Two Steps Forward, One Step Back – The Pandemic’s Impact on Open Access Progress – The Scholarly Kitchen

“2019 was a watershed year for progress in the transition of research publishing to open access (OA). The shakeup caused by Plan S had some time to sink in, cancellations of big subscription deals ramped up, and as I noted last October, the conversation had shifted from “eventually things will move to OA,” to instead a sense of urgency, “we’re on the clock for a move to OA.” The value of open science (increased transparency, open data, open access to research results) has become increasingly obvious during the current global health crisis. Both the positives (rapid reporting and sharing of information) and the negatives (the glut of bad science being issued as preprints and promoted via mainstream media without proper curation) are now evident, with the good generally outweighing the bad. Despite the daily evidence of the importance of shifting to an open science environment for research, the economic fallout from the pandemic is going to make necessary progress difficult and slow….

Business models beyond the APC may have an even bigger struggle ahead. Because of the many shortcomings of the APC model, a variety of OA business models that can be applied in different contexts and that are appropriate for each community and research field are needed for long-term sustainability. Right now, most of the non-APC models in-play rely upon voluntary spend from someone. Will the cost paid for publication of a Diamond-OA journal out of a library make the cut when budgets are being slashed? Collective action strategies that rely upon libraries voluntarily paying for memberships or subscribe-to-open models are going to be similarly hard to justify, given that you receive all the same benefits of the model whether or not you choose to pay….

Open access relies on the concept that knowledge is a public good, but acknowledges that there are costs and efforts necessary to produce and maintain that public good. The global health crisis has the potential to bring stakeholders together in support of improving the way we communicate research results, but the accompanying economic downturn may create significant roadblocks to those efforts.”

The Truth Is Paywalled But The Lies Are Free ? Current Affairs

“But let us also notice something: the New York Times, the New Yorker, the Washington Post, the New Republic, New York, Harper’s, the New York Review of Books, the Financial Times, and the London Times all have paywalls. Breitbart, Fox News, the Daily Wire, the Federalist, the Washington Examiner, InfoWars: free! …”

Accelerating open science in physics | Research Information

“Some argue there is enough money in the system to afford a transition to open access. Whether this is the case or not, there is no current solution or global plan in place to adjust the allocation and flow of funding so it resides at the levels exactly commensurate to where research is produced. These are not intractable challenges. But they require global consensus on the goal of open science, coordinated action to build the infrastructure, and incentives to create lasting change. This will take time….

Although Covid-19 might have reinforced the value of open science, its benefits are well understood by many in the physics community, and we are a long-standing proponent. But there is still much work for all involved if we are to transition to a fully and sustainably open landscape in physics and beyond.

To that end, we will maintain an open dialogue with the physical scientists and scientific organisations we serve and continue to seek more insight into what’s specifically important to them. Over the coming year we will engage in a series of projects to speak to the global physical science community so we can contribute to more open science – more ‘open physics’ – and we look forward to reporting back.”

Accelerating open science in physics | Research Information

“Some argue there is enough money in the system to afford a transition to open access. Whether this is the case or not, there is no current solution or global plan in place to adjust the allocation and flow of funding so it resides at the levels exactly commensurate to where research is produced. These are not intractable challenges. But they require global consensus on the goal of open science, coordinated action to build the infrastructure, and incentives to create lasting change. This will take time….

Although Covid-19 might have reinforced the value of open science, its benefits are well understood by many in the physics community, and we are a long-standing proponent. But there is still much work for all involved if we are to transition to a fully and sustainably open landscape in physics and beyond.

To that end, we will maintain an open dialogue with the physical scientists and scientific organisations we serve and continue to seek more insight into what’s specifically important to them. Over the coming year we will engage in a series of projects to speak to the global physical science community so we can contribute to more open science – more ‘open physics’ – and we look forward to reporting back.”

Science publishing has opened up during the coronavirus pandemic. It won’t be easy to keep it that way

Scientific publishing is not known for moving rapidly. In normal times, publishing new research can take months, if not years. Researchers prepare a first version of a paper on new findings and submit it to a journal, where it is often rejected, before being resubmitted to another journal, peer-reviewed, revised and, eventually, hopefully published.

All scientists are familiar with the process, but few love it or the time it takes. And even after all this effort – for which neither the authors, the peer reviewers, nor most journal editors, are paid – most research papers end up locked away behind expensive journal paywalls. They can only be read by those with access to funds or to institutions that can afford subscriptions.

Science publishing has opened up during the coronavirus pandemic. It won’t be easy to keep it that way

Scientific publishing is not known for moving rapidly. In normal times, publishing new research can take months, if not years. Researchers prepare a first version of a paper on new findings and submit it to a journal, where it is often rejected, before being resubmitted to another journal, peer-reviewed, revised and, eventually, hopefully published.

All scientists are familiar with the process, but few love it or the time it takes. And even after all this effort – for which neither the authors, the peer reviewers, nor most journal editors, are paid – most research papers end up locked away behind expensive journal paywalls. They can only be read by those with access to funds or to institutions that can afford subscriptions.

The changed – and changing – landscape of serials publishing: Review of the literature on emerging models – Herman – 2020 – Learned Publishing – Wiley Online Library

Abstract:  This article presents an up?to?date portrayal of the greatly changed landscape of scholarly journal publishing and identifies the emerging trends characterizing it. We consider the attributes, novelty, and disruptive potential of different models, which range from improvements to the extant model to attempts at reconfiguration and transformation. We propose that journal transition can be seen as falling into three categories. The first is enhanced models of the traditional scholarly journal, which typically afford enriched functionality that breaks the bonds of the printed page whilst otherwise remaining wholly traditional in their offerings. The second category is innovative models of the traditional scholarly journal, which aim at supporting the journal in performing its traditional roles through convention?altering ways. The third category is the possible alternatives to the traditional journal, which represent a move towards alternative modes of knowledge dissemination. This review shows that each of the models identified makes contributions to enriching the reporting and showcasing of scholarly output. They also make it more effective and more efficient. However, we conclude that none of the possible alternatives being discussed can serve as a full?fledged alternative to the journal.

 

The Conversation thrives during the pandemic – Columbia Journalism Review

“The Conversation—a nonprofit that brings together scholars and journalists to bring academic writing to a general audience—may tell us a bit about where nonprofit media is headed. 

The Conversation—which was founded by Andrew Jaspan and Jack Rejtman in Australia in 2011 with $6 million in funding from four universities, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, and the State of Victoria—is thriving amid the Covid-19 pandemic. Traffic is soaring, while its funding model insulates it from the collapse in advertising and subscription revenue hitting other outlets. Its stories are available for republication, for free, under a Creative Commons license—a model that seems particularly beneficial for other news outlets at this moment. “If there were ever a time for expertise and smart journalism, now is it, and we are doing it at a volume no one else is doing and there is no paywall. It is free to use and free to publish,” says Stephen Khan, the editor of The Conversation’s UK edition. …

The Conversation’s business model varies in each region, revealing a lot about the state of nonprofit media in different parts of the world. In Australia, funding comes from reader donations and universities. In Africa and Indonesia, it relies on foundations. In the UK and France, some 145 universities have signed on as financial members, including prestigious research-intensive institutions such as Oxford and Cambridge….”

EDP Sciences – Successful Subscribe to Open pilot paves the way for a ground-breaking roll out across the EDP Sciences maths portfolio

“EDP Sciences is pleased to announce an exciting development in its commitment to open access. Following the successful transition of Mathematical Modelling of Natural Phenomena (MMNP) to open access under the Subscribe to Open (S2O) pilot earlier this year, a further five maths journals will transition to open access under this model from January 2021. The journals are:

ESAIM: Control, Optimisation and Calculus of Variations (COCV)

ESAIM: Mathematical Modelling and Numerical Analysis (M2AN)

ESAIM: Probability and Statistics (PS)

RAIRO – Theoretical Informatics and Applications

 

 

RAIRO – Operations Research ….

Gold Open Access, Organizational and Discipline-Specific Barriers to its Adoption and Business Model Viability | Open Research Community

“Thus, transformative Gold Open Access agreements do not necessarily produce win-win results for publishers and universities, since they likely demand capital investment, protracted inter-organizational negotiations, and expertise-related costs. This indicates the likely continued importance of Green and hybrid Open Access for the scholarly publishing market and a significant role for innovative business models in this sector.”
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