Open Access in the developing world – yes, it is a Good.Thing.

A few days back a paper came out (not OA, sorry), with a keen grasp of the obvious: Open Access is useful for those living in countries where they do not have much access. Duh! Furthermore, those who barely do any science at all, i.e., in the least developed countries, don’t cite, so there is no difference between OA and TA there. And yet more, their methodology was fraught with errors galore. I am happy to report that this paper was debunked by several people already – so check them out:
Evans and Reimer greatly underestimate effect of free access
Research highlights from Dr. Obvious: Tracking the citation advantage of open-access publication in the developing world
A Global Perspective On The Open Access Effect
The Evans & Reimer OA Impact Study: A Welter of Misunderstandings
Perils of Press-Release Journalism: NSF, U. Chicago, and Chronicle of Higher Education
Especially those last two by Stevan Harnad are thorough and detailed. Don’t believe something just because it has been published!
Also a discussion here.