SoylentNews

quietus writes:

After 1 January 2020 scientific publications on the results of research funded by public grants provided by national and European research councils and funding bodies, must be published in compliant Open Access journals or on compliant Open Access Platforms.
(Plan S, key principle, September 4, 2018)

The European Commission, European Research Council, and the national science funding organisations of Austria, France, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Slovenia, Sweden and the UK together fund €7.6 billion of research. In a combined initiative (Plan S), that research must be freely accessible from January 1, 2020 on: anybody must be able to freely download, translate or re-use the resulting papers.

In cases where no quality open access journals or infrastructure exist, the members of Plan S will provide incentives and support to do so.

Any open access publication fees will be funded by the funding organizations, and not individual researchers; universities, libraries and other research organizations will be asked to align their policies and strategies.

The funding organizations will monitor compliance, and punish non-compliance.

This might change the face of scientific publishing in two years time, posits Nature. If the point of punishing non-compliance isn't contentious enough, another one of Plan S's principles might be:

The 'hybrid' model of publishing is not compliant with the above principles.

As currently only 15 percent of scientific publications are open access, this would mean that scientists involved will be barred from publishing in 85% of journals, including influential titles such as Nature and Science.

Also at Science Magazine and the PLoS Blog.

Original Submission   Alternate Submission

takyon writes:

China backs bold plan to tear down journal paywalls

In a huge boost to the open-access movement, librarians and funders in China have said that they intend to make the results of publicly funded research free to read immediately on publication.

The move, announced at an open-access meeting this week in Berlin, includes a pledge of support for Plan S, a bold initiative launched in September by a group of European funders to ensure that, by 2020, their scientists make papers immediately open.

It is not yet clear when Chinese organizations will begin implementing new policies, or whether they will adopt all of Plan S's details, but Robert-Jan Smits, the chief architect of Plan S, says the stance is a ringing endorsement for his initiative. "This is a crucial step forward for the global open-access movement," he says. "We knew China was reflecting to join us — but that it would join us so soon and unambiguously is an enormous surprise."

In three position papers, China's National Science Library (NSL), its National Science and Technology Library (NSTL) and the Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC), a major research funder, all said that they support the efforts of Plan S "to transform, as soon as possible, research papers from publicly funded projects into immediate open access after publication, and we support a wide range of flexible and inclusive measures to achieve this goal". "We demand that publishers should not increase their subscription prices on the grounds of the transformation from subscription journals to open access publishing," the papers say.

Previously: Plan S: Radical Open-Access Science Initiative in Europe
Wellcome Trust and Gates Foundation Join "Plan S" Open-Access Initiative

Original Submission

takyon writes:

Will the world embrace Plan S, the radical proposal to mandate open access to science papers?

How far will Plan S spread?

Since the September 2018 launch of the Europe-backed program to mandate immediate open access (OA) to scientific literature, 16 funders in 13 countries have signed on. That's still far shy of Plan S's ambition: to convince the world's major research funders to require immediate OA to all published papers stemming from their grants. Whether it will reach that goal depends in part on details that remain to be settled, including a cap on the author charges that funders will pay for OA publication. But the plan has gained momentum: In December 2018, China stunned many by expressing strong support for Plan S. This month, a national funding agency in Africa is expected to join, possibly followed by a second U.S. funder. Others around the world are considering whether to sign on.

Plan S, scheduled to take effect on 1 January 2020, has drawn support from many scientists, who welcome a shake-up of a publishing system that can generate large profits while keeping taxpayer-funded research results behind paywalls. But publishers (including AAAS, which publishes Science) are concerned, and some scientists worry that Plan S could restrict their choices.

[...] For now, North America is not following suit. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation was the first Plan S participant outside Europe, and another private funder may follow. But U.S. federal agencies are sticking to policies developed after a 2013 White House order to make peer-reviewed papers on work they funded freely available within 12 months of publication. "We don't anticipate making any changes to our model," said Brian Hitson of the U.S. Department of Energy in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, who directs that agency's public access policy.

Previously: Plan S: Radical Open-Access Science Initiative in Europe
Wellcome Trust and Gates Foundation Join "Plan S" Open-Access Initiative
China Backs "Plan S" for Open-Access Research

Original Submission