There has been a fair amount of talk related to this by anthropologists. I think your article also falls into what Chris Kelty wrote about as "Recursive Public Irony," about access to articles about access can be quite limited: http://savageminds.org/2005/05/24/recursive-public-irony/ http://blog.openaccessanthropology.org/?p=43 I was the editorial assistant for the journal Cultural Anthropology and remain involved in it's web-presence, but we too struggled with how to provide broader access to a journal which frequently contains information that policy makers, technologists, and activists might make use of, but typically wont pursue access if its not readily available. It exciting to see more efforts like yours, but I think we should connect efforts as well: http://savageminds.org/2007/12/19/an-open-access-case-study/ http://manao.manoa.hawaii.edu/ Best. Casey On Feb 7, 2008 1:07 AM, danah boyd <aoir.z3z@danah.org> wrote:
Today, an article of mine was finally published in Sage's Convergence series. I should be excited by this, but I'm actually quite depressed. While I'm lucky to be visible enough that some folks will find out about my article and ask me for a copy, most of the articles in that issue will barely get read because they are virtually inaccessible. Additionally, while scholars will ask me for my article, most policymakers and technologists will not, even though the article is probably more relevant to them than it is to you. I believe that the locked-down nature of this publishing regime silences academics while capitalizing off of our free labor at every turn. I think that this is unfair, unacceptable, and irresponsible.
Thus, since I'm a blogger, I wrote a ranty blog entry about the topic: http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2008/02/06/openaccess_is_t.html
-- Casey O'Donnell RPI STS Department - PhD Candidate http://homepage.mac.com/codonnell/