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\begin{document}

\title{Open access in order to foster universal value}



\author[1]{Peifeng Wang}%
\affil[1]{OpenCon London 2017}%


\vspace{-1em}



  
  \date{May 25, 2024}


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Unlike business content or political content, which serves certain
people's purpose and is appropriate in the context of specific location
and time, scientific content is supposed to be universally applicable.
Thus access to scientific content may differ from access to business or
political contents.

\par\null

Opposite to the open access model is regulated access, in which case,
the access platform owners put certain rules on accessible scientific
content. As owners are often in some business, their rules reflect those
businesses.

One example is general interest. In politics, general opinion decide, in
science, majority thinking may not be relevant. Who is interested in a
particular research result is not an integral part of that result.

Another example is importance. Many owners hold the belief that their
platforms are important, so are the works recorded in their platform,
but self claimed importance is not really important, the place where
scientific results are accessible is not science by itself. A platform
can be important only if it helps people accessing scientific results
easier.

A third example is urgency. As a prerequisite, scientific results must
have lasting value. So it does not matter much when a result is
accessible, whether some years earlier or later.

\par\null

Science, in its raw form, is only about what is universally true, while
who, where and when are at most business aspects of a scientific result.
In normal development of scientific research, the result was first
obtained, then made accessible to others, so that it could go through
independent checks, its universal applicability is established during
repeated independent tests. Within the process, accessibility is only
one step, no result becomes science immediately when it is made
accessible by some platform. The primary scientific activity includes
hard work to obtain the result prior to accessibility, and subsequent
repeated independent checks that eventually decide the true value of the
result. Only after those scientific activity can the proved validity
give rise to business values, i.e. universally valid results are
pertinent to everyone (general interest, important) so that people
should know it earlier (urgency).

\par\null

As the universal validity of a result can only be established after
accessibility followed by repeatable independent checks, talking about
the business value of a result prior to the accessible time is premature
and likely misleading. Unfortunately, these business aspects are
regularly asked by platform owners in decision on accessibility, which
often dilute, and sometimes even displace the scientific value of a
result. While readers are often distracted from scientific value by
those business value, accessibility of raw research is made artificially
troublesome for authors.

\par\null

In addition, the original writing of a scientific result represents the
genesis of that result, thus serves as the birth record of that result.
Due to the long lasting value of a scientific result, its birth record,
as manifested by the original writing, bears value that is absent from
business augmented writings.

\par\null

The emphasis on business value is hard to avoid on a regulated platform
as the platform is indeed a business. On the other hand, open access
model, by definition, looks promising in bypassing premature requirement
of business value. In fact, universality implies openness as both are
free of business impact of a particular party. In an open model,
accessibility becomes easy, so both readers and authors will focus more
on the raw universal value of scientific results. In that sense, open
access in science is close to free speech in politics, as it provides
equal opportunity for each result.

\par\null

It would be interesting to see how open access contributes to the
advancement of science. If luckily, someone will be able to afford such
a trial.

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