A distinguished group came together in February 2012 in Oxford's Rhodes House to publicly debate 'The Scientific Evolution: Open Science and the Future of Publishing'. The diverse panel included publishers, funders, academics and entrepreneurs: Tim Gowers the Fields Medal winning mathematician, Victor Henning the co-founder and CEO of Mendeley, Robert Kiley from The Welcome Trust, Alison Mitchell from Nature Publishing Group, Cameron Neylon the open science activist and blogger, Lord Robert Winston the advocate of public engagement, and Alicia Wise from the publisher Elsevier. The event was organised by Victoria Watson and Simon Benjamin, and Simon also chaired it.