Peter Suber

Peter Suber: Open Access; Implications for the Future of Scholarly Communications

Peter Suber
Peter Suber

Peter Suber

Peter Suber: Open Access; Implications for the Future of Scholarly Communications

The topic of Open Access has become highly contested in recent years as ethical questions have emerged regarding the delicate balance between an individual’s right to information and the danger of having such vast amounts of data in the hands of the few.  The Open Access Movement has already had a huge impact on scholarly communications, and many of the journals currently available via the Olin Library are open access.  Dr. Suber discussed the legal, technological, and ethical dilemma that surrounds Open Access.

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2008 - 2009 Season

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Speaker Bio

Peter Suber, Research Professor of Philosophy at Earlham College and a Visiting Fellow at the Information Society Project at Yale Law School, has been an advocate for Free Online Scholarship (FOS) since the 1990’s. Inspired by latent possibilities for utilizing the Web,

Suber has devoted much of his career to the future of scholarly communication. He has played an integral part in establishing the Open Access movement and is its leading proponent.  His vision is to shift the standard model for publishing in academe by making journals accessible to online readers without payment or subscription fees.

Suber’s interest in the free access concept led to participation at the Open Society Institute conference held in Budapest in 2002, which in turn “give birth” to the Budapest Open Access Initiative. Since that time the movement has been highly contested as ethical questions emerge regarding the delicate balance between an individual’s right to information and the implicit dangers of having such vast amounts of data in the hands of a few. The debate continues to be topically important as Internet issues evolve.

In addition to his writings on the topic of online scholarship, Suber has also written articles on the history of philosophy, ethics, formal and informal logic, philosophy, and law. Of special note are his books entitled The Paradox of Self-Amendment (Lang 1990) and The Case of the Speluncean Explorers: Nine New Opinions (Routledge 1998).

Suber holds both a doctorate in philosophy and a law degree from Northwestern University and has served as a senior researcher at the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC), and director of Open Access for the group Public Knowledge as well as positions at Earlham College and Yale School of Law.