A Guide to the Best Revenue Models and Funding Sources for your Digital Resources Page: 25
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A guide to the best revenue models and funding sources
for your digital resources
Nancy Maron, Ithaka S+RHow it works
In the author-pays or contributor-pays model, the publisher seeks the revenue it needs to cover its costs by
charging fees up front. Journals often assign these article processing charges or APCs to authors or other content
contributors in the form of publication or hosting fees. Unlike the subscription model, which assumes that the
desire to read or otherwise consume content will lead people to pay for it, the contributor-pays model sees the
primary beneficiary of publication as the author who wishes to make his or her content available on the web. In
this model, it is the author who is responsible for paying the publisher, which in exchange provides the
technological, editorial, and other organisational infrastructure and services to publish the contributor's content.
A 2012 study found that APCs averaged just over $900 (55o), but that the range of charges runs from $8 (5) to
$3,900 (2,385), with higher fees common in STEM disciplines and among commercial publishers and lower fees
typical among university presses and societies.45 There are some cases, as well, where fees are charged even for
the review process, for example by the Journal of Neuroscience, which charges $125 (76) for submitting an
article.46
Trends
Today, the author-pays model is in the midst of a real resurgence as a means to offer scholarly content free of
charge. This approach has become especially popular in the wake of governmental and institutional policy
changes to either require or at least strongly encourage researchers to ensure that their scholarship is open
access.47 In 2012, a UK government-commissioned working group issued a recommendation later accepted by
the government to make all publicly funded scientific research available for free,48 and beginning on 1 April 2013,
all research funded by Research Councils UK (RCUK) must be made freely available via either Green or Gold
Open Access (OA).49 In the United States, similar policies are being explored. The Fair Access to Science and
Technology Research Act (FASTR) bill introduced to House and Senate in February 2013 would provide funding
to all federal agencies so that they can develop "public access policies relating to research conducted by
employees of that agency or from funds administered by that agency," and later that month, the White House's
Office of Science and Technology Policy issued an executive memorandum that ultimately aims to expand the
45 David J. Solomon and Bo-ChristerBjork, 'A Study of Open Access Journals Using Article Processing Charges,' Journal of the American Societyfor
Information Science and Technology 63.8 (August 2012): 1485-95; for preprint, see: openaccesspublishing.org/apc2/preprint.pdf. See also
Eigenfactor, which plots journals' APCs against their impact factors: eigenfactor.org/openaccess/.
46 Society for Neuroscience, 'Submission Fee and Payment Policy,' The Journal of Neuroscience, jneurosci.org/site/misc/ifa_fee.xhtml. For a study of
submission fees, see Mark Ware Consulting, Ltd, 'Submission Fees - A tool in the transition to open access? Summary of report to Knowledge
Exchange' (2010). knowledge-exchange.info/Default.aspx?ID=413
47 For a list of such initiatives on the part of funders and institutions, see ROARMAP: Registry of Open Access Repositories MandatoryArchiving Policies,
http://roarmap.eprints.orgl
48 The Working Group on Expanding Access to Published Research Findings was commissioned by the UK Minister for Universities and Science and
chaired by Dame Janet Finch. Its report, Accessibility, Sustainability, Excellence: How to Expand Access to Research Publications, known as the Finch
Report, is available at researchinfonet.org/wp-contentuploads/2o2/o6/Finch-Grup-reprt-FNAL-VERSION.pdf. For the government's response
to and acceptance of the Finch Report, see bis.gov.ukassetsbiscresciencedcs2-97-etter-gvernment-respnse-t-finch-reprt-research-
publications.pdf
49 'Green' OA content is commonly delivered via institutional repositories as a draft or peer-reviewed post print, while 'Gold' OA is published with
immediate access through a designated OA Journal. On this topic OA scholar Peter Suber helpfully notes, "The greenlgold distinction is about venues
or delivery vehicles, not user rights or degrees of openness." http:/llegacy.earlham.edu/-peters/fos/overview.htm. For Research Councils UK policy,
see rcuk.ac.ukresearch/Pagesoutputs.aspx. See also a decision tree summarising the policy, created by the Publishers Association and endorsed by
RCUK: publishers.org.uk/index.php?option=com-docman&task=doc-download&gid=78o&Itemid=._Js
Author (or Contributor) Pays
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Maron, Nancy. A Guide to the Best Revenue Models and Funding Sources for your Digital Resources, report, March 2014; Bristol, UK. (https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc282585/m1/28/: accessed April 24, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, UNT Digital Library, https://digital.library.unt.edu; .