The Open Access Scholarly Publishing Association (OASPA) conducted “Equity in OA” workshops to gather researchers’ perspectives on their choices for publishing in open access or paywalled platforms. Researchers consistently identified two barriers to publishing open access: 1.) cost charged to the author and 2.) perception that high publishing cost or paywall access equate with higher prestige. As unfounded as they are, the dual narratives that publishing open access must be costly to researchers, and open access represents lesser prestige value both serve to reinforce paywall publication choices. Access to publishing and reading research is thus limited to those who can afford it, further exacerbating inequities.
Workshop participants noted the “pain points” of APC waiver workflows that are complicated and highly variable from publisher to publisher. Other OA funding models are not well-known or established (UMass Amherst Libraries participates in several). Researchers expressed their support for funder investment in non-APC/collective action platforms for them to share their works. Equity happens with collective action approaches take hold. It is the work of libraries, funders, professional societies and research organizations to build robust and stable open scholarship infrastructure that removes barriers to publishing, reading and using research outputs. Then, it is the work of researchers to recognize quality research and its impact, regardless of perceived “prestige” of platform based on legacy publishing models.
