An anonymous note in Online Publishing News for October 22, 2003, announces the launch of PLoS Biology. Excerpt: "The online journal is free of charge and represents a potential threat to the comfortable world of academic publishing....The journal was launched at least partly as a response to the steeply rising subscription costs of the most prestigious - and generally highly profitable - research journals. With subscription rates as high as $11,000 and little or no editorial costs - most papers are contributed free by their authors as part of the traditional peer-assessment system which has dominated academic publishing for so long - it's not surprising that there's plenty of money to made in academic publishing."
Posted by
Peter Suber at 10/27/2003 01:29:00 PM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
