The health of the research enterprise is closely tied to the effectiveness of the scientific and scholarly publishing ecosystem. Policy-, technology-, and market-driven changes in publishing models over the last two decades have triggered a number of disruptions within this ecosystem:
Ongoing increases in the cost of journal publishing, with dominant open access models shifting costs from subscribers to authors
Significant consolidation and vertical (supply chain) integration in the publishing industry, and a decline in society-owned subscription journals that have long subsidized scientific and scholarly societies
A dramatic increase in the number of “predatory” journals with substandard peer review
Decline in the purchasing power of academic libraries relative to the quantity and cost of published research To illustrate how researcher behavior, funder policies, and publisher business models and incentives interact, this report presents an historical overview of open access publishing.
A solutions-focused workshop targeted to these questions, organized by the MIT Press and funded by the National Science Foundation, was held on September 20, 2024. It convened a diverse group of experts for intensive discussion on the open questions provoked by changes in the research communications enterprise. The workshop’s goal was to advance a research agenda that can inform the development of new policies and practices in open science communications. This document summarizes the workshop and the key research questions emerging from each session.
“The future of open research policy should be evidence based”
Phillip A. Sharp, William B. Bonvillian, Amy Brand, Michael Stebbins
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, July 30, 2024
Q&A with Phillip Sharp and Amy Brand on the Future of Open Access Publishing
MIT News, November 30, 2023
