michael_nielsen

An unexpected personal benefit has been a steady flow of Paypal donations through my inbox, often accompanied by thankyou notes. You better believe I read and appreciate them.

Dozens of people have told me the book helped them change careers.

Would any of this have been possible closed access? Of course some of it would have. I might have made more money. But on nearly every other metric, I suspect being open access was a 100x or more multiplier on the impact.

A common problem in open science is that unconventional forms of publication don't "count" in the traditional ways, for tenure etc.

(I get occasional emails from people looking to cite the book, telling me some journal editor wants to know where "Determination Press" is located. I've so far resisted replying "Everywhere", and just demurely tell them "San Francisco".)

To sum up: open access makes material freely available to people who would otherwise never even hear about it. This amplifying effect is not small, it is enormous. And it applies in parts of the world woefully underserved by the existing publication system.