Category: Open Access

Articles on open access in the broadest sense including non-traditional literature data and other aspects.

The Inevitability of Open Access | Lewis | College & Research Libraries

Author: David W. Lewis

Comment: This is an interesting article to contrast results we see for gold OA. The article predicted, using business theory, that gold OA would reach 50% between 2017 and 2021, and 90% by 2025. This of course contradicts the saturation (if correct) that we see in gold OA (outside Latin America).

Abstract: Open access (OA) is an alternative business model for the publication of scholarly journals. It makes articles freely available to readers on the Internet and covers the costs associated with publication through means other than subscriptions. This article argues that Gold OA, where all of the articles of a journal are available at the time of publication, is a disruptive innovation as defined by business theorist Clayton Christensen. Using methods described by Christensen, we can predict the growth of Gold OA. This analysis suggests that Gold OA could account for 50 percent of the scholarly journal articles sometime between 2017 and 2021, and 90 percent of articles as soon as 2020 and more conservatively by 2025.

Source: The Inevitability of Open Access | Lewis | College & Research Libraries

The prevalence of green and grey open access: Where do physical science researchers archive their publications? | SpringerLink

Authors: Li Zhang & Erin Watson

Comment: This paper focuses on comparing green and grey (archiving in academic social media or personal/departmental website) OA, for CIHR funded research. Data is extract from WoS and Google Scholar used to determine green and grey OA. The prevalence of grey OA is highlighted, and the low up-take of green OA is shown as not attributed to publisher policies, as most do allow green. The takeaway is suggestion to rethink about ways to archive OA, given the high costs of running an institutional repository.

Abstract: The Canadian Institute of Health Research (CIHR) implemented an open access policy for its grant recipients in 2008. We used bibliographic data from the Web of Science to find out how CIHR-funded researchers in the physical sciences self-archived their publications. We also examined the self-archiving policies of the journals in which the researchers published, and compared the citation rates of two different self-archiving approaches: the green open access route (deposit in an institutional or subject repository) and the grey open access route (deposit in an academic social network or personal/departmental website). Only 14% of the articles were openly accessible through the green open access route, while 37% could be accessed through the grey open access route. We cannot ascribe the low uptake of green open access to publishers’ self-archiving policies, as almost all journals allowed self-archiving through the green open access route. Authors deposited 31% of their publications in ResearchGate, the most popular self-archiving option in our study, while they deposited only 2.1% of their publications in institutional repositories, the least popular option. The citation rates of the various self-archiving approaches did not differ significantly. Our results suggest that it may be time to rethink how to achieve open access.

Source: The prevalence of green and grey open access: Where do physical science researchers archive their publications? | SpringerLink

Article processing charge (APC) for publishing open access articles: the Brazilian scenario | SpringerLink

Authors: Cleusa Pavan & Marcia C. Barbosa

Comment: This article provides a detailed literature on OA publication in Brazil and tracks the progress over time. This is splits among journals with different APC policies. Again, the caveat may be the sole use of Web of Science data. However, it is still interesting to note that, although the number of OA publications has increased (in absolute terms, rather than percentages), the output process/vehicle has also become endogenic locally. This is possibly driven by lack of funds. The authors suggest policies for funding APC are required to increase international publications.

Abstract: The article processing charge (APC) provides economic sustainability for scientific journals that publish in open access (OA). In this work, documents published in OA between 2012 and 2016 by authors with Brazilian affiliation are identified, the profile of these publications is analyzed and the cost of APC is estimated. In order to do so, data from 930 journals and 63,847 documents were collected from the Web of Science Core Collection. It was found that 59% of these documents were published in journals that charge APC. The total expenditures for the 5-year period were estimated at approximately USD 36 million, the weighted average cost per document at USD 957.75 and the average cost per journal at USD 1492.27. The profile of these publications shows that journals indexed by SciELO represent 67% of the 63,847 documents. The use of mega-journals increased over the period, which implies an increase in expenditure in publications, since the average APC per journal was USD 2059.77. It was observed that the OA Brazilian scientific production is characterized by an endogenic profile and has a preference for the Gold road with APC. These results suggest that policies for funding charges are required to stimulate a more international attitude.

Source: Article processing charge (APC) for publishing open access articles: the Brazilian scenario | SpringerLink

The History, Deployment, and Future of Institutional Repositories in Public Universities in South Africa – ScienceDirect

Author: Siviwe Bangani

Comment:
Another interesting paper about IRs in South Africa (SA). Web data was collected, together with interviews been conducted. A detailed history of IRs in SA is given. While many of the South African universities have signed various international declarations and initiative on OA, they often don’t have an institutional policy on OA. Various factors (obstacles and enablers) are listed. Amount of funding is relatively low compared to other countries. Varying IR sizes, types of objects in IRs, multiple language support and issues, and suggestions for development are presented and discussed.

Abstract:
This paper investigates the history, deployment, and content of institutional repositories (IRs) in public universities in South Africa. Some of the local, national and international drivers and enablers that ensure the establishment and survival of the institutional repositories are identified. Lastly, an attempt is made to determine the future of the IRs. Findings include that South African universities were among the first universities in the world to host IRs with the first IR established in 2000. The most prevalent and dominant content in South African public university collections are electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs). There are signs that this is changing as more libraries cover research outputs emanating from the universities. African languages are sparsely represented in IRs in South Africa. The majority of universities in the country signed the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities, and the Budapest Open Access Initiative. Many of them do not have their own open access policy. The driving factors include the decline in government subsidy, increase in journal subscriptions, depreciation of the South African currency, and addition of the Value Added Tax (VAT) of 14% on electronic resources by the South Africa taxman while the enabling factors include the international open access mandates, the Carnegie Foundation grants, and the National Research Foundation’s statement on open access.

Bangani S (2018) The History, Deployment, and Future of Institutional Repositories in Public Universities in South Africa. The Journal of Academic Librarianship 44(1): 39-51.

Source: The History, Deployment, and Future of Institutional Repositories in Public Universities in South Africa – ScienceDirect

Institutional Repositories in Chinese Open Access Development: Status, Progress, and Challenges – ScienceDirect

Authors: Jing Zhong & Shuyong Jiang

Comment: An interesting paper interrogating institutional repositories (IR) in China. These IRs were accessed via ROAR, OpenDOAR, SouOA and CHAIR, though many URL links were broken. The article highlighted the slow development of OA repositories in China and attributed this to the lack of policy and support at all levels. At the end of the article, it mentioned that the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the National Natural Science Foundation of China, in May 2014, released an Open Access policy statement requiring that its funded research papers be made open access in IRs within 12 months after their publication. It would be interesting to follow-up on whether this had made any significant impact.

Abstract:
Open Access (OA) movement in China is developing with its own track and speed. Compared to its western counterparts, it moves slowly. However, it keeps growing. More significantly, it provides open and free resources not only to Chinese scholars, but also to those of China studies around the world. The premise is whether we can find them in an easy and effective fashion. This paper will describe the status of the OA movement in China with a focus on institutional repositories (IR) in Chinese universities and research institutes. We will explore different IR service modules and discuss their coverage, strengths, limitation, and most importantly implications to the East Asian Collection in the US.

Zhong J & Jiang S (2016) Institutional Repositories in Chinese Open Access Development: Status, Progress, and Challenges. The Journal of Academic Librarianship 42(6): 739-744.

Source: Institutional Repositories in Chinese Open Access Development: Status, Progress, and Challenges – ScienceDirect

How significant are the public dimensions of faculty work in review, promotion, and tenure documents?

Authors:  Juan Pablo Alperin, Gustavo E. Fischman, Erin C. McKiernan, Carol Muñoz Nieves, Meredith T. Niles, Lesley Schimanski

Summary: The authors examine tenure and promotions requirements documents from 129 North American universities looking for evidence of interest in engagement, open access and other community/public focussed activities. Relatively little is found and the the word ‘community’ is often co-located with words dealing with professional and academic service suggesting an inward looking focus. Also interesting from its perspective on textual analysis as a tool for analysis.

Abstract: Much of the work of universities, even private institutions, has significant public dimensions. Faculty work in particular is often funded by public funds, is aimed at serving the public good, and is subject to public evaluation. To understand how the public dimensions of faculty work are valued, we analyzed review, tenure and promotion documents from a representative sample of 129 Canadian and American universities. We found terms and concepts related to public and community are mentioned in a large portion of documents, but mostly in ways that relate to service—an undervalued aspect of academic careers. Moreover, we find significant mentions of traditional research outputs and citation-based metrics. Such outputs and metrics reward faculty work targeted to academics, and mostly disregard the public dimensions. We conclude that institutions that want to live up to their public mission need to work towards systemic change in how faculty work is assessed and incentivized.

Alperin, J.P., Muñoz Nieves, C., Schimanski, L., Fischman, G.E., Niles, M.T. & McKiernan, E.C. (2018). How significant are the public dimensions of faculty work in review, promotion, and tenure documents? Humanities Commons [preprint]. https://doi.org/10.17613/M6W950N35

Source: How significant are the public dimensions of faculty work in review, promotion, and tenure documents? | hc:21015 | Humanities CORE

Open Access: An Evaluation of its Impact, Obstacles, and Advancements

Author: Rachel A. Miles

Comments: A detailed article providing reviews on OA and Impact Metrics, and discussions on their misconceptions and misunderstandings. A review on OA mandates and policies is also provided. Other interesting discussions include those on Altmetrics, Eigenfactor, SNIP, JOI. An extensive list of potentially useful references are given.

Abstract: Access to research results is imperative in today’s robust digital age, yet access is often prevented by publisher paywalls. Open Access (OA) is the simple idea that all research should be free for all to access, use, and build upon. This paper will focus on three critical areas of the OA landscape: its impact on scholarship and the public, the obstacles to be overcome, and its advancements. The impact of OA actions and initiatives has been difficult to quantify, but the growing number of studies on OA have shown mostly overwhelmingly positive results. Cultural norms within academia, such as the reliance on the journal Impact Factor (IF) to assess the quality of individual research articles, have impeded the progress of OA. Conversely, federal mandates and institutional policies have supported the OA movement by requiring that scholarly publications be deposited into institutional or subject repositories immediately following publication. As information professionals, library and information science (LIS) professionals have a responsibility as practitioners, authors, and editors to support OA and encourage other academics to do the same.

Cite as: Miles, Rachel. (2016). Open Access: An Evaluation of its Impact, Obstacles, and Advancements. Bibliotekar, 58: (1-2).

Source: Open Access: An Evaulation of its Impact, Obstacles, and Advancements

Evaluation of Openness in the Activities of Research Organisations and Research Funding Organisations in 2016

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Author: finland Ministry of Education and Culture, Open Science and Research Initiative

Notes: Interesting scoring of Finnish research organisations regarding progress towards openness using data retrieved from public websites. A follow up survey gave organisations the opportunity to correct and supplement data. Also compared with other European research organisations. Because of the rapidly changing landscape the assessment was not repeated in 2017.

Abstract: This evaluation of the openness of Finnish research performing and funding organisations was completed as part of the Open Science and Research Initiative (ATT) by the Ministry of Education and Culture. The target of this evaluation is to assess the openness of operational cultures in research organisations and research funding organisations. The key objectives, against which the assessments are made, are defined in the Open Science and Research Roadmap. More information about the evaluation can be found at openscience.fi/openculture

http://www.doria.fi/handle/10024/127273

Publications | Free Full-Text | Enhancing Institutional Publication Data Using Emergent Open Science Services | HTML

Authors: David Walters and Christopher Daley (Brunel University, London)

Notes: An interesting article looking at integrating data sources to assess OA status and location of OA copies for single UK university. Focusses on data derived from CORE and from Unpaywall and its combination with other information from university systems.

Abstract: The UK open access (OA) policy landscape simultaneously preferences Gold publishing models (Finch Report, RCUK, COAF) and Green OA through repository usage (HEFCE), creating the possibility of confusion and duplication of effort for academics and support staff. Alongside these policy developments, there has been an increase in open science services that aim to provide global data on OA. These services often exist separately to locally managed institutional systems for recording OA engagement and policy compliance. The aim of this study is to enhance Brunel University London’s local publication data using software which retrieves and processes information from the global open science services of Sherpa REF, CORE, and Unpaywall. The study draws on two classification schemes; a ‘best location’ hierarchy, which enables us to measure publishing trends and whether open access dissemination has taken place, and a relational ‘all locations’ dataset to examine whether individual publications appear across multiple OA dissemination models. Sherpa REF data is also used to indicate possible OA locations from serial policies. Our results find that there is an average of 4.767 permissible open access options available to the authors in our sample each time they publish and that Gold OA publications are replicated, on average, in 3 separate locations. A total of 40% of OA works in the sample are available in both Gold and Green locations. The study considers whether this tendency for duplication is a result of localised manual workflows which are necessarily focused on institutional compliance to meet the Research Excellence Framework 2021 requirements, and suggests that greater interoperability between OA systems and services would facilitate a more efficient transformation to open scholarship.

Source: Publications | Free Full-Text | Enhancing Institutional Publication Data Using Emergent Open Science Services | HTML

Over 80% of research outputs meet requirements of REF 2021 open access policy – Research England

Author: Research England (neé HEFCE)

Notes: An important national survey of progress towards Open Access in the context of a strong policy and compliance requirement. Interesting both for the claims it makes about the levels of OA as well as the language and nature of the process by which it is being achieved. Lots of important detail on how metadata is and is not being collected an processed.

Abstract: Sixty one per cent of research outputs known to be in scope for the REF 2021 are meeting open access deposit, discovery and access requirements, with a further twenty per cent reporting a known exception, a report published today shows.The report details the findings of a survey by the former Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), the Wellcome Trust, the former Research Councils UK (RCUK) and Jisc. The survey sought to assess how the sector is delivering funders’ open access (OA) policies and to understand some of the challenges the sector faces. The four project partners were also interested in understanding the methods and tools being used across the sector to ensure policy compliance.

Source: Over 80% of research outputs meet requirements of REF 2021 open access policy – Research England