Transformative Agreements Are a Blind Alley | Katina Magazine

"A recent comprehensive review of transitional agreements in the United Kingdom revealed that for the biggest scientific publishers, “flipping” subscription-based journals to an open access (OA) model would take at least 70 years (Brayman et al., 2024). Despite such findings, ever bigger chunks of library budgets continue to be locked into these deals (also called “transformative” or “read-and-publish” agreements). Even worse, libraries—along with researchers, research funders, administrators, and policy-makers—have become complicit in propagating an OA approach that is highly inequitable and counterproductive to bibliodiversity and which does not deliver on the promised full-fledged OA transition. Recent research focusing on the Dutch approach through the lens of infrastructure studies suggests some reasons why...."