5. Open Access and Open Data

Screen-shot of the Media Lab Helsinki webpage

1. What is open access to scientific information?

(Source :European Commission background note on open access to publications and data in Horizon 2020 )

Open access can be defined as the practice of providing on-line access to scientific information that is free of charge to the reader. In the context of R&D, open access typically focuses on access to 'scientific information', which refers to two main categories:

• Peer-reviewed scientific research articles (published in academic journals);

• Scientific research data (data underlying publications and/or raw data).

• Open access publications go through the same peer review process as non-open access publications;

• As an open access requirement comes after a decision to publish, it is not an obligation to publish:

• As the decision on whether to commercially exploit results (e.g. through patents or otherwise) is made before the decision to publish (open access or not), open access does not interfere with the commercial exploitation of research results.

2. Benefits of open access for researchers

Research e.g. by Swan (2010)  shows,  that when researchers use open access, the increase in citations is significant in some disciplines, between 300% and 450% in medicine, between 170% and 580% in physics/astronomy and between 200% and 600%
in agricultural sciences. (Swan, Alma (2010) The Open Access citation advantage: studies and results to date.http://eprints.ecs.soton.ac.uk/18516/ )

3. What are 'Green' and 'Gold' open access?

They are two main and non-mutually exclusive routes towards open access:

• 'Green' open access (also called self-archiving) means that the published article orthe final peer-reviewed manuscript is archived by the researcher in an onlinerepository before, after or alongside its publication. Access to this article is often

delayed (‘embargo period’). Publishers recoup their investment by selling subscriptions and charging pay-per-download/view fees during this period during an exclusivity period. This model is promoted alongside the 'Gold' route by the open

access community of researchers and librarians, and is often preferred.

• 'Gold' open access means that a publication is immediately provided in open access mode by thescientific publisher. Associate costs are shifted from readers to the university to which the researcher is affiliated.

Gold open access fee is often called  article-processing fee (APF)  and  can sum up to a few thousand euro /article. Nevertheless, a large number of journals, including those with high prestige and/or high impact factors have also developed self-archiving policies ('Green' open access) that are compatible with the policies of research funding bodies such as the European Commission for Horizon 2020.

4.  Open access when applying for funding

An example of how to take the Open Access into account when applying for funding, an example  from Horizon2020  :

"All peer-reviewed scientific publications relating to results are published so that open access (free of charge, online access for any user) is ensured. Publications will either immediately be made accessible online by the publisher,  or publications are available through an open access repository no later than six months (12 months for articles in the fields of social sciences and humanities) after publication.  A machine-readable electronic copy of the published version or final peer-reviewed manuscript accepted for publication will be available in a repository for scientific publications. Electronic copies of publications will have bibliographic metadata in a standard format and will include "European Union (EU)" and "Horizon 2020", the name of the action, acronym and grant number; publication date, and length of embargo period if applicable, and a persistent identifier.

 University researchers aim to deposit at the same time the research data needed to validate the results presented in the above mentioned deposited peer-reviewed scientific publications."

Gold open access fees are eligible costs for most funding bodies and are eligible costs in Horizon2020. They should be taken into account when planning the budget of the research project.

5. Open access in research project agreements

 Each beneficiary must ensure open access (free of charge, online access for any user) to all peer-reviewed scientific publications relating to its results.In particular, it must:(a) as soon as possible and at the latest on publication, deposit a machine-readableelectronic copy of the published version or final peer-reviewed manuscript accepted for publication in a repository for scientific publications;

Moreover, the beneficiary must aim to deposit at the same time the research data needed to validate the results presented in the deposited scientific publications.(b) ensure open access to the deposited publication — via the repository — at the latest:(i) on publication, if an electronic version is available for free via the publisher, or(ii) within six months of publication (twelve months for publications in the social sciences and humanities) in any other case.

(c) ensure open access — via the repository — to the bibliographic metadata that identify the deposited publication.The bibliographic metadata must be in a standard format and must include all of the following: the terms ["European Union (EU)" and "Horizon 2020"] , the name of the action, acronym and grant number; the publication date, and length of embargo period if applicable, and a persistent identifier.

4. Open access when signing publishing agreements

Researchers traditionally sign publishing agreements in the capacity of copyright owners. When agreeing to publishers terms for scientific publications,   researchers should make sure that the terms allow either immediate gold open access or green open access within the time limit promised to funding bodies. There is no separate fund for gold open access fees in the university, these costs have to be included in project costs or come from funds from for example  the department.

As far as parallel saving is concerned, it should be borne in mind that an agreement signed with the original publisher usually transfers a wide range of the copyright to the publisher.  If the right to decide on the publication, production, or dissemination of a work has already been transferred to a publisher, the researcher must obtain the publisher's permission in order to also parallel-save the publication to the university-maintained open publication archive.

5. Open access in Finnish Universities

Universities  have taken the position for open access publication. Universities Finland (Unifi), formerly known as the Finnish Council of University Vice-Chancellors, signed the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Scientific Information on 23rd May, 2006 [4]. The signatories to the declaration emphasized the importance of open access and sought to promote open access to information by encouraging the online publication of national cultural material using a variety of open access methods.  Universities and colleges have open  electronic repositories. The University of Helsinki requires researchers at the University to deposit copies of their research articles published in academic journals in HELDA, the open digital repository maintained by the University of Helsinki.According to the Rector’s decision concerning self-archiving (126 / 2008), using  TUHAT research information system, which makes it easy to openly archive publications using the same system that researchers and departments use to maintain their register of publications and information about other research activities Aalto University has adopted open access principles of Aalto University  . The policy guidelines concern all scientific publications of Aalto and  principles of the policy are:The results of the research conducted at Aalto University are published in channels that maximise the scientific impact.

• Aalto University requests its researchers to publish their scientific articles and research results with open access.
• Aalto University provides a university-maintained Aaltodoc publication archive as a platform for open access publication and requires its researchers to deposit their scientific publications there.

The University of Jyväskylä has free access to scholarly information is one of the university's strategic goals. To support this, by promoting open access publishing, the University recommends researchers to publish openly when ever it is possible.http://openaccess.jyu.fi/en/oaju. Rearchers should send the files of their research articles  to the library at the same time when recording the relating data. A file here means a final draft version of the article.The library should  take the responsibility for checking or acquiring of rights from the original publisher, as well as for managing the publishing process as a whole.(Please see What permissions are required)

6. Cite the  definitive published version

Cite the work/article using an appropriate bibliographic citation,eg authors,book/journal,article, title/chapter, title,volume,issue,page numbers, DOI and the link to the definitive published version. Cite the the original, definitive published version and link to that version.

7. Open Access and Open data seminar 8.4.2016 material

20160408 Aalto Design Factory Open data oa publishing presentations.zip

Notes and References

[1] Creative Common

[4] Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Scientific Information

• European Commission: http://ec.europa.eu/research/science-society/open_access
• OpenAIRE: http://www.openaire.eu/en.
 

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