The cost of knowledge : editorial

What is the cost of knowledge? This is an interesting question and a question which has recently been the topic of much debate. It all started with Cambridge mathematician Professor Tim Gower refusing to neither publish in a particular publishing house's journals nor, peer-review for them largely because of the cost of accessing information. He appealed to other academics to support him in his endeavour to create a more open platform for the distribution of academic text. As a consequence, many editors of top earning journals resigned and the Wellcome Trust announced plans to withhold funding unless researchers made their publications freely available.