Open Access (OA) refers to publications that are free to all with an internet connection. This includes the rights to view, read, download and build upon the work being read. OA is the free, immediate, online availability of research articles coupled with the rights to use these articles fully in the digital environment.
Good open access practices offer the following:
Article Processing Charges (APCs): APCs are paid by authors (often through grant funding). They are used by open access journals in lieu of subscription fees to support the cost of publishing and may generate revenue for the publisher.
Creative Commons Licenses: When you choose to publish your article open access, you will retain your copyright, and you will choose a creative commons license to have on top of your copyright. A creative commons license tells those who download your article how they are able to use it. You can visit the creative commons site to learn about each license option.
Diamond Open Access: Journals receive financial support from institutions or other sponsors and do not charge a fee to readers or authors. Also referred to as Platinum Open Access.
Embargo: A period of time set by the publisher in which an academic article cannot be deposited into an institutional or other open access repository.
Green Open Access: An author publishes their article in a pay-to-access journal, and then is able to self-archive a version of their work in an open access repository or author website.
Gold Open Access: An author publishes their article in an open access journal, where anyone can access all the articles in the journal for free.
Hybrid Open Access: A journal or publisher that is primarily pay-to-access, but offers authors the option to pay to publish their individual articles as open access.
Predatory Publishers: Predatory publishing is an exploitative academic publishing business model that involves charging publication fees to authors without providing the editorial and publishing services associated with legitimate journals.
Publisher Policy: Publishing companies often have policies related to where and when authors can share versions of their articles.
Paywall: A paywall is a virtual "wall" behind which journal articles exist that someone must pay a fee to access. For researchers affiliated with an academic or research institution, this fee is often paid for by the institution in a subscription-based model.
Pre-Print: A draft of an academic article as submitted for peer review.
Post-Print: The final draft of an academic article after peer review but before copy-editing.
Publisher Version/PDF: The version of an academic article that is formatted for publication in a journal and/or online.
Repository: Institutional, governmental, disciplinary or other archive that hosts scholarly research.
S2O (Subscribe to Open): A publishing model that makes content Open Access if enough institutions continue subscribing to the content.
Transformative Agreement: A license agreement that undertakes to transform the access model from subscription to open access, paying the article/author processing charge or APC. Transformative agreements are contracts negotiated between institutions (libraries, national and regional consortia) and publishers that transform the business model underlying scholarly journal publishing, moving from one based on toll access (subscription) to one in which publishers are remunerated a fair price for their open access publishing services.
Working paper: Working papers are similar to pre-prints, in that they are a draft version of a publication and have not undergone formal peer review. When posted online, they may provide an opportunity for the author to receive feedback.