Why is it essential for you to know about Open Access?
18 July 2013
Why is Open Access important?
The more people who view your work, the higher the impact – both within the researchcommunity and on society as a whole.
Making work freely available increases its visibility, readership and impact. It can alsoincrease citations to your work and improve the speed at which your work is cited. HEFCE might require Open Access for any outputs submitted to the next REF in 2020.
What is Open Access?
Commercial publishers can offer two types of Open Access:
Open Access Publishing: (also called gold Open Access) describes paying an Article Processing Charge (APC) to the publisher in order to make the final, published pdf of your research paper available to anyone free of charge on publication (or, occasionally, retrospectively).
Open Access Self-Archiving: (also called green Open Access) describes depositing the full text of your research paper in an institutional repository (e.g. ORCA at Cardiff University). The publisher might not allow you to use the final, published pdf. An embargo period might also apply.
Some journals use a fully Open Access publishing model where no charges apply.
When is Open Access compulsory?
These funders require Open Access publication as a condition of their research grants, fellowships and PhD studentships:
all UK Research Councils Wellcome Trust Horizon 2020
If you are funded by one of these bodies, before submitting a paper for publication:
email your Subject Librarian or openaccess@cardiff.ac.uk to find out how you can be
compliant with your funder’s Open Access requirements; or
view the Funders & Authors Compliance Tool at http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/fact/
download our guidance notes from the Cardiff University Open Access pages at http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/insrv/forresearchers/openaccess/index.html