5 years ago, “Plan S”, an initiative for Open Access publishing, was launched by cOAlition S, a funding consortium with 12 European national research funding organisations. “Plan S” is committed to terminating journal subscription models and accelerating the transition from paid transcription to open access (OA).

Revolution brought about by Plan S

According to Plan S, cOAlition S requires all researchers it funds to publicly publish their research, making research readily freely and readily available to everyone without cost barriers. Researchers can choose to publish in OA journals, or publish a near-final manuscript online.

The implementation of Plan S was originally scheduled in 2020, but was later postponed to 2021, during which a compromise regulation was made in the content of the original plan. Through negotiations, it was decided to support “hybrid” publication model, including OA paper and paid paper, in Plan S.

Publishers were scrambling to launch OA products in early 2021 in response to industry upheaval brought about by Plan S, and to maintain the sustainability of their businesses.

New OA publishing model

Generally, authors only need to pay article processing charge (APC) for publishing OA research article. Accordingly, publishers have increased the fees for APC to maintain substantial revenue.

The Netherlands publisher, Elsevier, launched an experimental project “Mirror Journal” from 2018 to 2020, to explore a new OA publishing model.

Emilio Bruna, an ecologist and scholar in Latin American studies in University of Florida, USA and his group conducted a research on this project, suggesting that the first author of nearly 80% articles in mirror journals comes from higher-income country and there are almost no first authors from low-income country.

cOAlition S thought that reading and publishing should not become the economic burden for researchers. Therefore, in September this year, they announced the establishment of a working group to study alternative publishing models independent of APC. One feasible model is termed “Diamond Open Access (DOA)”, which allows journals to operate with financial support from sponsors or institutions without charge from either authors or readers.

The publication plan needs to be updated

The new plan “Towards Responsible Publishing” seems to acknowledge that the first development stage of Plan S is “on the decline”, which signifies scientific publication revolution accelerated by cOAlition S 5 years ago enters into the second stage.

The plan proposed an example model called ‘Publish, Review, Curate’: authors post their preprints openly on dedicated platforms and submit their paper for review; academics manage the peer-review process at no charge to authors; and peer-review reports, revisions and editorial decisions are published openly. Costs would be covered by a mixture of organizations, including libraries, funders, governments and universities. The publisher and journal still play roles, as they curate the peer-reviewed articles on the basis of their quality or subject, but wouldn’t make the initial decision on when to publish a preprint or peer-reviewed article.

At present, cOAlition S cooperates with Research Consulting, a research and consulting firm based in Nottingham, UK to lead a 6-month feedback survey, thereby collecting opinions from global researchers and inquiring if the plan can meet their needs.