The current state of OA
As declared in the Budapest Open Access Initiative in 2002, the Open Access movement is a combination of scholarly tradition and technology to improve the global dissemination of unrestricted research. Today, the movement has gained credibility across national borders and disciplines. Journals and institutions have joined forces with transformative agreements, shifting scholarly publishing business models away from subscription-based reading to Open Access publishing. These agreements ensure that users do not pay to read, instead giving authors or their institution the opportunity to pay-to-publish.
Agreements like these have given OA institutional legitimacy, similar to the ways in which government mandates have fortified OA publishing from a national and international perspective. Last year, the United States issued an OSTP memo, declaring that all federally funded research must be made publicly available by 2025. This order eliminates the 12-month embargo period typically placed on academic research and accelerates the shift from subscription-based revenue. While the OSTP Policy sparked many questions, debates, and discussions, it was not the first of its kind. In 2018, a consortium of 12 European national research agencies formed a similar agreement that required all scholars who benefit from state-funded institutions to publish their work in open journals and repositories that are freely available by 2021. These mandates remove paywalls and hurdles that prevent widespread access to research, helping authors get their work seen by an expansive audience and making it easier for libraries and institutions to provide access for students.
Yet, there are still challenges that the movement must overcome.
How the open sharing of early-stage research can boost the article economy
Powered by the credibility of transformative agreements and public mandates, the Open Access movement continues to grow. But what happens when the innovation of the Open Access movement meets the untapped potential of early-stage research?
Future-proofing your scholarly community
Open research repositories, knowledge databases, and digital libraries are not only opportunities for authors to gain valuable recognition and build their professional reputation.
Whether organizations choose to make their community’s early-stage research openly accessible or privately available, Morressier’s Research Libraries give societies the opportunity to extend the lifespan of their conference content and oversee their community’s research engagement levels. With a 360 degree view of user data, organizations are given the tools to keep track of which topics are trending and which early-stage insights will become scientific breakthroughs. These robust data and analytics features can help societies turn trending posters, presentations, or videos into future conferences themes or Open Access journal article topics, driving the article economy and fueling the scholarly ecosystem.
Finding your discipline’s future leaders
Thanks to emerging technologies, finding your community’s most talented members doesn’t have to be a guessing game. Through user profiles, researchers can keep a record of their achievements, even those that go typically unrecognized such as pre-published research and serving as a peer reviewer. These profiles make it easier to spot the individuals who are pushing your community (and science as a whole) forward.
When their early-stage ideas are shared openly, these individuals are more likely to be granted funding, providing them with the potential to become interdisciplinary collaborators, future peer reviewers, or journal article authors, helping societies increase their publishing output and further drive the article economy.
Finding the perfect partner for an OA-driven future
Moving beyond the academic community, it can be interesting to see the ripple effect your organization’s ideas can create within the corporate space. Offering corporations access to pre-published research can help contribute to a wider understanding of your discipline, lead to valuable professional opportunities for your members, and strategic partnerships that can lead to financial security for your organization.
These partnerships provide the profit and sustainable revenue that can support your society’s investment in OA strategies and lead to stronger capabilities or increased research outputs.
Conclusion
At Morressier, we’re committed to breaking down the silos in science. By making early-stage research widely accessible, societies and organizations can build the financial capital and reputation to drive the scholarly community forward.
