Category Archives: open access

Unfortunate lack of links in the NY Times

By Michael Eisen | Published: May 19, 2009

I get very frustrated every time I see an article about a PLoS article in the popular press that doesn’t include a link to the article. One of our motivations for starting PLoS was to give the public access to the primary research literature, and readers of popular news accounts of one of our articles […]

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NIH public access policy made “permanent”

By Michael Eisen | Published: March 13, 2009

The consolidated appropriations bill passed by Congress and signed into law on Wednesday has a provision that makes the NIH public access policy permanent: [Via THOMAS] Sec. 217. The Director of the National Institutes of Health (`NIH’) shall require in the current fiscal year and thereafter that all investigators funded by the NIH submit or […]

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PLoS and Drosophila Meeting T-shirts

By Michael Eisen | Published: March 11, 2009

A lot of people have asked about getting the various t-shirts I’ve made for PLoS and the Fly Meeting. I’ve posted the images for on zazzle.com if anyone wants a t-shirt of their own (proceeds go to PLoS). create & buy custom products at Zazzle

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John Conyers Tries [and Fails] to Explain His Position

By Michael Eisen | Published: March 7, 2009

Lawrence Lessig and I have been writing about the link between publisher contributions to members of the House Judiciary committee and their support for H.R. 801 – a bill that would end the newly implemented NIH public access policy that makes all works published as part of NIH funded research freely available to the public online. On Friday, […]

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I love Anna Eshoo!!

By Michael Eisen | Published: February 27, 2009

A friend posted this letter on Facebook: February 27, 2009 Dear ——-, Thank you for writing to me about H.R. 801, the Fair Copyright in Research Works Act.  As you may know, Congress directed that all NIH funded studies be available for free online. H.R. 801 would effectively overturn this important and much needed policy […]

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Evans and Reimer greatly underestimate effect of free access

By Michael Eisen | Published: February 24, 2009

A lot is being made of a new paper (no link – I only link to articles that are freely available) by University of Chicago sociologist James Evans in which he analyzes citation and free access histories of journals in various disciplines, and concludes that the effect of free access (which he mistakenly calls open […]

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Great op-ed on Conyer’s Bill

By Michael Eisen | Published: February 23, 2009

Misunderestimating open science By James Boyle Published: February 24 2009 02:19 | Last updated: February 24 2009 02:19 It is hard for politicians to do anything that would shock me but I have to say that John Conyers, a US Congressman, has done it. In the process, he has taught us a lot about how […]

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Herb and Marion Sandler and the Financial Crisis

By Michael Eisen | Published: February 14, 2009

I just received an email from Herb Sandler: Dear friends We are living in a benighted time. It is hard to believe that the attacks on Marion and me, and the company, are really happening. As you know, we were one of the very few companies which was monomaniacally  focused on loan quality, doing what’s […]

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Stats on Commenting in PLoS One

By Michael Eisen | Published: February 12, 2009

Euan Adie has a great post over at Nascent (Nature’s web tech blog) about commenting in PLoS One. My thoughts on it later, but it’s definitely worth checking out what he’s done.

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Bash my brother’s paper – for the good of mankind

By Michael Eisen | Published: February 8, 2009

My brother’s lab has a new paper in PLoS One, and he wants to use it to jumpstart our efforts to get postpublication commenting rolling: I am offering up my paper as a case study. If you comment and ask questions or make critiques, I will try to respond. And if you think something in […]

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