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Open access

Scholarly Communication

Scholarly communication at risk

The sharing of knowledge through scholarly communication has been increasingly at risk in recent years.  The escalating cost of journal subscriptions has resulted in academic and research libraries being able to acquire less and less of the published literature, while restrictive copyright policies and licensing terms for electronic products have further hindered the flow of information from academic author to reader.

With a view to improving access to academic content authors and funding agencies are combining with librarians to look at the way in which scholarly publishing takes place and at alternative publishing models.

Author's rights and copyright

If a publisher agrees to publish your journal article or book who owns the copyright?  The answer to this question will be important if you want to make a copy of your work available on your website, send an electronic copy to colleagues or make copies for teaching purposes.  The legal position is that you retain copyright unless you sign over your rights to the publisher.  Each publisher has its own copyright transfer or licence to publish agreement and so the rights you retain will vary.  If possible try to retain copyright or at least the right to self-archive i.e. make the work openly available on a personal, institutional or subject-based website.

To aid you in retaining selected rights, SPARC (The Scholarly Publishing & Academic Resources Coalition) has developed an easy-to-use Author Addendum to the publisher's agreement.

Open access

The Internet has facilitated the development of alternatives to traditional commercial publishing.  One model provides direct competition to high-priced journals through the provision of web-based subscription services.  Another makes journal content available on an open access basis, without charge to users, instead charging the author or author's institution for publishing articles.

As a complement to publishing many academic authors are reaching a wider audience by making their work freely available on the web through open access self-archiving, often by depositing copies in an institutional e-print repository.

Useful links

• Society of College, National & University Libraries (SCONUL) overview of scholarly communication
• The Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC)
• Budapest Open Access Initiative
• List of FAQs for self-archiving

E-prints at London Business School

What is an institutional e-print service?

E-prints are electronic copies of academic papers.  Universities worldwide are providing open access to e-prints of their research output on institutional servers so that their research will be widely and quickly disseminated over the Internet.

In line with such services the School is expanding its Faculty Research database to include e-prints and is encouraging faculty members to deposit copies of their papers.

What are the benefits for researchers of depositing e-prints?

• Wider access: Institutional repositories allow free, worldwide access to research papers 
• Impact: Studies show that citation impact is substantially enhanced for papers deposited in open access repositories 
• Searching: Content in the Faculty Research database is highly ranked by search engines such as Google
• Preservation: Your research papers are managed, stored and backed up centrally: a more robust alternative to personal web pages
• Funding: Research funding bodies are advocating the use of institutional repositories to improve access to research
• Download statistics: The database will allow depositors to see the number of times their papers have been accessed

What are the benefits for the School and society in general?

• Enhances the School's visibility and prestige
• Manages, disseminates and preserves the collective intellectual capital
• Automates administrative data compilation and analysis for funding and assessment exercises such as the RAE
• Advances scholarly communication and promotes the sharing of knowledge

What papers should I deposit?

You may deposit post-prints (journal articles accepted for publication), plus published journal articles, book chapters, conference papers and research reports.

Please note we cannot accept publisher produced PDFs unless the publisher has specifically agreed to this.

How do I deposit papers?

Depositing is a simple process via a submission form on Portal.  Click on My Profile, then My Biography/Add a Full-Text E-Print to a Publication.  You will be presented with a list of your publications in Faculty Research Online.  Click on the title of the relevant paper and you will obtain a submission form complete with the bibliographic details.  You can then attach your e-print and submit it.  If the paper is not already listed in the database click on add a new record, fill in the bibliographic details and attach your e-print. 

Library staff will check the copyright status and make the paper available in Faculty Research Online.  Please bear in mind that if it is necessary to contact the publisher for permission to deposit the response may take several weeks.

What are the copyright issues?

The majority of publishers retain copyright of the publisher produced PDF through the copyright transfer agreement.  However major publishers are now adapting their copyright policies to allow the post-print (final peer-reviewed draft) versions of articles to be held in open access repositories.   Papers can be hosted in the Faculty Research database if one of the following copyright conditions has been met:

• The publisher's copyright policy permits the archiving of post-prints on open access servers
• The publisher has given specific permission for the archiving
• The paper has been published in an open access publication
• You have retained the copyright or the right to self-archive

Where possible a link to the published version of a journal article will be provided.

For those interested, the SHERPA/Romeo list is a useful guide to the policies of some of the most prominent publishers.

Information and help

Please contact electronic.library@london.edu with any queries or comments about the service.

Useful links

• The case for institutional repositories (A SPARC position paper) (PDF document, 232kb)

• Securing a Hybrid Environment for Research, Preservation and Access (SHERPA)
• Registry of Open Access Repositories (ROAR)
• Research Councils UK position statement on access to research outputs