Étiquette : open access publishing

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EN

The Rise of Diamond Open Access Journals in Earth Sciences: Past Developments, Present Tensions, and Future Pathways

Authors : Olivier Pourret, Maëlis Arnould, Thibault Duretz, James Ian Farquharson, Dasapta Erwin Irawan, Larry Syu-Heng Lai, Alice Lefebvre, Craig Magee, Marc-Alban Millet, Samantha Teplitzky, Camille Thomas, Romain Vaucher, Lauren Waszek, Mark A Wieczorek, Thomas William Wong Hearing

Over roughly the last decade, a visible, community-led Diamond Open Access (OA) ecosystem has emerged in the Earth sciences, not as a departure from tradition, but as the latest expression of a long-standing culture of open, society-supported scholarly communication.

While free-to-read, fee-free publishing initiatives have deep roots in the field, predating the Diamond terminology by decades and encompassing regional infrastructures and institutional serial publishing by geological surveys and learned societies, the period since the mid-2010s has brought a new wave of explicitly Diamond-identified, community-governed disciplinary journals that have transformed the visibility and ambition of this model. This article analyzes that transition through a field-specific lens, taking journals such as Volcanica, Seismica, Tektonika, Geomorphica, Geodynamica, Sedimentologika, Advances in Geochemistry and Cosmochemistry, Open Paleontology, Planetary Research, and Journal of Studies of Earth’s Deep Interior as emblematic of a broader shift in scholarly communication.

Building on current Diamond OA debates, we argue that Earth sciences Diamond journals are not merely “no-fee” outlets but sociotechnical experiments in reclaiming agency, redistributing publishing labor, and redefining value away from commercial metrics. This article develops three claims. First, the Earth sciences Diamond turn has been enabled by existing community infrastructures and high levels of volunteer coordination, but it remains uneven and fragile.

Second, Diamond models strengthen equity for authors and readers while exposing unresolved tensions around labor sustainability, institutional support, and recognition regimes still structured by prestige metrics. Third, Earth sciences offer a strategically important testbed for a wider transition towards commons-based scholarly communication, especially where global fieldwork, data justice, and decolonizing commitments demand alternatives to the pay-to-read and pay-to-publish systems.

We conclude that the next decade should prioritize durable funding compacts, shared technical infrastructure, and reform of research assessment so that Diamond OA can scale without reproducing extractive or technocratic governance.

URL : The Rise of Diamond Open Access Journals in Earth Sciences: Past Developments, Present Tensions, and Future Pathways

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31223/X56J5P

Catégories
EN

Faculty Perspectives on Open Access: A Multidimensional Analysis of Open-Access Usage and Library Relationships at an R2 Institution

Authors : James E. Van Loon, Julia E. Rodriguez

Introduction: The focus of this study is the broad impact open-access (OA) publishing has on all aspects of faculty members’ work (including publishing habits, research activities, and teaching) and on faculty relationships with the library.

Methods: An online survey addressing the impact of OA publishing on faculty and on their relationship with the library was administered to full-time tenure-track faculty at an R2 institution. Responses were analyzed by disciplinary unit, and themes were developed from faculty qualitative responses.

Results: A majority of faculty respondents had experience with OA publishing, with payment of article processing charges (APCs) to OA publishers, and with the use of OA materials in research and teaching. Many faculty respondents reported a substantial impact of OA on their research, teaching, and authorship, but expressed concern with the funding of OA publishing fees, with the quality and reputation of OA journals, and with the ethics of the OA business model.

Discussion: Faculty respondents demonstrate differing levels of familiarity with OA materials in all three roles. Overall, they are more receptive to OA materials as readers and researchers and more demanding about the quality, impact, and cost of OA publishing as authors.

Conclusion: Despite recognition of the benefits of OA materials, faculty respondents express concern over the cost, quality, and ethics of OA publishing. Faculty respondents also indicate a desire for the institution to provide funding for OA publications and rely on the library for expertise in locating, evaluating, and utilizing OA publications.

URL : Faculty Perspectives on Open Access: A Multidimensional Analysis of Open-Access Usage and Library Relationships at an R2 Institution

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.20328

Catégories
EN

Challenges of Open Access Adoption in Low-Resource Settings: Lessons From Tunisia

Author : Ridha Mhamdi

Introduction

Open Access (OA) publishing is a transformative movement that removes subscription barriers to facilitate unrestricted dissemination of scholarly research. This study aims to identify gaps in OA adoption in Tunisia, assess whether Gold OA publications enhance the visibility and impact of research, and determine how OA publishing aligns with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Methods

Using Scopus data, we performed a bibliometric analysis of Tunisian research (2020-2024), including publication trends, citation metrics, SDG alignment, and funding sources of OA publications.

Results

Despite high regional productivity, over 60% of publications by Tunisian researchers remain paywalled, limiting their visibility. Hybrid Gold OA demonstrated the highest citation impact, while the advantage of Gold OA was constrained by publication in lower-prestige journals. Although Medicine, Computer Science, and Engineering were the dominant fields in OA output, only 40% of OA publications were aligned with the SDGs.

International collaboration, notably with Saudi Arabia, was a key driver of OA adoption. However, high article processing charges (APCs) and a heavy reliance on institutional funding present significant financial barriers.

Conclusion

Tunisia’s OA expansion is hindered by financial sustainability challenges and a misalignment with SDG-focused research. To enhance global research visibility and contribution to sustainable development, we recommend strategic policy shifts: redirecting funds from subscriptions to OA models, pursuing transformative agreements, supporting Diamond OA, and incentivizing high-impact, sustainability-focused research.

URL : Challenges of Open Access Adoption in Low-Resource Settings: Lessons From Tunisia

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.21182

Catégories
EN

Doing Openness Otherwise: Democratization and OA Publishing in the HSS

Author : Rebekka Kiesewetter

Open access (OA) publishing has often been framed through democratization narratives that shape how openness is understood in the humanities and social sciences (HSS). This article examines these narratives and critiques how they are bound up with discourses that equate openness with technological, legal, or financial access to research outputs.

In doing so, they abstract openness from the epistemic, social, and affective conditions under which scholarly knowledge is produced, evaluated, and experienced. In their mainstream, policy‑ and funder‑driven forms, these discourses—and the technocratic model of openness they promote—have become entangled with prestige regimes that privilege measurable outputs, reward efficiency, and marginalize forms of scholarly labor that resist quantification. As OA publishing becomes increasingly embedded within performance‑driven research cultures, HSS scholars often experience it less as an ethical or intellectual commitment than as an administrative obligation.

Even those critical of this evolution frequently lack the time, resources, or institutional support to pursue alternatives. In response, the article foregrounds OA practices emerging from feminist, decolonial, and post‑hegemonic traditions as democratic interventions into the very conditions of scholarly work. Through analysis of three publishing initiatives—Ecological Rewriting: Situated Engagements with The Chernobyl Herbarium (Méndez Cota 2023), the “Open Science Manifesto” (OCSDNet 2017), and “editing otherwise” (Kiesewetter 2024a, b)—it proposes that OA publishing can become a terrain of democratization through situated, collective experimentation with how knowledge is recognized, shared, and lived. Here, openness is not a technical fix or compliance measure but a practical insistence that scholarship can be done differently.

URL : Doing Openness Otherwise: Democratization and OA Publishing in the HSS

DOI : https://doi.org/10.3998/jep.7944

Catégories
EN

Researchers’ Views on Preprints and Open Access Publishing: Results From a Free-Answer Survey of Japanese Molecular Biologists

Authors : Harufumi Tamazawa, Kazuki Ide, Kazuhisa Kamegai

A survey conducted in 2022 amongst members of the Molecular Biology Society of Japan (n = 633) about preprints and open access journals included qualitative data from free-response answers (n = 161). Analysis of the free-form responses suggests that researchers believe that peer review of papers is the foundation for ensuring the credibility of research content.

The trust-building mechanism achieved through peer review shapes the research community. For this reason, researchers are extremely cautious about preprints that have not undergone peer review within their own fields.

This foundation has fostered a sense of responsibility within the community, and this sense of responsibility, which is being fulfilled by ensuring the quality of research, is a mixture of both a sense of responsibility towards the community itself and a sense of responsibility towards the outside world, namely the relationship between researchers and society.

Researchers also appear to view the rise in Article Processing Charges (APCs) as a problem for the entire community, rather than simply an issue for individual researchers. In the field of molecular biology, where collaborative research between universities and companies is common, differences in normative awareness based on position are reflected in the various attitudes towards preprints and open access.

URL : Researchers’ Views on Preprints and Open Access Publishing: Results From a Free-Answer Survey of Japanese Molecular Biologists

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1002/leap.2039

Catégories
FR

Saisir l’objet mouvant de la prédation dans la communication scientifique

Auteur : Innocent Azilan

Cet article examine la prédation dans la communication scientifique comme un phénomène complexe et mouvant qui dépasse la simple dichotomie entre revues « légitime » et « prédatrices ». Je propose une analyse nuancée qui identifie trois formes principales de prédation : par opportunisme (éditeurs frauduleux exploitant le modèle des frais de publication), par immaturité (revues périphériques aux capacités éditoriales limitées), et par avidité (dérives des grands éditeurs commerciaux sous pression de croissance). Je montre que la prédation n’est pas cantonnée aux marges du système scientifique mais touche également des acteurs établis.

HAL : https://hal.science/hal-05344926v1

Catégories
EN

No Fees, No Barriers—But What Standards? Considerations on the DIAMAS Diamond OA Standard Applied to a Public Health Journal

Authors : Annarita Barbaro, Maria Cristina Barbaro, Federica Napolitani

The Diamond Open Access (OA) model—characterized by the absence of fees for both authors and readers—has gained increasing attention in recent years. A wide range of scholarly journals are using this model, as emerged while mapping the Diamond OA landscape worldwide; however, some still depend on hybrid revenue streams such as print sales, subscriptions, and marginal APCs.

A number of recent initiatives underlined the need to increase quality assurance, sustainability, and cooperation within the Diamond OA ecosystem. Among them, the Diamond OA Standard (DOAS), a framework comprising detailed guidelines and a self-assessment tool to facilitate Diamond OA publishing practices, was created by the DIAMAS project, sponsored by the European Commission.

Annali dell’Istituto Superiore di Sanità, the official journal of the Italian leading public health research institution, is a Diamond OA journal. To improve transparency and quality, the editorial team used the DOAS self-assessment tool to evaluate its compliance with the standards proposed by DIAMAS and to identify potential areas for improvement.

This article presents the process and findings of the DOAS self-assessment tool conducted on Annali ISS, with the aim of sharing insights and support with other journals seeking to align with the DOAS framework.

URL : No Fees, No Barriers—But What Standards? Considerations on the DIAMAS Diamond OA Standard Applied to a Public Health Journal

DOI : https://doi.org/10.3390/publications13040053