The Case for Open Access: A Conversation with Peter Baldwin

Then & Now

In this episode, historian Peter Baldwin makes the case for open access. He surveys the history of knowledge production and transmission from the Gutenberg Bible, which opened up access in unprecedented ways. Open access today, he argues, is not a novelty but continuous with earlier developments in which artists and thinkers were "workers for hire," who were compensated for their creative and scholarly labor. In the same vein, university professors are paid to produce scholarship which, Baldwin argues, should incline them to accept open access. The conversation takes up the fate of copyright, ownership of ideas, and the core notion of authorship, all the more important to consider in the age of AI.

Peter Baldwin is an Emeritus Professor of History at UCLA. His previous books have focused on comparative histories of Europe and America as well as the history of copyright law. Dr. Baldwin’s most recent book, Athena Unbound: Why and How Scholarly Knowledge Should be Free for All, was published by MIT Press in March 2023 as an open-access volume.