Well that was quick. Less than a month after the Finch working group published its recommendations on the future of open access, UK science minister David Willetts has responded, saying in effect “Let’s go for it.” The government has taken essentially all of the recommendations on board and has committed the country to making all its publicly-funded research available for free online by 2014. Except that it’s not quite that simple.

Don’t be misled by the title: this is a book about love. Love for life, love for family and love for curiosity, which leads — circularly — to a love affair with books. Don’t be misled by the title: this is not a handbook.

This is not new since Mariana Mazzucato’s breezy pamphlet, The Entrepreneurial State , was published a year ago, but it was new to me. I’ve just finishing reading it, having snagged one of the copies that she brought to June’s fascinating Science Question Time on economic growth.

There has been a fairly torrid debate over open access over the last six months (even longer for aficionados). For people who look in only occasionally it must seem like a storm that swirls around the same arguments time and again.

My article on open access in the New Scientist provoked an email from copy-editor Miranda Potter.

I have the feeling that there have been too many words on this blog of late. I need a break and wonder if the beleaguered reader does too. Since I happened to be in the sunshine on London’s South Bank yesterday and have a soft spot for the London Eye, rather than torment you with yet more words, I thought I’d give you an Eye-ful.

Last week, having quickly digested the executive summary of the Finch Report on open access (OA), I told you it was complicated. I’ve now read the report in its entirety, along with a large swathes of blogospheric commentary. I’m still decidedly of the view that it’s complicated but I wanted to think through some of the initial responses. In particular, I’d like to try to address the vexed issue of costs.

This is a big deal for me: my first ever article in New Scientist – a magazine that I read in the library in Ballymena as a teenager. Pardon me for preening a little. What’s it about? You guessed it: open access. My thanks to Simon Singh for suggesting that I pitch it to them.

A committee set up by government was never going to foment a revolution. And so it has proved to be. The recommendations of the Finch Report released today mark a cautious, measured step in the right direction, but it is nevertheless a significant one.

For me, one of the more appealing aspects of open access publishing is that by making costs transparent it could stimulate competition between publishers and generate innovative solutions to drive down prices. Today sees the launch of one such innovation: a new open access platform for life and medical sciences called PeerJ. It is a fascinating gamble that may well pay off.

I was determined not to miss the transit of Venus today. Life’s too short. But this week I have relocated to St Raphael in the south of France for a conference on picornaviruses and had to leave my telescope behind. Despite this lack of equipment I roused myself from bed at 5:20 and went in search of the sunrise, hoping to be able to catch the tail end of the transit.