Category Archives: oa.elsevier

A new era of Open Access for the Journal of Infection – Journal of Infection

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“January 2024 is a watershed moment for the British Infection Association (BIA) and the Journal of Infection, a title which is owned by the BIA and published by Elsevier. Since its inception in 1979, the Journal has been a subscription journal, with income mostly derived from institutional and personal subscriptions. Any profits in the form of royalties have been used by the Association for academic activities, including educational grants, research grants, and meetings. The advantage of the subscription model has been a reliable income supporting the production of the Journal. The downside, shared by all subscription journals, is the paywall, which requires readers to pay for access if they or their institution do not subscribe. Not only is this inequitable, but it also diminishes the dissemination of authors’ work. Furthermore, it is a paradox that most of the work that is published is ultimately funded by the general public via taxation and the general economy but is restricted from universal consumption and impact—why shouldn’t everyone have direct and immediate access to work done on their behalf, and funded by them? In this context, we are delighted that the Journal of Infection this month will flip from subscription to open access.”

Conference “What do we want (or not want) from publishers?”, April 18, 2024 | Universiteiten van Nederland

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Looking beyond the current Dutch contract with Elsevier

UNL, NFU and NWO are delighted to announce a one-day conference entitled “What do we want (or not want) from publishers? Looking beyond the current Dutch contract with Elsevier” that will take place on Thursday, April 18 2024 in the Domstad Conference Centre, in Utrecht.

 

Open Access Platforms: Empowering Transparent and Efficient Publishing Workflows | Sponsored by Elsevier | 5 December

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“With the advent of Open Access agreements that cover publishing costs, librarians have needed to go beyond managing traditional subscriptions to monitoring and managing publishing workflows as well. How do Open Access agreements impact library acquisitions’ workflows? What does it look like to manage, track articles activated under the agreement, and validate author processing charges (APCs)? In this session, library and industry experts will demonstrate for attendees author workflow & institutional workflow within Elsevier’s Open Access Platform and discuss how Elsevier works with researchers and librarians to improve both author and institutional journeys….”

Navigating Risk in Vendor Data Privacy Practices – SPARC

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“Produced in collaboration with Becky Yoose of LDH Consulting Services, Navigating Risk in Vendor Data Privacy Practices: An Analysis of Elsevier’s ScienceDirect documents a variety of data privacy practices that directly conflict with library privacy standards. The report raises important questions regarding the potential for personal data collected from academic products to be used in the data brokering and surveillance products of RELX’s LexisNexis subsidiary…”

Navigating Risk in Vendor Data Privacy Practices: An Analysis of Elsevier’s ScienceDirect

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“Navigating Risk in Vendor Data Privacy Practices: An Analysis of Elsevier’s ScienceDirect documents a variety of data privacy practices that directly conflict with library privacy standards, and raises important questions regarding the potential for personal data collected from academic products to be used in the data brokering and surveillance products of RELX’s LexisNexis subsidiary.

By analyzing the privacy practices of the world’s largest publisher, the report describes how user tracking that would be unthinkable in a physical library setting now happens routinely through publisher platforms. The analysis underlines the concerns this tracking should raise, particularly when the same company is involved in surveillance and data brokering activities. Elsevier is a subsidiary of RELX, a leading data broker and provider of “risk” products that offer expansive databases of personal information to corporations, governments, and law enforcement agencies. 

As much of the research lifecycle shifts to online platforms owned by a small number of companies, the report highlights why users and institutions should actively evaluate and address the potential privacy risks as this transition occurs rather than after it is complete.”

SPARC Report Urges Action to Address Concerns with ScienceDirect Data Privacy Practices | SPARC

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Today, SPARC released Navigating Risk in Vendor Data Privacy Practices: An Analysis of Elsevier’s ScienceDirect. Produced in collaboration with Becky Yoose of LDH Consulting Services, the report documents a variety of data privacy practices that directly conflict with library privacy standards, and raises important questions regarding the potential for personal data collected from academic products to be used in the data brokering and surveillance products of RELX’s LexisNexis subsidiary.

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Elsevier introduces Geographical Pricing Pilot to support authors in low- and middle-oncome countries with equitable open access publishing options

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“Elsevier, a global leader in scientific publishing and information analytics, today announced that it is piloting Geographical Pricing for Open Access (GPOA) across 142 of its Gold Open Access journals to make open access article publishing charges (APCs) more affordable for authors in low- and middle-income countries.

The GPOA model, a publishing industry first, is set to take effect from January 2024. As part of the pilot, Elsevier will structure its article publishing charges for this subset of journals based on countries’ local economic conditions and average income. By tailoring pricing structures according to Gross National Income (GNI) per capita, a transparent and well-established measure used by many international organisations including Research4Life, Elsevier aims to reduce financial barriers that have traditionally hindered researchers and institutions from low and middle-income countries from publishing the latest research in Gold Open Access journals. Elsevier’s approach to GPOA and country banding based on GNI are outlined on our website. A full list of the journals taking part in this novel pilot can be found here. Elsevier will continue to waive APCs for authors in the lowest economic band and already provides affordable access to over 100,000 peer-reviewed resources for institutions in 120 low- and middle-income countries through Research4Life….”

Letter from the Editor-in-Chief: Neurotherapeutics’ Transition to Gold Open Access | SpringerLink

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“Beginning with the January 2024 issue, Neurotherapeutics will become a fully Open Access journal in keeping with the overall trend in scientific publishing. Over the years, the official journal of the American Society for Experimental Neurotherapeutics (ASENT) has gone through a number of transitions regarding its publishing model, beginning with traditional subscription-based print journal paid by libraries, universities, and other institutions, then hybrid online publishing with both subscription and open access options, and now moving to fully open access where the cost of publishing will be covered by authors, their funders, or institutions. Invited articles will not be subject to Article Processing Charges. Along with this change, Elsevier will now be the new publisher of Neurotherapeutics.”

No Evilsevier DEAL!

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“No matter how well-intended (and we all know to which place the road leads that is paved with good intentions!), transformative agreements (such as DEAL in Germany) are generally the wrong tool at the wrong time for making publicly funded science accessible to the public. If you count public statements, the picture of a rare academic consensus emerges: the DEAL-incompatible proposals and criteria from the Council of EU Science Ministers were enthusiastically welcomed by a wide range of scientific organizations. This was not surprising as these conclusions originated from within the scholarly community and build on existing solutions within scholarly institutions. More surprising is the positive feedback coming from the smaller publishers. They welcome these modern concepts from the scientific community that have found their way into the EU decisions, because they finally give them an opportunity to compete with the larger publishers. In short, the only ones still considering DEAL to be up to the task are DEAL themselves and the big publishers; all other relevant actors who have made public statements so far, all reject DEAL.

If DEAL needs to be rejected in general, the Elsevier DEAL needs to be rejected with particular fervor. In addition to the reasons mentioned above, the price negotiated by DEAL with Elsevier is many times more expensive than the market-based solutions favored by all other stakeholders. These spiraling costs will eventually eat into the budget also of non-DEAL fields, which have already taken massive hits by the serials crisis. Elsevier is also part of the surveillance corporation RELX and the clauses in the contract that are intended to protect users from data abuse are useless, because they are neither policed nor enforced. This blank check issued to Elsevier makes participating institutions accomplices in the corporation’s eventual privacy violations. Especially in times of globally growing autocratic tendencies, there should be no question that German universities ought not to denigrate themselves to data suppliers for international intelligence services and law enforcement agencies – all important RELX customers….”

ACS, Elsevier, and ResearchGate resolve litigation, with solution to support researchers

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ACS and Elsevier, members of the Coalition for Responsible Sharing, have agreed to a legal settlement with ResearchGate that ensures copyright-compliant sharing of research articles published with ACS or Elsevier on the ResearchGate site. The lawsuits pending against ResearchGate in Germany and the United States are now resolved. The specific terms of the parties’ settlement are confidential. Dr. James Milne, Chair of the Coalition for Responsible Sharing and President, ACS Publications, said: “The settlement is good news for researchers. ACS, Elsevier, and ResearchGate have agreed on a technical solution that enables authors who have published research articles with ACS or Elsevier to share their work on the ResearchGate platform in a copyright-compliant way. Automated checks occur instantly at the point of upload, helping researchers to save time. “I’d like to thank all parties for their cooperation on this solution. Asking the courts to resolve ResearchGate’s responsibilities in connection with copyright compliance was a necessary step. Publishers in the Coalition for Responsible Sharing actively promote and enable the sharing of research articles as they support researchers to make progress that benefits society. We’re pleased that this settlement helps remove uncertainty for researchers sharing their work on the ResearchGate site.” Ijad Madisch, Co-Founder and CEO of ResearchGate, added: “Today’s joint announcement marks a new chapter in the relationship between ACS, Elsevier, and ResearchGate, and we’re pleased to have landed on an automated solution that makes it easier for authors to share works published with ACS and Elsevier on ResearchGate. This automated solution performs a series of checks to determine applicable sharing options at the point of upload – with no additional overhead for researchers. This helps scientists and researchers who use ResearchGate every day, and we look forward to continuing to work with publishers across the industry to deliver the best solutions for researchers.” At the point of upload, the ResearchGate platform will check rights information for ACS and Elsevier published content. ResearchGate will then immediately determine how the content can be shared on its site. Authors can store their copyrighted ACS and Elsevier published Version of Record articles privately in their ResearchGate profiles and share them privately when requested by other users. The platform also identifies articles that may be shared publicly. -Ends-

German science organizations strike open-access deal with Elsevier | Science | AAAS

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“A new open-access publishing deal announced today has finally put to bed a long-running tussle between German science organizations and the publishing giant Elsevier. The agreement will allow German academics to publish open-access, or free-to-read, papers in the publisher’s journals at discounted fees, and give their institutions access to the full range of Elsevier titles at no extra cost.

Compared with the previous subscription-based arrangements, “We get a lot more for lots less money,” says Günter Ziegler, president of the Free University of Berlin and lead negotiator of Project DEAL, a nationwide consortium of universities and science funders that brokered the agreement. “That’s quite an achievement.”

The deal has been a long time coming. Project DEAL was set up in 2014 to negotiate agreements that would allow German-authored papers to be read for free after publication around the world while also giving German institutions full access to a wide range of journals, including paywalled ones. Negotiators hoped such agreements would both increase access and reduce institutions’ costs. The goal was a “publish and read” agreement, in which publishers are paid based solely on the number of articles published and in return provide access to all their journals….”

DEAL Consortium and Elsevier Announce Germany-wide Open Access Agreement – DEAL Konsortium

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“The DEAL Consortium is delighted to announce a transformative Open Access agreement with the global publisher Elsevier.

This milestone agreement will have a profound impact on the landscape of scholarly publishing and research access in Germany.

Under the terms of the five-year agreement, authors from participating institutions across Germany will publish their research in Elsevier’s journals as Open Access aricles under a open license retaining their copyright. This includes well-known journal brands such as Cell Press and The Lancet.

In addition to this new publishing opportunity, participating institutions will secure comprehensive reading access to almost the entire Elsevier journal collection hosted on ScienceDirect.

Learn more about the agreement here.”