Open access publishing: important changes for the BJGP
peter.suber's bookmarks 2013-12-06
Summary:
"To enable us to examine some of the implications of open access for the BJGP [British Journal of General Practice] we have analysed the funding sources of 216 articles published in the Journal over the past 2 years. Approximately 49% appear to be funded by organisations that could be expected to financially support open access publication, with far more UK articles meeting this criterion than articles from outside the UK. We contacted the authors of a number of articles from European countries and it appears that the move towards open access publication is much slower outside the UK, with little evidence at present of the development of national policy on open access, although a few researchers commented that they thought that some funders (both institutional and pharmaceutical) may not be surprised to be asked to fund APCs. The House of Lords report has wisely emphasised the need to keep a watching brief on these developments in case a ‘mid-course correction’ is required.
The move towards open access at the BJGP has been extensively discussed over the past few months. We wished to avoid creating any disincentives to the submission of high quality original research to the Journal, while moving forward in both the spirit and the letter of open access and, of course, adopting a viable business model. From 1 April we will offer open access publication of articles submitted to the BJGP that arise from research grants in which the resources for paying APCs have been included. We will also offer authors wishing to make their work immediately available through open access the option of paying the same APC (currently set by the BJGP at £1700 per article) payable on acceptance. The editorial team at BJGP will be pleased to discuss individual cases and to answer queries arising from this change in policy."