Open Access Bill for (nearly) all US publicly-funded research

I really like seeing this bill come up - the opposite of the Research Works Act, and a bill that will greatly improve access to research in the U.S.

I am concerned, however, that it uses “peer reviewed journals” as the standard for mandating publication. Computer science does most of its ongoing publication in conferences, not journals; also, specifically naming “journals” seems to me to invite name games, unless journal is defined sufficiently broadly in the bill's text.

I would prefer to see the requirements kick in when research is published in any peer-reviewed publication.

But still, this bill is a great step forward, and things like this are details that can hopefully be worked out.

Worth noting that this bill allows but does not require access for text mining. For example, papers in PubMed Central can not be systematically downloaded (PMC is the result of a previous rule within the NIH).

According to Peter Suber, "If it's passed, agencies will have a year to adopt their own policies, and we can then press them to require libre."

https://plus.google.com/116956861224568841998/posts/DPcA4f1q...

The short summary is that this act (FRPAA) will require free online public access to most publicly-funded research in the US.

Many more details are available here: http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/hoap/Notes_on_the_Federal_Resea...