Chronicle
of Higher Education: Cornell University's Philip Davis has
just
published
a study that looked into the impact of making research
papers freely available online. Seven academic publishers gave
Davis the power to grant free access to 20% of articles in 36
different journals. The free articles, which Davis selected
randomly, were downloaded more than twice as often as were the
articles that remained behind access controls. The free
articles didn't, however, garner more citations than the unfree
articles. In an interview with the
Chronicle's Ben Wieder, Davis notes that a paper's
citations originate from a small group of specialists, who,
like most researchers, already have what amounts to free access
either through their institutions or informally through their
collaborators. A paper's readership is wider. Now that it can
be quantified, readership should perhaps be included alongside
citations when assessing a paper's impact, said Davis.
