Category Archives: oa.business_models

BioOne announces Subscribe to Open Pilot | EurekAlert!

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“BioOne, the leading nonprofit aggregator in the biological, ecological, and environmental sciences, today announces a bold plan to offer up to 80 society titles as part of a Subscribe to Open (S2O) pilot beginning in January 2026.

This decision, unanimously endorsed by the BioOne Board of Directors, follows 18 months of careful feasibility analysis and extensive interviews with BioOne’s community of society and library partners in search of an equitable and sustainable path to open.

BioOne will work with its publishing community throughout 2024 to encourage participation in the pilot, enabling a rollout to the library market in 2025 for a 2026 volume year launch. The pilot offering will focus on those titles that are exclusively available to researchers via the aggregation BioOne Complete, representing societies, museums, research organizations, and independent presses across 15 countries. BioOne Complete will remain a mixed-model collection of subscribed, S2O, and gold OA titles.”

Copim and SCONUL webinar “”Exploring practical problems and potential strategies to fund equitable OA book publishing” Jan 25, 2024, 10am (GMT) | Zoom registration

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SCONUL and Copim Open Book Futures invite you to join a webinar featuring UK library leaders from a range of institutions to explore the difficulties of funding open access books, and how different libraries have developed strategies to tackle these challenges.

There is a growing shift towards open access (OA) for books, with policies such as UKRI mandating OA publication and a number of OA presses springing up at different universities. But when some institutions are not eligible for funding, and budgets are under increasing pressure, can libraries support this shift to open access for books? If so, how might it be done?

The challenges include: budget constraints, a lack of adequate funding (or byzantine administration to access it), scant institutional buy-in higher up the chain, and even “we don’t know where to start”. When one-off Book Processing Charges (BPCs) cost too much to be practical, what other options are available?

This session will begin with a frank discussion of the challenges of supporting OA for books, before featuring case studies of how some different libraries have devised solutions and potential routes to OA for books. These include exploring collective programmes, in which each library pays a small amount to jointly fund OA initiatives; setting up an institutional outlet of one’s own; new strategic policies and ringfenced OA budgets, and more.

This webinar will create a forum for discussion, and equip attendees with advice and practical strategies, with case studies from a range of libraries in the UK that have begun to make important steps in this direction.

Speakers:

Chaired by Andrew Barker – Library Director, Lancaster University
Phil Brabban – Library Director, Coventry University
Dominic Broadhurst – Head of Content & Discovery at The University of Salford
Anna Clements – Director of Library Services & University Librarian, University of Sheffield

Q&A: Phillip Sharp and Amy Brand on the future of open-access publishing | MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology

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“A group of MIT scholars is releasing a new white paper about academic open-access publishing. The paper gathers information, identifies outstanding questions, and calls for further research and data to inform policy on the subject.

 

The group was chaired by Institute Professor Emeritus Phillip A. Sharp, of the Department of Biology and Koch Institute of Integrative Cancer Research, who co-authored the report along with William B. Bonvillian, senior director of special projects at MIT Open Learning; Robert Desimone, director of the McGovern Institute for Brain Research; Barbara Imperiali, the Class of 1922 Professor of Biology; David R. Karger, professor of electrical engineering; Clapperton Chakanetsa Mavhunga, professor of science, technology, and society; Amy Brand, director and publisher of the MIT Press; Nick Lindsay, director for journals and open access at MIT Press; and Michael Stebbins of Science Advisors, LLC.

 

MIT News spoke with Sharp and Brand about the state of open-access publishing….”

Access to Science and Scholarship: Key Questions about the Future of Research Publishing

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“The health of the research enterprise is closely tied to the effectiveness of the scientific and scholarly publishing ecosystem. Policy-, technology-, and market-driven changes in publishing models over the last two decades have triggered a number of disruptions within this ecosystem:

Ongoing increases in the cost of journal publishing, with dominant open access models shifting costs from subscribers to authors

Significant consolidation and vertical (supply chain) integration in the publishing industry, and a decline in society-owned subscription journals that have long subsidized scientific and scholarly societies

A dramatic increase in the number of “predatory” journals with substandard peer review

Decline in the purchasing power of academic libraries relative to the quantity and cost of published research To illustrate how researcher behavior, funder policies, and publisher business models and incentives interact, this report presents an historical overview of open access publishing.

The report also provides a list of key questions for further investigation to understand, measure, and best prepare for the impact of new policies related to open access in research publishing, categorized into six general areas: access and business models, research data, preprint publishing, peer review, costs to researchers and universities, and infrastructure.”

Report to Congress on Financing Mechanisms For Open Access Publishing of Federally Funded Research

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The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) submits this report to the Appropriations Committees of the Senate and the House in fulfillment of the requirement in the Committee Report accompanying the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023 (P.L. 117-328) for financing mechanisms for open access publishing of federally funded research.1 According to that Report, “The Committee recognizes the considerable progress made by OSTP” and “encourages OSTP to continue its efforts to coordinate the implementation of public access policies across Federal departments and agencies and to identify additional opportunities to enhance access to the results of Federally funded research.” At the same time, the Committee expressed concern about how mechanisms for financing open access publishing “may present growing barriers to knowledge generation and sharing,” noting that there are “limited data on the subject.”

As defined by UNESCO, the term “open access publishing” refers to “the provision of free access to peer reviewed, scholarly and research information to all. It requires that the rights holder grants worldwide irrevocable right of access to copy, use, distribute, transmit, and make derivative works in any format for any lawful activities with proper attribution to the original author.”2 Recent technological and policy changes around the world have enabled free and immediate access to publicly funded research. OSTP, in collaboration with its federal partners and in consultation with external stakeholders, has been tracking the trends in opening public access to federally funded research, including trends in open access publishing. These efforts illustrate a highly complex, rapidly evolving, and vitally important scholarly communication ecosystem. Within this system, academic publishers can be viewed as a platform that matches research readers with research writers. By providing distributional and certification services, these publishers help mediate research incentives, interactions, and impact.

For research readers, substantial progress has been made in making new articles available to everyone quickly and without charge through various models for open access publishing. These readers include students, researchers, policymakers, advocates, and members of the broader public, who may not have access to paywalled articles through institutional subscriptions or who may not be able to pay to read an article. In its 2022 public access guidance, OSTP holds that: “Financial means and privileged access must never be the pre-requisites to realizing the benefits of federally funded research that the American public deserves.”3 The goal of federal public access policies is therefore to ensure that federal investments go towards unlocking knowledge supported by American taxpayers so the benefits of federally supported research can benefit all of America.

 

IOP Publishing and Manipal Academy of Higher | EurekAlert!

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“IOP Publishing (IOPP) and the Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India have finalised a Read and Publish agreement as they work towards breaking down barriers to publishing open access (OA) for researchers from lower and lower middle-income countries.”

Open access: Dependence from article processing charges publishing in Portugal

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Abstract:  Introduction: Conversely to diamond open access, gold open access is associated with article processing charges (APCs), which may represent an important burden in research budgets. The aim of this study was to identify the level of dependence of Portuguese scholarly publications from the five major APC-based publishers: BMC, Frontiers, Hindawi, MDPI, and PLoS.

Methods: Documents published from 2000 to 2022, containing an author’s address (AD field) including the word “Portugal” and assigned to any of the five publishers (PUBL field) were extracted from the Web of Science (WoS) Core Collection on April 21, 2023. Only documents catalogued as article, review, editorial material, or letter as Document Type were considered. Institutions names were obtained from the Portuguese General Directorate of Higher Education. Dependency was defined as the proportion of documents published in APC-journals from the total documents with a Portuguese author in the WoS.

Results: During the 23 years of study, 30,691 documents were published by Portuguese authors in the 663 journals published by these publishers: 3,202 documents in 210 BMC journals, 4,252 in 66 Frontiers journals, 1,448 in 172 Hindawi journals, 19,043 in 209 MDPI journals, and 2,746 in 6 PLoS journals. Overall, this production represents 7.5% of all the documents indexed in the Web of Science with Portugues authors, increasing from 0% in 2000 but reaching 24% in 2022. Significant different APC-dependency in 2022 was found between types of institutions with 30.4% (SD 6.5) in universities, 35.9% (SD 12.5) in polytechnic institutes, and 13.7% (SD 7.2) in other institutions.

Conclusion: An increasingly growing proportion of Portuguese authored documents are being published in the five biggest APC-based publishers, reaching almost 25% of all the documents published in 2022. APCs paid in 2022 overcomes the amount devoted to doctoral grants in Portugal. To reduce the burden of these publishing practices, funding bodies and higher education institutions should consider reinforcing the diamond open access publishing system.

Guest Post: Why De Gruyter Decided to Use Subscribe to Open as the Main Model to Transform Our Journal Portfolio – OASPA

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“De Gruyter was founded to support scholars, promote knowledge, and spread quality research to the widest possible audience. As a publishing model, open access hinges on the idea that the scientific and intellectual heritage of humankind should be open to all—without restrictions tied to wealth, status, or place of birth. There is thus much overlap between the vision which animates the open access movement and De Gruyter’s own founding mission. For more than fifteen years, this affinity has led De Gruyter to be an early and active supporter of open access publishing. 

In keeping with our longstanding commitment to open access, 2023 saw De Gruyter adopt Subscribe to Open (S2O) as its main open access model. S2O is an innovative publishing model which provides for the sustainable transformation of gated journals to open access. Over the next five years, De Gruyter plans to transfer 85% of its 320 subscription journals to open access via S2O.

We are hugely excited about S2O. Not only in terms of its impact on our own portfolio—on average, the 9 journals we have transformed so far using S2O have seen an increase in usage of 700%, with readership from 2.8 times the number of countries compared with previously—but for what its wider adoption could do for both open access and the wider research community….”

Möglichkeiten alternativer Finanzierung für Open-Access-Publikationen. Eine Untersuchung bestehender Geschäftsmodelle | KOALA @ Zenodo

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German abstract (original): Der vorliegende Report ist im Rahmen des BMBF-geförderten Projekts „Konsortiale Open-Access-Lösungen aufbauen“ (KOALA) entstanden. Das Projekt verfolgt das Ziel, Konsortien zur gemeinschaftlichen Finanzierung von Open-Access-Zeitschriften und -Buchreihen zu etablieren und damit Alternativen zu Open Access mit APC/BPC-basierter Finanzierung zu fördern.

Als Grundlage unserer Modellentwicklung wurden unterschiedliche Ansätze konsortialer Open-Access-Finanzierungen untersucht. Ziel war es, herauszuarbeiten, was die jeweiligen Modelle auszeichnet, wo ihre Schwächen, Chancen und Herausforderungen liegen. Indem diese Untersuchung unterschiedliche Ansätze, Modelle und Initiativen vorstellt, leistet sie auch einen Beitrag zur Debatte um mögliche Modelle einer Open-Access-Finanzierung, die in der Lage sind, den freien Zugang zu wissenschaftlichem Wissen ohne Barrieren für jede*n zu ermöglichen.

English abstract (via deepl.com): This report was produced as part of the BMBF-funded project “Building Consortial Open Access Solutions” (KOALA). The aim of the project is to establish consortia for the joint financing of Open Access journals and book series and thus to promote alternatives to Open Access with APC/BPC-based financing.

As a basis for our model development, different approaches to consortial open access financing were analysed. The aim was to work out what characterises the respective models, where their weaknesses, opportunities and challenges lie. By presenting different approaches, models and initiatives, this study also contributes to the debate on possible models of open access funding that are capable of enabling free access to scientific knowledge without barriers for everyone.

 

Who should pay for open-access publishing? APC alternatives emerge

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“When publishers first introduced APCs, the expectation was that these fees would be relatively small and a temporary measure that would provide an incentive for publishers to move to open access. “It’s one of those things that looked like a good idea at the time,” says Johan Rooryck, executive director of cOAlition S, a group of research funders and organizations supporting the shift to immediate open-access academic publishing. The coalition developed Plan S, a 2018 agreement originating in Europe, whereby research funders mandate full open access for the work that emerges from their support….”

Communication Scholarship and the Quest for Open Access

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Abstract:  The advent of black, green, and gold open access publication models poses unique questions  for scholars of communication. Plato’s (1956) classic critique of writing in the legend of Theuth and Thamus warned that the printed word “rolls about all over the place, falling into the hands of those who have no concern with it” (pp. 69–70). More than 2 millennia later, scholars and administrators at all levels of the discipline face just such a phenomenon. As scholars of cyberspace debate whether “information wants to be free” (Levy, 2014), a communication perspective involves consideration of the importance of authorship and attribution amid an ever-shifting array of digital publishing options and subversions. The purpose of this study is to investigate the ongoing transformation of academic publishing by examining black, green, and gold open access models, the responses of the communication discipline, and ongoing questions surrounding the nature and extent of accessibility. As access options for research and publication continue to evolve, this study hopes to provide coordinates for administrators seeking to navigate questions concerning the what, how, and why of communication scholarship in a digital age. 

Supporting open access publishing for books: Collective funding models event summary – Research

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“The UKRI open access policy for monographs, book chapters and edited collections goes live on 1 January 2024, and UKRI have confirmed that their ring-fenced fund of approximately £3.5 million can be used to support a range of open access models, including Diamond agreements (such as Purchase to Open or collective models) as well as the more traditional book processing charge and book chapter processing charges.

In preparation for policy implementation, Jisc and the Open Access Books Network came together to hold a series of online events which focused on different publishing models for open access books. We held three 90-minute webinars with panel speakers including publishers, librarians, and open access infrastructure providers.

Each webinar was chaired by an expert in the field of open access and included a Q&A session, with the chair inviting questions from attendees and some from the chair to the presenters….”

Statistical analysis of DOAJ-indexed Chinese open access journals and their charging policies

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Abstract:  [Purposes] This paper aims to analyze the characteristics of DOAJ-indexed Chinese open access (OA) journals and their charging policies to provide references for the establishment of an article processing charge (APC) system for OA journals in China. [Methods] A total of 253 Chinese and English journals in China included in DOAJ were used as the research objects, and the time of inclusion, language distribution, publisher distribution, discipline distribution, and charging policies of each journal were collected from the journals’ official websites and DOAJ database by web research method. Then, the characteristics of the journals and their charging policies were analyzed. [Findings] The number of Chinese OA journals included in DOAJ is small, and the distribution of OA journals by discipline is uneven. The degree of intensification of OA journal publishing is not high. Chinese OA journals and Chinese and English OA journals still follow the traditional mode of charging page fees and the fees are generally not high. English OA journals have initially established APC charging rules. Different disciplines show differences in APC. [Conclusions] Strengthening policy guidance, enhancing information construction, improving journal service quality, encouraging Chinese researchers to debut their results in Chinese OA journals, and developing a charging system framework suitable for the development of OA journals in China will promote OA publishing development in China.

After the “Nelson Memo”: Key Considerations for Delivering on the Promise of Open & Equitable Scholarship

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“This resource details practical steps that individuals and organizations can take to ensure that the emerging open-centric research ecosystem is optimized for equity, inclusivity, efficiency. replicability, transparency, trust, and engagement. It provides guidance to colleges and universities, public and private funders, professional societies, and others for aligning their processes and their incentive structures with open scholarship values. Additionally, It highlights a range of organizations that are exhibiting good practices in the field.”