One of our Faculty has just joined the editorial team of an academic journal and they are in discussion with the publishers about making an element of the journal free/open access. The publishers are a bit reticent of this thinking that this will curtail the desirability of the journal for those who pay for a license for the journal as a whole.
To this end the editorial team are canvassing the opinions of Librarians about the impact of making an element of the journal free access. The section they are negotiating to make open-access, is comprised of short articles/elements, some as small as 300 words, and comprising about a 5th of the journal content. Individual access/purchase to these articles is the same price as a peer reviewed 6000 word journal article (circa £24).
So they pose two questions. I have given my own feedback, but I I would be grateful if colleagues could respond as well, so I can give more feedback to the teaching staff member concerned.
1. In principal, if a journal (within a package of journals that you subscribed to) made a portion of the journal free-to-access, what effect would this have on your ongoing decision to remain subscribed to this package of journals?
2. The same question as regards a subscription to a single journal?
A supplementary question that came up in my discussion with the academic is, Would having these articles as open access increase traffic to the journal as a whole?
Many thanks for your help,
Frank Trew
College Librarian
Rose Bruford College of Theatre and Performance.
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