar budget estimation.[6]

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Reactions

After Peter Suber drew attention to PRISM's initial press release on his Open Access News website,[7] PRISM drew swift reactions from the scientific community. Much of the ire directed at PRISM and expressed on the Internet was chronicled by Bora Zivkovic, Online Community Manager for PLoS ONE.[8] In mid-September, another chronicle of the unfolding events was published by Walt Crawford, senior analyst at the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC).[9]

  • Science writer Dave Munger noticed that, in a fit of irony, the PRISM website violated copyright law: images on its front page had been taken from the stock-photo supplier Getty Images, with their watermark notations intact.[10]
  • On 2007-08-30, Mike Rossner, the Executive Director of Rockefeller University Press, sent an open letter to the AAP requesting that the PRISM website carry a disclaimer making clear that not all AAP members support PRISM's stated goals.[11] Rossner stated that he and his colleagues at Rockefeller University Press "strongly disagree with the spin" which PRISM had placed on the open access issue. He pointed out that the PRISM website falsely implies that the NIH is advocating the dissolution of peer review, that PRISM's references to "bias" are nonsensical, that government funding agencies were forced into supporting a federally-funded research repository because publishing companies refused to release their content, and that publishers depend upon publicly-funded research for their livelihood, thereby incurring an obligation to return value to the taxpayer. Finally, Rossner stated that PRISM's title is inaccurate:
The use of the term "research integrity" is inappropriate in this context. The common use of this term refers to whether the data presented are accurate representations of what was actually observed. In other words, has any misconduct occurred? This is not the primary concern of peer reviewers, who ask whether the data presented support the conclusions drawn. It is thus incorrect to link the term research integrity directly with peer review.[11]
I'd like to make it clear that membership in AAP does not imply or require endorsement of the arguments made by PRISM. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press is currently a member of AAP but our access policies are our own. We were not involved in the formation of PRISM and do not support many of the statements being made on its behalf.[12]
(In 2004, CSHL Press announced that its journal Genome Research would allow authors to distribute their papers online immediately upon publication, given a $1,000 publication surcharge.[13] In general, CSHL Press journals provide free access to articles some time after publication, with a publishing surcharge option for authors who wish immediate open access.)
Oxford University Press is not part of the PRISM initiative, and we do not intend to become a signatory to the PRISM Principles.[15]
  • James Cranch of the University of Sheffield has also launched a letter-writing campaign against PRISM[16].
  • On 2007-09-04 the Association of Research Libraries released an official statement [17], strongly criticizing PRISM and encouraging the scholarly community to use this opportunity to "engage in conversations with members of your campus community concerning the changes to the scholarly communication system and how this may affect scholarly journal publishing."
  • Tom Wilson, founder of the International Journal of Information Management, resigned from that journal's editorial board to protest PRISM's position, and called upon other academics to do the same for other journals published by supporters of PRISM.[18]
  • James Jordan, president and director of Columbia University Press, resigned from the Executive Council of the AAP's Professional and Scholarly Publishing division (AAP/PSP) on 28th August, to protest against PRISM. Stephen Bourne, chief executive officer of Cambridge University Press, also stated that “has in no way been involved in, or consulted on, the Prism initiative”, and has distanced himself from their statements and goals. [19]
  • Nawin Gupta, member of the AAP/PSP Executive Council and journals manager for University of Chicago Press, told The Chronicle of Higher Education that UC Press "does not support or endorse the spin that is being put at the Prism site", and questioned "whether Prism really reflects the overall membership of the PSP in any way."[5]

In response to these criticisms, PRISM modified its website in mid-September, adding a few paragraphs and removing some others. Peter Suber said of these modifications, "All in all, these changes reduce the polemical temperature of the two front pages, which is welcome. But they are more about tone than substance, and they are limited to the two front pages."[20] For example, the "about" page still states, misleadingly, "Government mandates [...] risk undermining the very fabric of the system of independent, formal peer-reviewed publication."[20] Mike Rossner noted that even after the modifications, the PRISM website lacked the disclaimer which he had requested on behalf of Rockefeller University Press.

The statement, "Scholarly publishers themselves are not unanimous in their views on this topic," does not provide sufficient distance between our views and those of PRISM. We are disturbed that the AAP continues to send such a strong message on behalf of its members, especially given your awareness that not all members support PRISM. We thus repeat our request that you place a disclaimer on the website. We also think it is important to include a list of supporters. Any publisher that stands behind PRISM should be prepared to do so publicly.[21]
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References

  1. ↑ PRISM website
  2. ↑ Jim Giles, PR's 'pit bull' takes on open access: Journal publishers lock horns with free-information movement, Nature, 24 January 2007; doi:10.1038/445347a
  3. ↑ PRISM website
  4. ↑ PRISM - take action.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Jennifer Howard, Project of Publishers' Association Is Criticized by Some of Its Members and Open-Access Advocates, Chronicle of Higher Education, 2007-09-11. (Subscription only; excerpt available here.) Accessed 2007-09-11.
  6. ↑ Jim Giles, Publishers prepare for war over open access, 2007-09-20. A PDF copy of the leaked memorandum is available here, and an HTML transcript here. Accessed 2007-09-20.
  7. ↑ Peter Suber, Publishers launch an anti-OA lobbying organization, Open Access News 2007-08-23. Suber's post includes a detailed rebuttal to the PRISM claims.
  8. ↑ Bora Zivkovic, This PRISM does not turn white light into the beautiful colors of the rainbow, A Blog Around the Clock, 2007-08-26.
  9. ↑ Walt Crawford, PRISM: Enough Rope?, in Cities & Insights, 2007-09-18. Accessed 2007-09-19.
  10. ↑ Dave Munger, Opening knowledge -- or locking it up (when it's convenient), Cognitive Daily 2007-08-27.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Mike Rossner, Letter to the Association of American Publishers, 2007-08-30. Available here and here.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Calling for a Boycott of of AAP - Association of American Publishers, The Tree of Life, 2007-08-28.
  13. ↑ An "immediately open access" option for authors of papers in the leading journal Genome Research, CSHL press release, 2004-12-27.
  14. ↑ Peter Murray-Rust, Open Letter to Cambridge University Press, A Scientist and the Web, 2007-09-01 and Open Letter to Oxford University Press, 2007-09-02.
  15. ↑ Martin Richardson, Letter to Peter Murray-Rust, 2007-09-05. Accessed 2007-09-06.
  16. ↑ James Cranch, Writing letters to oppose PRISM, accessed 2007-09-05.
  17. ↑ Statement by ARL, accessed 2007-09-09.
  18. ↑ Tom Wilson, Resignation from Editorial Boards, Information Research Weblog, 2007-09-03. Accessed 2007-09-11.
  19. ↑ University-Press Leader Quit Publishers' Panel Over Anti-Open-Access Campaign, Chronicle of Higher Education. Accessed 2007-09-13.
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 Peter Suber, Changes at the PRISM web site, 2007-09-17. Accessed 2007-09-18.
  21. ↑ Mike Rossner, Letter to the AAP, 2007-09-18. Accessed 2007-09-19.
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External links

Retrieved from "http://www.eurekajournalwatch.org/index.php/PRISM"
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