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Open Access: Resources

A guide about making your work open for everyone to read and reuse

Helpful Resources

  • BioMed Central "BioMed Central is an STM (Science, Technology and Medicine) publisher of 258 peer-reviewed open access journals...." (About Us)

  • OpenDOAR (The Directory of Open Access Repositories) "OpenDOAR is an authoritative directory of academic open access repositories. Each OpenDOAR repository has been visited by project staff to check the information that is recorded here. This in-depth approach does not rely on automated analysis and gives a quality-controlled list of repositories. As well as providing a simple repository list, OpenDOAR lets you search for repositories or search repository contents." (The Directory of Open Access Repositories - OpenDOAR)

  • Peter Suber's Wiki - "Peter Suber is the the Director of the Harvard Open Access Project , Faculty Fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society and Senior Researcher at the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition." (General)

  • PubMed Central "PubMed Central® (PMC) is a free archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature at the U.S. National Institutes of Health's National Library of Medicine (NIH/NLM). In keeping with NLM’s legislative mandate to collect and preserve the biomedical literature, PMC serves as a digital counterpart to NLM’s extensive print journal collection. Launched in February 2000, PMC was developed and is managed by NLM’s National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI)." (PMC Overview)

  • Registry of Open Access Repositories "The aim of ROAR is to promote the development of open access by providing timely information about the growth and status of repositories throughout the world. Open access to research maximises research access and thereby also research impact, making research more productive and effective." (Notice)

  • ROARMAP Registry of Open Access Repositories Mandatory Archiving Policies

Key Declarations & Statements

Budapest Open Access Initiative (December 01-02, 2001): "An old tradition and a new technology have converged to make possible an unprecedented public good. The old tradition is the willingness of scientists and scholars to publish the fruits of their research in scholarly journals without payment, for the sake of inquiry and knowledge. The new technology is the internet. The public good they make possible is the world-wide electronic distribution of the peer-reviewed journal literature and completely free and unrestricted access to it by all scientists, scholars, teachers, students, and other curious minds. Removing access barriers to this literature will accelerate research, enrich education, share the learning of the rich with the poor and the poor with the rich, make this literature as useful as it can be, and lay the foundation for uniting humanity in a common intellectual conversation and quest for knowledge..."

Bethesda Statement on Open Access Publishing (Released June 20, 2003): "Our organizations sponsor and nurture scientific research to promote the creation and dissemination of new ideas and knowledge for the public benefit. We recognize that publication of results is an essential part of scientific research and the costs of publication are part of the cost of doing research. We already expect that our faculty and grantees share their ideas and discoveries through publication. This mission is only half-completed if the work is not made as widely available and as useful to society as possible. The Internet has fundamentally changed the practical and economic realities of distributing published scientific knowledge and makes possible substantially increased access..."

Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities (October 22, 2003) : " Preface: The Internet has fundamentally changed the practical and economic realities of distributing scientific knowledge and cultural heritage. For the first time ever, the Internet now offers the chance to constitute a global and interactive representation of human knowledge, including cultural heritage and the guarantee of worldwide access."

Open Access Timelines

 

Declarations in support of OA - "This is a list of declarations, principles, and public statements in support of open access" (Suber, OAD, par. 1)

A brief timeline of Open Access -  Created by Symplectic in celebration of the 8th International Open Access Week. 

Groups & Organizations in Support of OA

Harvard Open Access Project "The Harvard Open Access Project (HOAP) fosters the growth of open access to research, within Harvard and beyond, using a combination of consultation, collaboration, community-building, and direct assistance." (Harvard Open Access Project)

 
PLoS (Public Library of Science) "Public Library of Science (PLOS) is a nonprofit publisher, membership, and advocacy organization with a mission to accelerate progress in science and medicine by leading a transformation in research communication." (About)
 
Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC) "SPARC is an international alliance of academic and research libraries working to create a more open system of scholarly" (About Us)