Open Access in Science: Fair Trade for researchers - Knowledge - Tagesspiegel

" ... Mathematicians have now taken the matter into their own hands. At the elite Cambridge University recently announced 39 renowned scientists that they have established two new magazines: the Forum of Mathematics, Pi, and the Forum of Mathematics, Sigma. Pi and Sigma publish one hand only items that high-profile researchers have examined previously. On the other hand, and this is special, this open-access journals are free. Scientists, students, libraries - all have access to the article. In the first three years, the authors do not even participate in the cost, which takes on the Cambridge University Press ... Later, scientists must publish their papers in Pi and Sigma, money must bring. The award is intended but only correspond to real production costs.  As the golden road ('Gold OA') of this new publication model is referred to, of which not more readers, but the authors bear the cost. 9000 Open Access journals are now available worldwide, always adding new ones. Many of them work independently publisher. Their message to the scientific publishers is clear: What you can, we can too! Even cheaper, better and fairer.  For decades could for journal subscriptions yield-oriented major publishers such as Springer, Elsevier and Wiley-Blackwell require a lot of money , even though the scientists themselves were no fees. The want to do differently the founders. Therefore, individual researchers, research organizations, and professional associations close together, establish - as the European geoscientists - a whole bunch of open-access journals or establish new titles such as PeerJ or eLife . The goal is the same: research be made ​​freely available ... Many scientific tradition publishers have jumped on the gold train: because demand is high and thus can earn quite money. The authors then pay on publication of a book or an article a certain amount to the publisher so that the text is freely available on the Internet later. The prices vary greatly, from just 100 to several thousand dollars per text. In the scientific community, this form of open access is therefore not without controversy.Because a portion of the research funds should be diverted for the publication.  Apart from the new business model has already attracted a number of cheaters.  'Almost every day I get emails from journals, of which I've never heard of,' says the Berlin professor of mathematics and director of the Konrad-Zuse-Zentrum Martin Grötschel ..."