Your contributors will benefit from:
Creative Commons (CC) licences provide a simple standardised way for authors to share their work with others. Offering works under a CC licence does not mean authors give up copyright. The licences allow users to reuse, remix and share the content legally, as long as they follow certain conditions. They are widely used and provide an excellent choice for managing the licensing aspect of publishing an OA journal.
Authors publishing in your journal should sign an open access licence agreement. If no licence is applied Australian copyright law automatically applies. A CC licence makes it clear to users under what circumstances they can share and reuse the content without needing to visit the journal's sharing and reuse policy or contact the journal or author. Visit the Creative Commons website for more information and assistance in selecting the most appropriate licence for your and your authors' needs.
Subscription-based journals can still support open access by implementing an open access policy that is compatible with the requirements of major funding bodies in Australia and internationally.
The National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) and the Australian Research Council (ARC) require that any publication arising from NHMRC or ARC supported research must be made open access within twelve months of publication. There is more information about funders’ open access mandates here.
To facilitate a more open access friendly journal, you can:
There are many pathways for converting a journal to open access, each with their own strengths, weaknesses and considerations.
Harvard Library published a comprehensive literature review on options and best practices on converting subscription-based scholarly journals to open access, including analysis of different scenarios and case studies of journals that have made the transition:
More recently, Lars Wenaas authored a paper describing a case study of 11 Norwegian journals in the humanities and social sciences that transitioned from subscription to open access:
SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) also have a comprehensive guide on Transitioning Your Journal from Subscription to Open Access.
Operating an OA journal takes resources and will incur some cost.
How will researchers, librarians and the general public discover your journal and its content?
Journal indexes, directories, metadata harvesters and search engines
International Standard Serial number (ISSN)
Obtain an International Standard Serial Number (ISSN), a uniform worldwide means of uniquely identifying a serial publication. It is free and simple. Contact the Australian ISSN Agency.
Digital Object Identifiers (DOI)
The DOI system is designed to uniquely identify and facilitate the location of digital material. Consider joining CrossRef, the official Digital Object Identifier (DOI) registration agency for scholarly publications. It also supplies a number of useful cross referencing services that will help integrate your journal's material into other literature. Author's should cite the unique DOI given to their article when promoting their article online as the DOI will link to the full text and also enable systems such as PlumX and Altmetric to track mentions in social media, blogs and news items as well as citations, views, downloads and more.
Professional networking
Directories
Guides for OA Journal Publishers. This is a list of guidelines, primers, recommendations, and best practices for publishers of OA journals.
Library Publishing Directory. Produced annually by the Library Publishing Coalition. The LPC supports an evolving, distributed range of library publishing practices and furthers the interests of libraries involved in publishing activities on their campuses.
Open access journal publishing [Graphic] by Open Access Australasia. Detailed graphic outlining what OA journal publishing is and why it's important. Includes links to additional support resources.
Note: Whilst UWA Library considers these directories valuable resources, you may find some broken links on these sites.
Comprehensive guides
Developing Open Access Journals: A Practical Guide (Chandos Pub, 2008). This book by David J. Solomon provides a practical guide to developing and maintaining an electronic open access peer-reviewed scholarly journal.
Library Publishing Toolkit (pdf, 400p, IDS Project Press, 2013) This OA book, edited by Allison P. Brown, can also be downloaded free from iTunes or purchased in print from Amazon. Several chapters relate to publishing an open access journal eg. Open Access Journal Incubator at University of Lethbridge Library by Sandra Cowan.
Brief guides and blogs
Principles of transparency and best practice in scholarly publishing. Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ).
How to start an Open Access journal. (September 4, 2013). Brief post by fictocriticism author Karina Quinn (aka Quinn Eades)
Essential guide: How to start an Open Access journal in five steps. (ca 2013). Suzanne Pilaar Birch describes her experience of getting Open Quaternary started.
Starting an Open Access Journal: a step-by-step guide part 1 and part 2 (2012) Dr Martin Paul Eve, Lincoln University.
Open Access Publishing and Scholarly Societies: A Guide. 34 page document prepared by the Open Society Institute, July 2005.
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