What Price Freedom Of Information ?
There has been a great deal of fuss over a few emails and the topic of freedom of information in relation to the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit.
At the core of the debate is the issue of whether or not specific information about a few tree rings and weather stations was already available - if you knew where to look - or was being deliberately kept back contrary to law.
I have yet to see even one blogger or commenter pick up on the fact that if the data had been provided it would have been provided on request at a price. By law.
The whole point of recent moves on freedom of information is that any and all data of relevance to climate science should be freely and publicly available.
I agree with that 100%, but I would go further. Climate data should be free as in: no payment required.
How not to do things
The British Library has a digitised collection of newspapers and magazines. They have two million items from the 19th century. These documents are now in the public domain as a matter of law. Apart from other historic data, they contain a wealth of national and local climate and weather history.
I was delighted to learn that these national and regional newspapers were being digitised. There is a potential to extract a complete 19th century UK climate record. The information is there. It is already in the public domain. It is available for a mere GBP9.99 for 200 articles.
This is the age of the international web community. Much of that community earns less in a month than many sites charge per view. In effect, the paywall is a poverty barrier: an exclusion zone.
If the British government is sincere about freedom of climate information then it should guarantee full and free public access to information.
Across the planet there are quite literally millions of scientists living on very low incomes. There is no excuse for excluding these people from a process of climate science synergy - especially not on grounds of poverty.
If you are going to put climate science data behind a paywall then you may as well lock it in a bank vault.
Never mind climategate - how's about some action on paywallgate?
