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share their data. These open data policies are in the spirit of the Bermuda Agreement to share human genetic data (see page 7), but broader in scope. There are a lot of ways this is happening; so let me describe just a few snapshots. In narrowly focused areas such as genomics, the policies can be quite demanding. Earlier in the book, on page 3, we saw how genomics can be used to figure out links between genes and disease; the resulting studies are called genome-wide association studies (GWAS). In 2007 the NIH instituted a policy requiring that data from GWAS be made openly available, subject to some restrictions to ensure participant privacy. Another major funder of genomics research, the Wellcome Trust, now requires all genetic data to be made openly available, again subject to privacy and similar concerns. Furthermore, these agencies specify which online databases the data should be uploaded to, in what formats, and so on.

Broader policies on data sharing are usually less specific. For instance, since 2006 the UK Medical Research Council has required all scientists it funds to make their data openly available, provided that doesn’t violate any ethical or legal regulations. But this policy doesn’t specify exactly how or where data should be made available. Many open data policies are still in early stages of development. For instance, since January of 2011 the US National Science Foundation has required grant applications to include a two-page data management plan. It’s not a full-fledged open data policy, but a spokesperson said this announcement was merely “phase one” of an effort to ensure that all data be openly accessible. Overarching all this, at the highest political levels there is a growing understanding of the value of open data. For instance, in 2007 the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) recommended that member countries make publicly funded research data openly accessible. Such recommendations take time to filter down, but over time they can have an impact.

Open access and open data policies are powerful steps toward open science, the sorts of steps that are difficult for individual scientists to take on their own. The grant agencies are the de facto governance mechanism in the republic of science, and have great power to compel change, more power even than superstar scientists such as Nobel prizewinners. The behavior of many scientists is dictated by the golden rule: them that have the gold make the rules. And the big grant agencies have the gold. If the people running the grant agencies decided that as part of the granting process, grant applicants would have to dance a jig downtown, the world’s streets would soon be filled with dancing professors. Now, many people—including many grant officers—find fault with this system, believing that it is too centralized and controlling. But as a practical matter, the grant system presently rules much of science, and if the grant agencies decide to take open science seriously, so too will scientists. Imagine, for example, that one of the big grant agencies began asking applicants to submit evidence of public outreach using blogging and online videos. Or suppose they started asking applicants to describe their contributions to science wikis, as evidence of research activity. Such policies would do much to legitimize new tools.

Although grant agencies can help new tools become accepted, they don’t have unlimited power to impose open science on scientists. Recall again the story of the Bermuda Agreement for the sharing of human genetic data. Those principles weren’t merely imposed by fiat on molecular biologists by some central granting agency. Instead, leaders in the molecular biology community gathered in Bermuda, where they agreed that it would be in the whole community’s best interest to share data. Essentially, individual scientists were saying, “We’d like to go open—but only if everyone else does too.” The granting agencies then helped achieve that end by enforcing the policy of openness. But part of the reason the policy was so effective