COAR’s response to the American Chemical Society’s new fee for repository deposit – COAR

"COAR strongly objects to this charge for the following reasons:

• Authors own their manuscripts and should retain their rights. Authors typically hold the copyright to their research, but too often transfer those rights to publishers when publishing their manuscript. When authors retain the copyright to their manuscript, they have the right to disseminate and use their own manuscript as they choose. If authors’ rights are retained, publishers do not own an article accepted manuscript (AAM) and researchers should not be duped into paying a fee to exercise a right they already have.
• This fee is in direct contravention with the ethos of open science and scholarship and equity. Science is about sharing and advancing knowledge and open access policies are being designed very carefully to ensure that all researchers are able to do so, even if they do not have funding to pay to publish their articles.
• ACS is charging $2,500 while providing no added value. There is not a fee for an extra service offered. It requires no extra work on the side of the publisher, but rather is an attempt to develop a new revenue stream, while at the same time they will be receiving funds from subscriptions and pay-to-access for this same article. ACS is creating a false impression about compliance with funder policies. There is no charge for complying with funder OA policies. Nor is there any charge for depositing manuscripts in OA repositories. A fee is only required if you want to publish in an ACS journal and sign over your rights...."