Reactive comment: White House announces new policy to drop paywalls around publicly funded research

Business Announcement

FRONTIERS

On 25 August 2022, the White House unveiled new policy to end the paywalls surrounding federally funded scientific research in the United States.

The Office of Science and Technology Policy announced ground-breaking new guidance to remove any “delay or barrier between the American public and the returns on their investments in research.” When implemented, it will make the results of taxpayer-supported research immediately available to the public at no cost.

Citing the need to realize and access the ground-breaking possibilities created by taxpayer-funded research, Dr Alondra Nelson said the “American people fund tens of billions of dollars of cutting-edge research annually” and that this research, when widely available, “can drive more equitable outcomes across every sector of society.”

Kamila Markram, co-founder and chief executive officer of Frontiers, the open access research publisher, said: “Enormous progress has been made in our collective efforts to extend the benefits of publicly funded research to all of society, and this announcement ought to be a tipping point. The Covid emergency taught us that open science drives innovation and saves lives.

“As we face down global, existential threats, not least climate change, open science without paywalls will accelerate collaboration and improve our chances of success. We stand ready to work with partners in the vanguard of this transition.”