Societies and the transition to Open Access

A view from the

Andrea BaierDeputy Head of Publications

andrea@britishecologicalsociety.org

HOORAY!

OPEN ACCESS

…BUT…

April 12, 1913 (Saturday)The British weekly magazine New Statesman was founded by Sidney Webb and Beatrice Webb, with financial backing by George Bernard Shaw.[23]

The British Ecological Society, an environmentalist organization that was the first of its kind in history, was founded by 47 persons who had been invited by the British Vegetation Committee. An American counterpart, the Ecological Society of America, would be created in 1915.[24]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/April_1913

about 20 staff

6 journals …

… and 1 book series

ca. 5000members in ca. 100 countries

Membership Magazine

15 Special Interest Groups

… each reaching

100-400 members &

non-members

Advancing Ecology and Making It Count

1.1 We will continue to publish high-impact journals and will develop them to attract the best international ecological research.

1.2 We will seek to distribute ecological research in effective and novel ways so that information is readily available to all who wish to use it.

HOORAY!

• Aligns well with our goals to distribute research as widely as possible

• Gives access to those without university libraries

… and we haven’t been lazy!

• HYBRID – since 2005• GREEN – 12-month embargo compliant• PREPRINT POLICY – since 2013

• DELAYED GRATIS – 2 years after publication• LIBRE – CC-BY options for GOLD OA since 2013• GOLD – since 2012 via Ecology and Evolution

9500 institutions via licenced sales or philanthropic deals> 4.3 million downloads in 2013

…BUT…Year # OA articles % OA articles

2006 3 0.6

2007 4 0.8

2008 9 1.5

2009 5 0.9

2010 7 1.2

2011 8 1.2

2012 11 1.6

2013 30 4.3

2014 46

Gold OA articles in the 5 hybrid journals

33 other strategic objectives

5.5 We will continue to develop and support the journals to further advance their standing and so that they remain a sustainable and significant income stream for the Society.

70 % of income comes from journals

…BUT…

…BUT…

So what to do???

2 Strategic Reviews

10 000 submitting authors

5000 members

100s of responses

22 learned societies and relevant organisations

14 ecologists and publishing professionals

&1

clear message

No one size

fits all.

Author survey

: = 1: 2Under 25 years

26-40

41-55

56-65

>66

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

1%

65%

26%

6%

2%

Age of respondents

9776 submitting authors

± 3% margin of error

2 weeks in early 2014

90.3% completion rate

>1300 respondents

Journal is OA / provides an OA option

Speed of publication

Specialist subject area of the journal

Journal offers thorough peer review

Journal impact factor

International reach of the journal

Journal reputation amongst my peers

0 20 40 60 80 100

34.4%

84.0%

86.4%

89.5%

90.5%

91.9%

93.5%

Percentage who rated each factor as very important or fairly importanton a 5-point scale ranging from very important to not important at all.

n = 1247-1261

How do authors choose journals?

Reputation

International reach

Impact Factor

Thorough peer review

Reaching specialist audience

Publication speed

OA/with OA option

Not applicable as I have not yet published

... submit to subscription journals with page charges

... submit to GOLD OA journals with article processing charges where articles are free to read for all on publication

Other (please specify)

... submit to subscription journal without page charges

... select the journal that is best for my article, regardless of whether there are article processing charges, page charges or whether articles are only available to subscribers

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

1%

1%

2%

3%

27%

66%

When I submit my work, I usually submit to...

n=1293

Does money play a role?

…most appropriate journal

…subscription journal without page charges

other

…GOLD OA journal

…subscription journal with page charges

…n/a

None

1 paper

2 papers

3 papers

4 papers

5 papers

6 to 10 papers

>11 papers

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

48.8%

24.6%

12.2%

6.4%

3.2%

2.7%

1.6%

0.7% n = 1282

Percentage of respondents

How many have published Open Access?

Nr of OA articles published in past 3 years(paid a fee/received waiver)

Why did authors publish Open Access?

46.% of times:

journal of choice happened to be an OA journal

Journalof

Choice

40% of times out of personal choice“Because I want to!”

26.6% of times: collaborator’s choice

7% of times:

funder requirement

§§§

If you haven’t published open access in the last 3 years, what were the reasons?

12% journal of choice did not have an Open Access option !

60% of times authors did not have the funds

And why not?

14% of times money was available

WILL/NEED

0

US$1-500

US$501-1000

US$1001-2000

>US$2000

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

24.3%

48.1%

22.6%

4.5%

0.4% n = 1175

About the money…

What APC would you be prepared to payin a new selective Open Access journal?

250 further free comments

Glad you are finally going to start Open Access publishing!

• Benefits of Open Access• Money and Open Access• Quality and Open Access• Business model

I hope no BES journal would become Open

Access.

Affordability of open access publishing differs widely across the globe. Therefore academics from poorer countries and institutions do not consider publishing in open access journals a viable option.

As a graduate student with limited resources, but working in applied ecology, I would love to be able to make at least some articles (relevant to practitioners) open access, but the costs are prohibitive. Although I am from a wealthy country and a high-ranking university research funds for graduate students do not extent to publication costs and supervisors are only prepared to meet costs if it is necessary for publication.

As a member of a small academic institution with limited funding, open access fees have the potential to really restrict my ability to publish.

I know open access is the wave of the future, but I don’t like the low peer-review standards and financial barriers to publishing. I hope standard journals dominate for a while. I am much more sceptical of papers in open access journals because I assume they haven’t been vetted very well.

Science improves if we all share.

Open access helps young scientists attempting to get established to disseminate their work and get citations much more rapidly. This has become particularly important in light of the strong competition for jobs in the sciences.

Affordability of open access publishing differs widely across the globe. Therefore academics from poorer countries and institutions do not consider publishing in open access journals a viable option.

As a graduate student with limited resources, but working in applied ecology, I would love to be able to make at least some articles (relevant to practitioners) open access, but the costs are prohibitive. Although I am from a wealthy country and a high-ranking university research funds for graduate students do not extent to publication costs and supervisors are only prepared to meet costs if it is necessary for publication.

As a member of a small academic institution with limited funding, open access fees have the potential to really restrict my ability to publish.

I know open access is the wave of the future, but I don’t like the low peer-review standards and financial barriers to publishing. I hope standard journals dominate for a while. I am much more sceptical of papers in open access journals because I assume they haven’t been vetted very well.

Science improves if we all share.

Open access helps young scientists attempting to get established to disseminate their work and get citations much more rapidly. This has become particularly important in light of the strong competition for jobs in the sciences.

Affordability of open access publishing differs widely across the globe. Therefore academics from poorer countries and institutions do not consider publishing in open access journals a viable option.

As a graduate student with limited resources, but working in applied ecology, I would love to be able to make at least some articles (relevant to practitioners) open access, but the costs are prohibitive. Although I am from a wealthy country and a high-ranking university research funds for graduate students do not extent to publication costs and supervisors are only prepared to meet costs if it is necessary for publication.

As a member of a small academic institution with limited funding, open access fees have the potential to really restrict my ability to publish.

I know open access is the wave of the future, but I don’t like the low peer-review standards and financial barriers to publishing. I hope standard journals dominate for a while. I am much more sceptical of papers in open access journals because I assume they haven’t been vetted very well.

Science improves if we all share.

Open access helps young scientists attempting to get established to disseminate their work and get citations much more rapidly. This has become particularly important in light of the strong competition for jobs in the sciences.

Affordability of open access publishing differs widely across the globe. Therefore academics from poorer countries and institutions do not consider publishing in open access journals a viable option.

As a graduate student with limited resources, but working in applied ecology, I would love to be able to make at least some articles (relevant to practitioners) open access, but the costs are prohibitive. Although I am from a wealthy country and a high-ranking university research funds for graduate students do not extent to publication costs and supervisors are only prepared to meet costs if it is necessary for publication.

As a member of a small academic institution with limited funding, open access fees have the potential to really restrict my ability to publish.

I know open access is the wave of the future, but I don’t like the low peer-review standards and financial barriers to publishing. I hope standard journals dominate for a while. I am much more sceptical of papers in open access journals because I assume they haven’t been vetted very well.

Science improves if we all share.

Open access helps young scientists attempting to get established to disseminate their work and get citations much more rapidly. This has become particularly important in light of the strong competition for jobs in the sciences.

Affordability of open access publishing differs widely across the globe. Therefore academics from poorer countries and institutions do not consider publishing in open access journals a viable option.

As a graduate student with limited resources, but working in applied ecology, I would love to be able to make at least some articles (relevant to practitioners) open access, but the costs are prohibitive. Although I am from a wealthy country and a high-ranking university research funds for graduate students do not extent to publication costs and supervisors are only prepared to meet costs if it is necessary for publication.

As a member of a small academic institution with limited funding, open access fees have the potential to really restrict my ability to publish.

I know open access is the wave of the future, but I don’t like the low peer-review standards and financial barriers to publishing. I hope standard journals dominate for a while. I am much more sceptical of papers in open access journals because I assume they haven’t been vetted very well.

Science improves if we all share.

Open access helps young scientists attempting to get established to disseminate their work and get citations much more rapidly. This has become particularly important in light of the strong competition for jobs in the sciences.

Affordability of open access publishing differs widely across the globe. Therefore academics from poorer countries and institutions do not consider publishing in open access journals a viable option.

As a graduate student with limited resources, but working in applied ecology, I would love to be able to make at least some articles (relevant to practitioners) open access, but the costs are prohibitive. Although I am from a wealthy country and a high-ranking university research funds for graduate students do not extent to publication costs and supervisors are only prepared to meet costs if it is necessary for publication.

As a member of a small academic institution with limited funding, open access fees have the potential to really restrict my ability to publish.

I know open access is the wave of the future, but I don’t like the low peer-review standards and financial barriers to publishing. I hope standard journals dominate for a while. I am much more sceptical of papers in open access journals because I assume they haven’t been vetted very well.

Science improves if we all share.

Open access helps young scientists attempting to get established to disseminate their work and get citations much more rapidly. This has become particularly important in light of the strong competition for jobs in the sciences.

I think open access is an ideal to which we should be moving, but do not publish OA because this is money that then cannot be spent on data collection.

As a poor postdoctoral associate with relatively few grant $$, I love the idea of open access (who can pay for articles, especially if I lose ties to an institution for a while?),but I can't afford to pay to have my work published open access. It's kind of a catch-22.

I work in a government environment, not one where grants may support publication costs and it is often impossible to identify the means to pay these costs.

As an academic with a high publication rate but no active grants, I cannot afford to publish in journals that charge me to do so.

I think open access is an ideal to which we should be moving, but do not publish OA because this is money that then cannot be spent on data collection.

As a poor postdoctoral associate with relatively few grant $$, I love the idea of open access (who can pay for articles, especially if I lose ties to an institution for a while?),but I can't afford to pay to have my work published open access. It's kind of a catch-22.

I work in a government environment, not one where grants may support publication costs and it is often impossible to identify the means to pay these costs.

As an academic with a high publication rate but no active grants, I cannot afford to publish in journals that charge me to do so.

I think open access is an ideal to which we should be moving, but do not publish OA because this is money that then cannot be spent on data collection.

As a poor postdoctoral associate with relatively few grant $$, I love the idea of open access (who can pay for articles, especially if I lose ties to an institution for a while?),but I can't afford to pay to have my work published open access. It's kind of a catch-22.

I work in a government environment, not one where grants may support publication costs and it is often impossible to identify the means to pay these costs.

As an academic with a high publication rate but no active grants, I cannot afford to publish in journals that charge me to do so.

I think open access is an ideal to which we should be moving, but do not publish OA because this is money that then cannot be spent on data collection.

As a poor postdoctoral associate with relatively few grant $$, I love the idea of open access (who can pay for articles, especially if I lose ties to an institution for a while?),but I can't afford to pay to have my work published open access. It's kind of a catch-22.

I work in a government environment, not one where grants may support publication costs and it is often impossible to identify the means to pay these costs.

As an academic with a high publication rate but no active grants, I cannot afford to publish in journals that charge me to do so.

Where does this leave the Society?

So what are our plans?

Inform our members

Look for new journal opportunities

External funding

Broaden our income sources

Engage in the OA debate

Make our voice heard

Thanks to• BES photographic competitors / photo credits:

Cath Waller (yawn), Tara-Leigh Dallas (seals), Jason Tylianakis (frog),

Victoria Allen (crabs), Ute Bradter (weaver bird), James Bell (seal)• BES staff• Survey respondents