The incident occurred shortly before the opening December 2009 Copenhagen global climate summit. It has prompted general discussion about increasing the openness of scientific data (though the majority of climate data have always been freely available). Scientists, scientific organisations, and government officials have stated that the incident does not affect the overall scientific case for climate change. Andrew Revkin reported in "The New York Times" that "The evidence pointing to a growing human contribution to global warming is so widely accepted that the hacked material is unlikely to erode the overall argument."