How can I support the OA movement? [1]



  • Deposit all your publications in your institutional repository. At the University of Luxembourg, the repository is ORBilu.
  • Help launch an open-access journal in your field. Open-source journal management software can automate clerical tasks and keep costs down.
  • Serve on the editorial board or referee papers for an open-access journal.
  • When sitting on grant-review panels or hiring, tenure, or promotion committees, give due weight to peer-reviewed publications regardless of their price or medium. And don’t rely only on prestige or impact factor — this discriminates against new journals that may be of high quality.
  • Help your professional associations understand open access. Serve on their committees and governing boards, and write opinion pieces for their newsletters. Nudge them into adopting open access for their own journals and endorsing open access for other journals in the field.
  • If you are a journal editor, encourage your publisher to adopt an open-access business model. If the publisher is unwilling and pursues policies that restrict access, consider following the example of journals in disciplines such as biology and mathematics by “declaring independence”. Along with the rest of your editorial board, resign from the journal and launch a new, open-access journal to serve the same niche.
  • Help your library make intelligent decisions about subscriptions and cancellations by having a discussion about the real value of scholarly journals. Librarians often feel pressured to take actions that perpetuate the pricing crisis by subscribing to journals whose price may not be a true reflection of their size, quality, impact, or usage.
  • Educate colleagues and the next generation of scientists and scholars. You can prevent damaging myths or alarmist claims about open access from circulating without challenge. Open access is compatible with peer review, copyright, and career advancement.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


[1] Text © SPARC 2004. http://www.arl.org/sparc/bm~doc/OpenAccess.pdf