Research Area
Science and Technology Studies
Research Institution
Austrian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Technology Assessment
Academic Position
Director
My approach to open access is rooted in science and technology studies. My research since almost 15 years focusses on the impact of the Internet on academia (cyberscience). In this perspective, electronic publishing is probably the development with the most important consequences for the scientific world. Not only did it change the way scientist work and write.
Digital access to an ever increasing stock of scientific publications (but also of other documents) has impacted both on internal and external academic communication. And it has remarkable consequences on the citation culture. That is where open access comes into play: What is available freely on the Net today, has a much higher chance to become received and the basis of further findings.
Therefore I consider it essential that open access becomes the rule and I contribute untiringly by not only making my own publications available, but also by motivating my environment (my colleagues, my institution). I am pleased that in the meantime the Austrian Academy of Sciences (OAW) formally supports open access and that its institutional repository epub.oeaw makes a considerable contribution to open access in Austria.
Web: http://www.oeaw.ac.at/ita/nentwich
Pub: http://epub.oeaw.ac.at/michael_nentwich