Types of Open Access
Open Access is a very broad term and it encompasses a lot of different ways of publishing. Here are the most common versions of OA and what you need to know about them.
Jump straight to:
- Green Open Access
- Gold Open Access
- Diamond/Platinum Open Access
- Subscribe to Open
- Transformative Deals
Green Open Access
Publishing Green OA means that you can deposit the 'accepted’ version of your work in your institutional repository as soon as the version of record is published. You may also deposit the accepted manuscript version in a non-commercial disciplinary repository following a stated embargo period (this will change from publisher to publisher, but for EUP, it’s one year for journals and three years for books).
The ‘accepted’ version of your article, chapter or book is the final version that you sent to the publisher or journal editor before the copyediting, typesetting and proofreading stages. This version will have been fully peer reviewed, but may have some slight differences in wording, formatting etc. from the version of record. Publishers often abbreviate this to either AM (accepted manuscript) or AAM (author's accepted manuscript) - both mean the same thing.
When depositing your work in an institutional or subject repository, you should always provide an acknowledgment of the version of record (i.e. the version of the work that was officially published) and a link to it. This shows people that your piece has been fully peer reviewed and lets them know that they can have confidence in it. It also allows them to cite the version of record and makes sure that you receive all of the citations that your work accrues.
When publishing Green OA, most publishers will not allow you to post the ‘accepted’ version of your work in commercial repositories or on commercial websites (such as academia.edu or ResearchGate). You are generally allowed to post the ‘original’ version of your manuscript on these sites after an embargo period if you wish to. The ‘original’ version is the first version of the work that you submitted to the publisher or the journal, before any assessment or peer review took place. This version is usually abbreviated to either AO (author's original) or AOM (author's original manuscript) by publishers - again, these mean the same thing.
- Find out more about EUP's Green OA journal publishing policies
- Find out more about EUP's Green OA book publishing policies
Gold Open Access
When people say ‘Open Access’ they’re generally talking about Gold OA. If you’re publishing via the Gold OA route, you’ll need to pay an Article Processing Charge (APC), Chapter Processing Charge (CPC) or a Book Processing Charge (BPC). This charge covers the overhead costs for publishing your work and (in most cases) allows the publisher to make a profit in order to continue publishing books and/or journals.
When your article, chapter or book is published via Gold OA the version of record (the copyedited and typeset version) becomes OA immediately upon publication. This means that anyone can read or download it via the publisher’s website and they are able to reuse or adapt the content straight away. There may be some restrictions on who can reuse the content or how they can reuse it, depending on the policies of the publisher.
If your work has been published via Gold OA, you can post it in any repositories or on any websites that you like as soon as it is published. You should not do this before the version of record is published though and, as noted in the Green OA section above, it’s always best to acknowledge and link back to that version.
Most publishers, including EUP, will allow you to convert your work to Gold OA after publication if you would like to. The APC, CPC or BPC is usually discounted if you opt to do this a certain amount of time after the initial publication.
- Find out more about EUP's Gold OA journal publishing policies
- Find out more about EUP's Gold OA book publishing policies
Diamond/Platinum Open Access
Diamond or Platinum OA is very similar to Gold OA. The main difference is that there is no APC, CPC or BPC for you to pay as the author. Journals or book series that are published via Diamond or Platinum OA generally have some external funding – often from a university or society – to cover the publication costs.
The same rules apply to work published via the Diamond or Platinum OA route as apply to work published via the Gold OA route. Depending on the journal or book series that you’re publishing in, you may or may not be able to select the type of license that your work is published under.
EUP currently publish two Diamond or Platinum OA book series: Edinburgh Studies in Urban Political Economy and Visionaries: The Work of Women Filmmakers. We also have one Diamond OA journal: Film-Philosophy.
Subscribe to Open
In this model, institutions subscribe to the journal as normal. But once a certain income threshold is met (i.e. once enough institutions subscribe to the journal), all content published in that year becomes OA. As with Diamond or Platinum OA, there are no APCs for authors to pay and the articles follow the same rules as those published via Gold OA.
There are some risks to publishing with a Subscribe to Open journal though. Essentially, at the time of submission, you may not know whether your article (if accepted) will be published OA or end up behind a paywall. The decision of whether your work will be free to read, download, reuse and adapt comes down to how many institutions choose to subscribe to the journal and this can change on a year-to-year basis. So, for example, Volumes 1-4 of a Subscribe to Open journal may be OA, but if the threshold is not met for Volume 5, all articles in that volume will be published via a subscription model and will be inaccessible to anyone who does not have a subscription. In this scenario, all content from Volumes 1-4 would remain OA.
Transformative Deals
Only a select number of institutions and publishers offer transformative deals. It’s worth checking whether your institution has any of these types of arrangements with any publishers before submitting your manuscript. With these deals, sometimes called ‘read and publish deals’, institutions pay to gain access to a publisher’s content and allow their researchers to publish OA with that publisher. There may be certain caps or restrictions included in these deals and they will vary from publisher to publisher and institution to institution.
In general, these deals are only available to the largest institutions (or consortia of institutions) and the largest publishers. To be beneficial to both sides, there needs to be enough people submitting content to the publisher from that institution (or consortium) and enough interest in the publisher’s content from within the institution.
At the moment, EUP does not have any transformative deals for books or journals.
