Open Access hurts young scholars, people from poor countries, people not working in Universities, and those in poor disciplines, like Archaeology, etc. etc. etc. because they can’t afford paying $2,000, $3,000, $10,000 to get published in OA publications.
I have my suspicions about how this rumor got started. Critics of Open Access, like Jeffrey Beall, mention some of these issues in tirades* against Open Access. But, probably 99% of people who publish in scholarly journals do not actually follow the debate about scholarly publishing. I highly suspect that most of you feel this way because you have tried to publish with Springer, Elsevier, Wiley, etc. and have gone through their automatic system that asks you if you want to have your article made Open Access for only $6,000. Which makes their offer of color printing a steal at only $1000 extra.
If you have had this experience I would be surprised that you don’t view Open Access as a scam to fleece you out of your hard earned research money- or if your are an independent scholar, your lunch/rent money.
“There are three types of lies — lies, damn lies, and statistics.” ― Benjamin Disraeli
It is Open Access Week and I am back to my series on publishing in Archaeology so I thought I would tackle some of the issues surrounding Open Access publishing in Archaeology and in the World. First up is the misconception that Open Access means you pay and pay a lot.
‘Gold open-access is the predominant open-access model’- Beall
In case you are not aware, Gold Open Access is when the author pays to have their work made Open Access. I asked Beall about where he got the data to back up such a statement but there was no response**. Though the data out there says that actually most Open Access publishers do not charge authors anything, as in 0$, 0£ to publish. A quick look at the Directory of Open Access Journals finds that 6,444 journals DON’T charge you to publish vs. 3,065 that do charge. That is a 2 to 1 ratio of journals not charging anyone.
Archaeology Does Not Charge
I can actually count on my hands the number of Open Access Journals that run an author pays model in Archaeology- Internet Archaeology, STAR, and journals at Ubiqity Press. There are a few other journals out there but they tend to be run by disreputable publishers and are basically scams. I have a list of 200+ places you can publish your work and it would be free. It gets a bit fuzzy in that some of these places don’t have Creative Commons licenses or rolling walls (free access after a year or two) so not OA in some people’s eyes. But, there are literally hundreds of places to publish in Archaeology where it costs you and the readers nothing.
They Charge But Do They Really?
Famously, PLOS ONE, the mega Open Access Journal, waves fees if requested. Here is what Internet Archaeology has to say about the issue of affording fees-
‘All proposals are assessed purely on their academic quality. The decision to publish an article in Internet Archaeology is wholly independent of payment or ability to pay. However where publication costs can be covered by your research sponsor, we appreciate your assistance in applying for these costs (also called APCs). Waivers are possible and considered on a case-by-case basis.’
Reputable OA publishers will waive fees if you can not afford them. I love the work that Internet Archaeology does and would try my hardest to find funds to support their work. However, that system is based scholarly comradery and not exhortation.
They Charge But How Much Really?
Even if you can get a waiver there are many journals that are very reasonable in fees. From STAR –
‘Members of the Society for Archaeological Sciences receive full waiver of Article Publication Charges as a benefit of their membership.’
You know how much membership in SAS is? $20 unwaged. You could get the student or retired members discount of $15. Yes, for $15 you can get published Open Access and receive the SAS newsletter, pretty great deal. I know many archaeologists that spend that much money in 30 seconds at the bar.
Something to Think About…
There is no denying that there are publishers that use extortion tactics to get you to pay for Open Access i.e. you can’t publish OA with us unless you pay $5,000. However, the majority of Open Access journals don’t charge you. When they do many offer waivers (IA or PLOS ONE or the many others) and if even if you have to pay most of the fees are very reasonable. Seriously, $20 and you get the SAS bulletin, is a great deal. In some cases this money is go to support publishers doing innovative work, like IA. I hope I have convinced you that the majority of OA publishing is not about extorting $10,000 from researchers that could use that money for … well, research.
Prestige, Prestige, Prestige
Yes, I realise that a common perception is that the people charging $6,000 for OA, control the “prestigious” journals but that is not actually true, but for another post. One corrected misconception at a time.
* Not sure that is the right word but it certainly was not a scholarly analysis of Open Access. I think the wikipedia page describes it best- “In December 2013, Beall published a comment in tripleC, an open access journal, in which he articulated his criticism of open access publishing in general.[4] He portrays open access publishing as an “anti-corporatist movement” whose advocates pursue the goal of “kill[ing] off the for-profit publishers and mak[ing] scholarly publishing a cooperative and socialistic enterprise”. Further, he considers that the “open access movement is a Euro-dominant one, a neo-colonial attempt to cast scholarly communication policy according to the aspirations of a cliquish minority of European collectivists”. According to Beall, “the emergence of numerous predatory publishers” has been “a product of the open-access movement”. In a subsequent article published by Joseph Esposito on his blog, Scholarly Kitchen, Esposito commented that “much of what he says seems to me to be correct, but simply overstated and stuffed inside a political wrapper“.
** He answered other comments after I posted mine so he at least say it. Maybe he got busy and forgot to answer?
Doug's Archaeology 
anderskastberg
October 22, 2014
Excellent that there are OA publishers that do not charge the authors an APC, and that the review process is independent of payment.
However, that does raise another question. If the journal offer the same service as we (at least I) have been used to, that is things like professional peer review, archiving, indexing, PR (see also the blog post of yesterday by Kent Anderson http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2014/10/21/updated-80-things-publishers-do-2014-edition/), and charge neither writer or reader, how can their operations be economically sustainable?
I am not saying that you’re wrong; I just struggle to see how things add up. The way I read you, the journals you mention do not just offer you a free lunch, they waive the entire cost for the flight ticket. How is that possible?
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
October 22, 2014
Hi Anders,
A couple of ways:
1. Pay what you can model. That is some publications are waved but those that can pay do. In a way they support those that can’t pay.
2.A charity based model were an organisation takes on the costs associated with publishing as part of their charitable goal.
Both models are possible because while there are no free lunches in publishing it is possible to have very cheap lunches. Someone did the math and found that you can run a journal for a few hundred $. That did not take into account things like dois but did include preservation via LOCKSS or CLOCKSS- the main cost. Printing takes up maybe 25% of costs probably less. Elsevier’s profit margin goes up and down but take away 35-40% in profit & print and costs are cut in half to 2/3rds. Many of the remaining costs are mainly human costs copy-editing, etc. (assuming you are using Open Journal Systems) This essentially then becomes volunteered or paid through by one of the above methods.
While I agree with kent’s list many of the things he lists can and have been automatized. For example, ‘Tracking of submissions throughout. [ENHANCED]’- Open Journals System- a free open source software does this. What he does not mention is that most human costs- type setting, copy editing, has been outsourced to india and the like for pennies on the dollar. Essentially, many of the remaining labor intensive work is actually very cheap. The quality that you are use to is actually built on the backs of those in low income countries.
Or a third option is super low APCs Ubiquity press charge between £50-250 per article. They provide ALL of the services Kent discusses and stuff like dois and cross ref. It is all much more affordable than we are led to believe.
This is just a quick comment. If you would like I can do a longer post explaining this in greater detail?
Thanks for the comment
Doug
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
October 23, 2014
Hi anders- longer explanation of how it works. https://dougsarchaeology.wordpress.com/2014/10/23/in-open-access-publishing-there-are-no-free-lunches-but-it-is-really-really-cheap/
Lee
October 22, 2014
I’m glad this debate is getting more air, so thanks for that. If Beall is guilty of glossing things in an overly negative light though, I think it’s probably fair to suggest that you are doing so in an overly positive one. Yes, the problem most people have is with ‘Gold Open Access’ rather than with Open Access per se but this is a standard model for journals with a high impact factor – i.e. those that we are encouraged to publish in if we are to get and keep an academic job. This goes far beyond ideas of prestige and instead to the very core of why we publish as much as where.
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
October 22, 2014
Hi Lee,
I have a whole blog post I am working on- possibly two because it is a very complicated issue. I would say that it is an issue separate from OA or paywall publishing but one the affects them so we have to deal with it. Sorry, that does not really address your comment but I hope to better articulate my ideas in future posts.
Thanks for the comment.
Doug
Lee
October 22, 2014
Thanks Doug, I’ll look forward to reading it. After all, you did me the courtesy of reading my brief ramblings on the subject!
Pandelis Perakakis (@ppandelis)
October 24, 2014
What we seem to forget is that gold OA is not the only way. Who cares if the publisher’s pdf is behind a paywall if I can do a Google Scholar search and find the exact same content at the author’s institutional repository? And why should we publish in PloS ONE instead of a journal of our choice depending on the audience (e.g. old widely-distributed journals related to specific academic societies) and —yes, as long evaluation criteria remain journal-based we need to be pragmatic— impact factors. We can’t ask young researchers to carry on their shoulders the transition to a more ethical publishing model especially when this may involve a potential risk for their careers!
My message to young researchers: Publish wherever you want. Don’t worry if it is not an OA journal. Just make sure to archive your post-peer review pre-print to an OA repository. Ask the librarian of your institution if they can handle the submission process for you. Anyway, it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes. That’s it! Your work is freely accesible by your colleagues and the public and compliant to all institutional or agency mandates…
Doug Rocks-Macqueen
October 24, 2014
“I can do a Google Scholar search and find the exact same content at the author’s institutional repository?” – I would add that you need to make sure your repository is indexed by Google. Many are not. Moreover, what if you don’t have an institutional repository?
Vitor Taga
January 8, 2016
Beyond that, What if the author do not self-archive some of the versions of the article by himself, if the research was not granted or the university policies doesn’t mandate or require the author to self archive the article, more critically will be if the author is already tenure, and what about less fortune people who need to have immediately access to published research results but cannot afford the cost to do so or can’t wait until the end of the embargo period and just can’t hope that the author will self-archive his article published maybe 48 months ago.
And I do not agree with Pandelis argument which states that young researchers should just worry or concern about publishing, I believe they need to be aware at least about the consequences about where they going to publish, we have a moral and ethical obligation to show and explain to them, also about the mechanics of this publish and perish system and how it took place at first, and not just omit that and just go publishing, this is a strong wrong message that a lot of teachers and authors are promoting without carrying about the consequences that this type of action or mindset generates, especially in young researchers.