Openly confused

"EU mulls open-source edict" (March 2) contains significant misuse of terminology. "Open source" means software where the source code is available for inspection, amendment and recompilation. "Open access" is the subject of European Union consideration and includes two variants: self-archiving of published papers (green open access) and open-access journals (gold open access).

Academe includes a multitude of proponents of openness in many areas, and it is important that these meanings are not confused.

Andrew A. Adams

Reading University