A Royal Wedding? The Marriage Between Open Access and the International Society for Computational Biology

1. A Royal Wedding?The Marriage BetweenOpen Access and the International Society for Computational Biology Philip E. Bourne University of California San Diego pbourne@ucsd.edu http://www.sdsc.edu./pb/Talks Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

2. The Marriage • A young Society (the groom) and a new open access publication (the bride) • Their happily ever after - broadening the dissemination and impact of their science • Ah but .. previous relationships linger • And like many marriages the commitment did not come easily Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

3. The Groom - Life So Far • ~2000 member Society founded 1995 • Primarily computational molecular biology • Previous “official journal” Bioinformatics (OUP) – royalty arrangement • Other journals offered at a discount • FASEB Member • Executive Officer & Offices at UCSD • Main activates: ISMB, journals, education, SIG’s, regional meetings, Web portal Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

4. The Groom’s Strategic Priorities • Intellectual leadership – to sponsor and promote the highest quality conferences and society journal. • Advocacy– to develop, disseminate and promote policies on behalf of our members and scientific discipline. • Financial Stability – to improve the long-term financial footing of the society in order to achieve the above goals. • Governance – to improve the governing structures of the society in order to improve the responsiveness of the society to members, and to enhance our ability to achieve our strategic priorities. Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

5. The Groom’s Monetary Situation:Preliminary 2004 Year End Financial Projections • Total assets, 1 January 2004 $ 197,093 • Estimated 2004 Income $ 824,635 • Estimated 2004 Expenses $ 770,000 • Estimated Assets, 1 January 2005 $ 251,728 Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

6. The Groom’s Previous Lingering Relationship - OUP Bioinformatics • Content – primarily methods • Impact factor 6+ increased +1 / year • After one year – free access to full articles • Low cost/free on-line in developing countries • On-line access to papers soon after acceptance • Recent survey indicated 70% supportive of open access – up from 50% last summer Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

7. OUP contract expiring end 2004 April 2004 RFP issued to publishers June 2004 13 publishers responded with 15 options July 2004 Board of Directors and membership deeply divided over move to open access, loss of revenue also an issue A duel model favored OUP not supportive of a ménage de trois Sept. 2004 form partnership with PLoS CB Nov. 2004 former ISCB President and Chair of Publications Committee becomes EIC Jan. 2005 Launch with very strong EB Now 70 papers processed, 1500 signed up for early alerts June 2005 first issue at ISMB The Courtship Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

8. The Bride’s Unique Scope • PLoS Computational Biology is published in partnership with the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB) andfeatures works of exceptional significance that furthers our understanding of living systems, at all scales, through the application of computational methods. Readers include life and computational scientists who can take the findings presented here to the next level of discovery. Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

9. The Bride’s Aspirations • Quality, quality, quality • Papers pre-filtered with response in 2-3 days • High quality review in 4-6 weeks – 3+ reviews • Papers on-line soon after acceptance • Reviews • Perspectives • Lay summaries • Annotated references • Society pages Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

10. Unresponsive Editors JMS Innovation slowed by conventional requirements What happens when open access is the norm? Ground swell of support for open access PLoS are scientists! Open to innovation Feeling of a new beginning The Marriage Thus Far Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

11. When the Honeymoon is Over Marriage Is All About Growing Up Together • Using the medium for more than just distribution: • Living tutorials (needed in a fast growing field) • Seminal lectures (video) with DOIs • New presentation methodologies e.g. • Usable tables • Applets for review of specific types of data • The Knowledge (journal article) and the data (database) become integrated in cyberspace • The paper is the interface to the databases • The databases are the interfaces to the paper content Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

12. The Children • The Children (membership) are ideally suited for developing open source tools (BioLit) to support their parents • Support searching and literature mining • Authoring tools Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

13. The Wood Anniversary • Bring computational biologists working at different scales into contact through shared methodologies • Have ISCB as the support organization for this broader membership • Take more ownership for the dissemination of our science such that it be available without regard for geographic or economic boundaries • Improve the comprehension of our science through the use of appropriate Web technologies Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

14. Thank You Any similarity to persons living or dead (or the Royal Family) is entirely coincidental Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

15. ISCB Membership / ISMB AttendanceShows Significant Growth in 2004 Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

16. ISCB Membership Expands Globally51 Countries Represented in 2004vs. 37 Previous Year • 1924 Total Members • US 834 • UK 284 • Germany 129 • Canada 86 • Japan 53 • S. Korea 46 • Sweden 45 • Less US Centric • Almost 40% Students Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

17. Traditional Subscription Model Journals Offer Discounts to ISCB Members Journal Name Member Savings (USD) • Bioinformatics $ 375 • Briefings inBioinformatics 31 • Briefings in Functional Genomics & Proteomics 31 • Combination BIB and FGP (when ordered together) 94 • Comparative & Functional Genomics 11 • Computers in Biology and Medicine 143 • Computer Methods and Programs in Biomedicine 133 • Human Genomics 16 • Human Molecular Genetics 94 • Journal of Biomedical Informatics 151 • Journal of Computational Biology 234 • OMICS 141 Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

18. PLoS Founding Board of Directors Harold Varmus PLoS Co-founder and Chairman of the Board President and CEO of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center Patrick O. Brown PLoS Co-founder and Board Member Howard Hughes Medical Institute & Stanford University School of Medicine Michael B. Eisen PLoS Co-founder and Board Member Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory & University of California at Berkeley Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

19. PLoS – A Brief History • Founded in October, 2000 • Circulated an open letter urging publishers to increase access to research literature • >30,000 signatories • Some positive effects, but overall response from publishers fell short of demands • In December, 2002, $9million grant from Moore Foundation to launch open access journals. Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

20. PLoS Publishing Strategy • Launch two high quality open access journals • PLoS Biology in October, 2003 • PLoS Medicine in 2004 • Then launch more specialist open access journals • Stimulate and partner with other organizations to do the same Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

21. PLoS Biology - Year One • Articles submitted – 757 • Articles published – 140 • Extensive media coverage PLoS Biology is established as a high quality open access journal Emerging Trends April 13, 2005

22. Sebastian Bonhoeffer Peer Bork Chris Burge Richard Durbin Jonathan Eisen David Eisenberg Mark Gerstein David Haussler Steve Henikoff David Hillis Peter Hunter Simon Levin Wen-Hsiung Li Dianna Murray Janet Thornton Andrej Sali Chris Sander Arend Sidow Current Editorial Board Emerging Trends April 13, 2005