BizTech Law Blog

White House Decrees Free Access to Government Research

The White House has declared that the results of government funded research, with certain exceptions for classified data, will be available to the public for free within in a year. Such results include peer-reviewed publications and digital data.

The Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) made the move after being pressured by an online petition demanding the policy change, stating that free access to such digital data allows companies to focus their energies on exploiting the discoveries.

The OSTP Memorandum, authored by John P. Holdren, states that:

• The directive applies only to agencies with more than $100 million in research and development expenditures; and
• Those agencies’ draft plans must be submitted to OSTP within six months of February 22^nd, the date of the memo.

Scientists often publish their results in scholarly journals whose publishers claim the open access policy would destroy them. As a compromise, the White House directive allows the publishers to hold the scientific article for a year after the date of publication before allowing free public access. They can also petition for a longer delay.

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