“The Good, the Bad and the Ugly” Open Access in the UK

Open Access Tage 2014, 9th September 2014 Dr Torsten Reimer (@torstenreimer) Open Access Project Manager, Imperial College London

Outline

1.  Introduction 2.  UK Journey to Open Access 3.  OA at Imperial College London 4.  Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs 5.  Conclusion

The Imperial College OA REF Challenge: ~£100m – ~100% OA

Imperial College London – key facts

•  Seven London campuses •  Four Faculties: Engineering,

Medicine, Natural Sciences and Business School

•  Ranked 3rd in Europe / 10th in world (THE World University Ranking)

•  Net income (2013): £822m, incl. £330m research grants and contracts •  ~14,000 students, ~6,600 staff, incl. ~3,500 academic & research staff •  Staff publish ~10,000 scholarly articles per year

http://www.imperial.ac.uk/

OA at Imperial, early 2012

•  Wellcome Trust funds to pay for article processing charges (APC) administered since 2005.

•  Newly established OA fund (£150,000) for staff who don’t have access to other funds.

•  The College repository Spiral, established in 2008, holds theses and papers published by Imperial staff.

•  A new Open Access mandate requires copies of all peer-reviewed publications to be deposited in Spiral.

Outline

1.  Introduction 2.  UK Journey to Open Access 3.  OA at Imperial College London 4.  Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs 5.  Conclusion

Wellcome Trust OA Policy

WT early adopter, drives OA policy development.

Policy requires peer-reviewed papers to be available through Europe PMC.

Funds for CC BY publications available through the institution.

Current sector compliance 66%, WT introducing sanctions.

Imperial, fund management described as “exemplary”, no sanctions.

To include other charities for Charity OA fund.

2012 – Finch Report and Shift to Gold OA

•  Driver: boost UK’s digital economy and create more value.

•  In June 2012 the UK government accepts report of the “Working Group on Expanding Access to Published Research Findings” (aka Finch Group).

•  Recommends to make publicly funded research outputs available as OA, with a preference for Gold.

•  Controversial, some criticise publisher influence.

www.researchinfonet.org/publish/finch/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/policyexchange/8410110541/ CC BY

RCUK Policy on Open Access

•  Policy replaces earlier approach (2005) to pay for OA from project budgets.

•  Effective from April 2013. •  All RCUK-funded papers to

be OA within 5 years. •  75% gold, 25% green OA •  Gold: CC BY; green 6-12(24)

month embargo periods. •  RCUK allocates annual OA

budget to universities. •  Responsibility to support and

enforce lies with university.

http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/research/openaccess/policy/

Post-2014 REF Policy as Game Changer for Open Access

“The core of this policy is as follows: to be eligible for submission to the post-2014 REF, outputs must have been deposited in an institutional or subject repository on acceptance for publication, and made open-access within a specified time period. This requirement applies to journal articles and conference proceedings only […]. Only articles and proceedings accepted for publication after 1 April 2016 will need to fulfil these requirements, but we would strongly urge institutions to implement the policy now.”

http://www.hefce.ac.uk/pubs/year/2014/cl072014/#d.en.86764 ⇒  Challenge: move (as close as possible) to 100% OA (closed deposits

allowed as exceptions) through green route, on acceptance. ⇒  No extra funding available, yet significant increase in OA support costs. ⇒  However, gives universities the chance to get control of their outputs

again and to significantly boost OA.

Outline

1.  Introduction 2.  UK Journey to Open Access 3.  OA at Imperial College London 4.  Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs 5.  Conclusion

The Imperial Open Access Project*

Open Access Project (OAP) group

OA Executive, via Project Manager

OA Implementation Group

Library

Team Leader: Education and

Research Support

OA Fund Manager

OA Support Assistant

Education and Research Support

Assistant

Team Leader: Systems and

Innovation Support Services

Not formally in the project

Liaison Librarians Acquisitions and Metadata

Senior Library Assistant Metadata

Senior Library Assistant Metadata

Finance & Facilities Manager

ICT

Programme Manager

Analysts and Developers

Research and Academic Support

Team Leader

Research Office

(Project Manager)

Research Systems and Information

Manager

Research Operations and Assurance

Manager

College Headquarters

Research Officer

Strategic Research Manager

OAP members: •  Chair: Dean of Faculty of Natural Sciences •  College Secretary •  Director of the Graduate School •  Director of Library Services •  Director of the Research Office •  Representatives of the faculties •  Senior Planning Officer •  Project Manager

* only three staff in the project work 100% on OA.

Project Priorities

1.  Phase (2013-14) •  Improve OA systems support •  Make processes more efficient and scalable •  Increase support capacity •  Improve user-facing online presence

2.  Phase (2014-15) •  Focus on communication and outreach •  Prepare for REF OA support •  Continue to deliver efficiencies

3.  Phase (2015-16) •  Implement REF OA support •  Continue work on communications and efficiencies

4.  Phase (2016-) •  OA becomes business as usual

Imperial Open Access Options

•  College Preference for Green •  Green OA through Symplectic

Elements and Spiral (repository) •  Options for Gold OA (2014-15):

•  RCUK fund: £1,35m •  Wellcome Trust (soon:

Charity Open Access) fund: scales up as required

•  Imperial fund: £650,000 •  Project funding available •  Journal does not charge

an APC •  Uptake of Gold much higher

than Green

Author action RCUK* compliant

Wellcome** compliant

HEFCE post-2014 REF compliant

NIHR compliant

(APC paid for) Immediate OA in a journal

ý ý ý ý

(APC paid for) Immediate OA in a journal with CC BY licence

þ

ý ý ý

(APC paid for) Immediate OA in a journal with CC BY licence and publisher deposit to EuropePMC

þ

þ

ý þ***

Deposit, following publication, of accepted/final version with compliant embargo

þ ý ý þ

Deposit, following publication, of accepted/final version with compliant embargo and deposit to EuropePMC

þ

þ

ý þ

Deposit on acceptance with closed access/on request with compliant embargo

ý ý þ ý

Deposit on acceptance with immediate access

þ ý þ þ

Deposit on acceptance with immediate access and deposit to EuropePMC

þ þ þ þ

Compliance tables by Ruth Harrison (r.e.harrison@imperial.ac.uk)

Issues Around OA Fund Management

Publishers/journals •  Pricing and OA conditions often difficult to identify for authors •  Journal OA policies still changing •  Journals offer non-compliant licences •  Invoicing per individual article •  Invoices lack relevant information (such as article title, licence) •  Invoices not always sent to correct address •  Articles only published after payment received •  Publishers sometimes claim copyright for CC BY articles or keep them

behind paywalls •  Pages and colour charges add complexity (and increase costs) Funders •  Lack of harmonisation of funder policies •  Could sometimes be clearer on compliance procedures Universities •  Standard invoice payment time is 30 days

Publisher Agreements/OA Deals

The College Library has concerns about OA prepayment/discount deals with “legacy” publishers: •  Makes APC market less transparent •  Double dipping not addressed •  Discounts too low •  Funds locked away with publishers •  Some deals offer non-compliant licences •  Deals might add to market concentration •  “Buying compliance” (retrospective OA offerings) not good use of public

money

The College Library is exploring agreements with OA publishers that offer real benefits such as reduction of admin overheads or discounts that are seen as value for money.

Process Improvements

Fund Management 09/2013 Fund Management 09/2014 3 application forms, supported by 4 spreadsheets

1 application form supported by online database and fund management tool

No way for authors to save drafts or revisit past applications

Authors can save drafts and revisit past application

All information added manually by authors Author data entry significantly reduced, data feeds from staff directory, grants system etc.

Information exchanged via email and phone Tasks delegated through system

Invoices go to authors Invoices go to the library

On average 8 interactions between author and library

(too early to say)

30 days invoice payment time Invoices paid within 5-10 working days

Manual reporting through combining spreadsheets

Reporting from single data source

ASK Open Access

Current process Ideal REF process?

Work on REF “on acceptance” Workflow

Article published

CRIS detects publication, collects metadata

Author claims output, ideally adds manuscript

(Manuscript deposited)

Article accepted

Authors uploads manuscript with metadata

Metadata made public

Manuscript deposited (closed with embargo)

Article published

CRIS detects publication, ideally updates metadata

Author may have to claim output

Article accepted

Publishers share manuscript and metadata

Metadata made public, Manuscript deposited

Article published

CRIS detects publication and claims automatically

REF process

New Approach to Licensing

https://www.flickr.com/photos/rooreynolds/243810133 CC BY NC

Explore new licencing approaches:

•  Give academics control over their outputs

•  Reduce admin overheard (embargos, checking publisher policies)

Options for licensing service include: •  SPARC/Edinburgh

Addendum •  Harvard-style policy

approach

Cost of OA - Resourcing

Preliminary (!) data from College OA project: •  Gold OA requires ~3x management effort compared to Green OA per

article •  and about twice the time from academics, in particular hybrid journals Hypothetical scenarios, assuming 0.5h per deposit and 1.5h per gold application, for 10K articles per year and an average APC of £1,750: •  100% REF compliant: 3-4 FTE •  100% REF + 40% Gold (assuming efficiencies): 6 FTE + £7m APC •  100% Gold: 10 FTE + £17.5m APC Scenarios do not factor in cost of academic time and the effort is lower than current fund/repository management time.

Outline

1.  Introduction 2.  UK Journey to Open Access 3.  OA at Imperial College London 4.  Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs 5.  Conclusion

Tim Gowers’s FOI Request

Dear [Head of university library], I would like to make a request under the Freedom of Information Act. I am interested to know what [name of university] currently spends annually for access to Elsevier journals. I understand that this is typically split into three parts, a subscription price for core content, which is based on historic spend, a content fee for accessing those journals via ScienceDirect, and a further fee for accessing unsubscribed titles from the Freedom Collection, also via ScienceDirect. I would like to know the total fee, and how it is split up into those three components. Many thanks in advance for any help you can give me on this. Yours sincerely, Timothy Gowers http://gowers.wordpress.com/2014/04/24/elsevier-journals-some-facts/

University   Cost   Enrolment   Academic Staff  Birmingham   £764,553   31,070   2355 + 440  Bristol   £808,840   19,220   2090 + 525  Cambridge   £1,161,571   19,945   4205 + 710  Cardiff   £720,533   30,000   2130 + 825  Durham   £461,020   16,570   1250 + 305  Edinburgh   £845,000   31,323   2945 + 540  Exeter   £234,126   18,720   1270 + 290  Glasgow   £686,104   26,395   2000 + 650  

Imperial College London   £1,340,213   16,000   3295 + 535  

King’s College London   £655,054   26,460   2920 + 1190  

Leeds   £847,429   32,510   2470 + 655  Liverpool   £659,796   21,875   1835 + 530  London School of Economics   £146,117   9,805   755 + 825  

Manchester   £1,257,407   40,860   3810 + 745  Newcastle   £974,930   21,055   2010 + 495  Nottingham   £903,076   35,630   2805 + 585  Oxford   £990,775   25,595   5190 + 775  Queen Mary U of London   £454,422   14,860   1495 + 565  Queen’s U Belfast   £584,020   22,990   1375 + 170  Sheffield   £562,277   25,965   2300 + 460  Southampton   £766,616   24,135   2065 + 655  

University College London   £1,381,380   25,525   4315 + 1185  

Warwick   £631,851   27,440   1535 + 305  York   £400,445   17,405   1205 + 285  

Wellcome Trust release APC Data, 2012-13

•  WT released data on 2012-2013 APC spend: http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.963054

•  Data cleaned up and analysed by the community (http://bit.ly/1qQHet9); 2129 APC, 94 publishers.

•  Michelle Brook’s analysis highlights massive spend on hybrid journals:

“In Oct 2012 – Sept 2013, academics spent £3.88 million to publish articles in journals with immediate online access – of which £3.17 million (82 % of costs, 74 % of papers) was paying for publications that Universities would then be charged again for.” http://access.okfn.org/2014/03/24/scale-hybrid-journals-publishing/

http://blog.wellcome.ac.uk/2014/03/24/new-data-on-wellcome-trust-grant-spending/

WT Data highlights Cost and Quality of Service Issues

WT highlights the following issues: •  Content remaining hidden behind pay-walls; •  Content not available in PMC/Europe PMC; •  Missing, incorrect, or contradictory licence; •  CC-BY licensed articles still linked to sites

where readers may be charged.

“In summary we contacted 20 publishers in relation to 150 articles (approximately 7% of the total number of articles for which an APC had been paid).” “The bigger issue concerns the high cost of hybrid open access publishing, which we have found to be nearly twice that of born-digital fully open access journals.”

http://blog.wellcome.ac.uk/2014/03/28/the-cost-of-open-access-publishing-a-progress-report/

The Issue with Hybrid Journals

Academia pays twice: through subscription and APC (“double dipping”).

Practically no sign of hybrids “flipping” to Gold or “offsetting” (IoP and Sage excluded).

Developing an Effective Market for Open Access Article Processing Charges:

•  Average APCs vary from $1,418 (OA journal) to $2,097 (OA journal, subscription publisher) and $2,727 (hybrid journal)

•  Full OA journal market seen as functioning •  Hybrid market was found to be extremely

dysfunctional

http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/About-us/Policy/Spotlight-issues/Open-access/Guides/WTP054773.htm

Universities release APC Data

http://figshare.com/articles/Imperial_APC_data_2006_2014_/1086122 http://figshare.com/articles/University_of_Edinburgh_RCUK_Gold_Open_Access_APC_data_2013_14_/1146256 http://figshare.com/articles/University_of_Glasgow_APC_data_2013_14_/1117888 http://figshare.com/articles/Liverpool_APC_data/1083499 http://figshare.com/articles/University_of_Sheffield/1116258 http://figshare.com/articles/University_of_St_Andrews_APC_data_2013_2014/1150253 http://figshare.com/articles/Sussex_APC_data_2013_14_/1066953 http://figshare.com/articles/Warwick_APC_data/1063704 http://libraryblogs.is.ed.ac.uk/openscholarship/2014/05/01/university-of-edinburgh-open-access-update-april-2014/

RCUK Review of OA

FOI request from Research Fortnight to 84 HEIs •  27 responded with average compliance of 49%,

but 11 non-compliant •  84% gold route reported •  HEI who checked found 8% of OA articles not

been made OA by publisher

http://www.researchresearch.com/index.php?option=com_news&template=rr_2col&view=article&articleId=1344415

Example RCUK Response: Edinburgh

https://www.era.lib.ed.ac.uk/bitstream/1842/9386/1/University%20of%20Edinburgh%20RCUK%20Open%20Access%20Report%202013-14.pdf CC BY 2.5

Data from the Imperial College Response to RCUK

Category Numbers Papers estimated to relate to RCUK projects ~4,000 Sample of papers known to relate to RCUK-projects

1,326

Papers from sample published as Gold OA 709 Papers from sample deposited in Spiral 31 Total Spend from RCUK fund £299,492.12 Average APC paid from RCUK fund £1,837 Spend on hybrid journals £252,683.02 Average hybrid APC £1,974 Average APC for full OA journals £1,337

Outline

1.  Introduction 2.  UK Journey to Open Access 3.  OA at Imperial College London 4.  Towards Transparency in Publishing Costs 5.  Conclusion

The Good, the Bad, the Ugly

•  Broad understanding of cost of OA required

•  OA publication process needs to become more efficient and cheaper

•  Hybrid journals!! •  Sustainability of Gold OA:

£163m subscriptions vs £245m Gold OA for UK (~140K articles annually)

•  HEFCE policy massive challenge, but also a chance

https://www.flickr.com/photos/csullens/3532617842 CC BY SA 2.0