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The German taxpayer provides 95% of the Max Planck Society's funding, yet the findings of research are rarely freely accessible to the public. Talking particularly about university researchers, German politician Götz von Stumpfeldt for instance said: "Most professors at German universities are state funded, but their findings are only published in expensive trade journals. These magazines then have to be bought by libraries, again using taxpayers money." It is now hoped that other German universities will follow Max Planck's lead in making their institution's research freely available to the worldwide scientific community, and to the taxpayers that fund it. The Universität Göttingen, itself a prestigious research university, was the first BioMed Central member in Germany. By signing up for BioMed Central membership Max Planck has ensured that article-processing charges are waived - for any of the more than 3000 researchers it employs - for publication in any of BioMed Central's 90 peer-reviewed journals in which all the research content is free. BioMed Central is the largest open access publisher of biology and medicine journals, with a business model based on charging for research articles to be published and then making the content free to readers. Upon acceptance, the article becomes immediately freely available through the Internet to readers worldwide. A number of Max Planck researchers have already published in BioMed Central's journals. With over 100 articles already published by German authors, BioMed Central reports that Germany is in the top five countries worldwide in terms of both their submissions and publication, along with the USA, the UK and Canada. German scientists have been quick to adopt the open access model. When asked why he had published his paper with BioMed Central, Max Planck researcher Konrad Büssow said, "because I think that free access to results of public research is important."