Friday Fun: Six open access myths put to rest

It's been kind of a crazy week for me, so I haven't really had much of a chance to contribute to or even read a lot of the Open Access Week calls to arms out there right now.

So I thought I would kind of commandeer my Friday Fun silly lists habit and redirect that energy to open access.

So here it is, from Peter Suber:

Open access: six myths to put to rest

1. The only way to provide open access to peer-reviewed journal articles is to publish in open access journals
2. All or most open access journals charge publication fees
3. Most author-side fees are paid by the authors themselves
4. Publishing in a conventional journal closes the door on making the same work open access
5. Open access journals are intrinsically low in quality
6. Open access mandates infringe academic freedom
   

   This is true for gold open access but not for green. But if you believe that all open access is gold, then this myth follows as a lemma. Because only about one-third of peer-reviewed journals are open access, requiring researchers to submit new work to open access journals would severely limit their freedom to submit work to the journals of their choice. By contrast, green open access is compatible with publishing in non-open access journals, which means that green open access mandates can respect author freedom to publish where they please. That is why literally all university open access mandates are green, not gold. It's also why the green/gold distinction is significant, not fussy, and why myths suppressing recognition of green open access are harmful, not merely false.

Of course, read Suber's original article to get the detailed explanations of all the myths. And please do share the list widely with all your friends, relatives, contacts, faculty, librarians, and legislators.