Chua's 3 criteria for Radically Transparent Research (things sound silly when I put my last name on them)
Aha! This is the best version so far of my criteria for which is basically "a methodology for producing Free Scholarship." I know, I know, there all tons of Open Research movements and projects out there; I'm trying to write an examination right now and will loop back and check in with them again after I pass it, ok?
- The work is public and freely accessible.
- The artifacts (data, analysis, etc.) used to create the work is also public and freely accessible so that it can be studied and peer-reviewed by communities of practitioners.
- The work and its artifacts can be freely modified and distributed so others in these communities can benefit from and build atop it.
"Chua's 3 criteria for RTR" (or whatever less-silly name I can tack on that later) comes directly from a Free Culture + Academia mashup. From academic-land (specifically, the scholarship of teaching and learning), we have Lee Shulman’s 3 criteria for scholarship (paraphrased):
- It is public
- It is peer-reviewed by the practitioner’s community
- It can be used by that community as a stepping-stone towards future work
From Free Culture, Richard Stallman's 4 criteria for software Freedom:
- The freedom to run the program, for any purpose.
- The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish. Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
- The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor.
- The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others. By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes. Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
See the connections between Shulman and Stallman? I don't imagine this is the final or best statement ever (and look forward to seeing what future version comes up), but it sounds pretty good to me right now.