The “Finch Report,” produced by the Working Group on Expanding Access to Published Research Findings, was updated last week and can be read here.  The report was commissioned by the government of the United Kingdom in order to produce a plan to make publicly funded scientific research available to all for free. The solution seemed to be to publish research data under open-access models, but controversy brewed over what “colour” these models should be.

The update comes as a response to concerns from researchers and politicians that the original Finch Report, which concluded that research institutes in the UK should mandate the “Gold” Open Access model, was based on flawed research.

In the “Gold” Open Access model, researchers pay for their work to be published, whereupon it is made freely available for all to read. In the “Green” Open Access model, researchers upload accepted articles to online repositories, with no upload fees. Critics of the Finch report disagree with the suggestion that the burden of publishing costs should be placed solely on researchers. Many universities state that research funding bodies must commit themselves to providing adequate funds for Gold publishing, or researchers will suffer undue costs. Read a bipartisan coverage of the debate at the Times Higher Education website.

The updated Finch Report reinforces its original recommendation that the UK government should mandate the Gold Open Access model for all publicly funded research. The update indicates that the mandate will follow through.

The Netherlands, another “powerhouse” nation with a significant portion of the academic publishing market, has indicated its intentions to follow the UK in mandating Gold Open Access.

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