[okfn-discuss] Open Participatory Research

[Rufus Pollock]

On 16/07/08 03:16, Sören Auer wrote:

[snip]

> In the last weeks I was talking with several people involved in science 
> funding and they seemed to be pretty interested in the idea of creating 
> an *prediction market [1] for research ideas* in order to identify the 
> most promising approaches.
> 
> In order to advance this project, attract supporters and thus finally 
> convince decision makers in research funding an politics we have set up 
> a web site at:
> 
> <http://wiki.cofundos.org>

[snip]

This sounds like a great initiative. Looking at the wiki I was 
particularly struck by your mention of 'Open Peer Review'. This is 
something I've recently been thinking about quite a bit in the context 
of an economics paper I'm writing with an academic colleague on the 
subject of efficient dissemination of scholarly information. This is 
still at an early stage  but the basic ideas in it are set out in the 
introduction a portion of which I include below (for those who prefer 
things with a url I've just posted online at [1])

Regards,

Rufus

[1]:<http://www.rufuspollock.org/2008/07/16/dissemination-of-scholarly-information/>

## Introduction

It is well known that in order to (completely) address a given number of 
(independent) goals one needs an equal number of instruments. For 
example, if one is seeking to address both congestion and pollution in 
relation to road-traffic, a single instrument, for example petrol taxes, 
will be insufficient. The same issues arise in relation to the 
dissemination of scholarly information.

Here too there are multiple independent goals. Traditional academic 
publishing provides but a single instrument. Originally there was 
nothing that could be done (for reasons discussed further below), but 
changes in technology render this restriction to a single instrument 
unnecessary. Unfortunately, the two-sided nature of the journal market 
(based on expectations), combined with the current evaluation structure 
of academia, continue to lock society into this inefficient restriction. 
Open-access journals provides one, though as we shall argue, not the 
only, or even most efficient, way to improve the current situation.

### Goals and Instruments

Crudely put, the two main goals (or tasks), in relation to the 
dissemination of scholarly information are:

   * Distribution (transmission of the data/information) -- `Making 
material available for Reading'
   * Filtering/Recommendation -- `Deciding what to Read'

It seems clear that these are distinct and hence require distinct 
instruments for their achievement. Journals can be seen as a single 
instrument which traditionally have tried to address both ends 
simultaneously. The deficiency of academic publishing can then be seen 
as one of insufficient instruments. Initially, because of the 
limitations of reproduction and distribution technologies, there was 
little that could be done about this. Today with the advent of the 
computer and the Internet this is no longer the case and it is possible 
to these two distinct goals with two distinct instruments.

Why then did restricted-access Journals originally come about? The 
answer lies in technology, in particular the nature of the technology 
available in earlier periods to manage distribution (printing and 
transmission). When many journals were originally started the cost of 
transmitting information was very high. Journals essentially acted as a 
club good by which the costs of reproduction and distribution could be 
(efficiently) shared (the efficiency arising here from economies of scale).

At the same time, given the limited `bandwidth' it was natural for 
Journals to take on some filtering role in order to economize on the 
scarce transmission capacity. In this situation, dissemination is 
limited and with only one instrument available (Journals) and it is 
natural to tie dissemination and filtering together (with filtering in 
many ways secondary). Once filtering is being done it is natural for 
journals to `tie' material to the journal explicitly via copyright -- 
though at an early stage given the scale economies of journals this 
explicit tying was not actually necessary and was probably done for 
simple legal convenience.

With the advent of digital communications, in particular the Internet, 
bandwidth is no longer scarce. What is now scarce is attention. In this 
setup the importance of a journal is not its role in efficiently sharing 
reproduction and distribution costs but its role as a filtering 
mechanism. However, while when distribution is central it is natural to 
`add-in' filtering, it is not natural, or necessary, to tie distribution 
in to filtering when filtering is central. In fact it seems clear that 
distribution and filtering can be done entirely separately (i.e. one can 
have two instruments focused on distribution and filtering 
respectively). The Open Access movement can be seen as largely about 
achieving this separation: with open access there is no longer a 
connection between access/distribution (which would be free) and the 
filtering mechanism (the choice of which articles go in a particular 
journal).

That said the `Open Access' movement still has a large focus on journals 
-- albeit open-access ones. This, in our view, is a mistake. Technology 
has also affected possibilities for filtering. In particular it is no 
longer clear why the centralized mechanism of official peer-review and 
journals is superior to alternative decentralized options. The last 
decade, has witnessed widespread, and often successful, experimentation 
with distributed voting and evaluation mechanisms (for example 
Slashdot's story-ratings and Google's link-based site rankings).

Thus, to be more radical, it may make sense not only to remove 
centralized control of distribution but also centralized control of 
filtering. A more distributed (market-like?) filtering mechanism would 
permit the same freedom (and same status?) to participate in reviewing 
and recommendation as it does in the production of scholarly 
information. At the same time it would deliver greater transparency, and 
by permitting `free-entry' in filtering, would allow greater 
specialization, greater diversity, increased participation and greater 
competition.

As such, the gains from going 'open' are not simply wider access, but a 
reduction in the time and energy scholars spend finding and processing 
research information. Significantly, this second item, which is less 
frequently mentioned in discussions of 'Open *Access*', may well be the 
most significant.