SCOAP3 Open Access Initiative launches in January 2014

On December 5, CERN confirmed the launch of the Open Access SCOAP3 initiative on January 1 , 2014. A vast number of scientific articles in the field of particle physics will be available in open access, at no cost to authors: everyone will be able to access these articles; authors will retain their copyright, and licenses will be applied that will allow for the widespread reuse of all information. SCOAP is the result of intense preparations and consensus building with the support of partners in 24 countries, including Portugal, represented by the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT).

Based at CERN, this is the largest open access initiative ever created on a global scale and involves international collaboration between more than a thousand libraries, library consortia, and research organizations. The SCOAP3 project is supported by funding agencies and was established in cooperation with leading scientific publishers, namely Elsevier, IOP Publishing, and Springer. To maximize results, subscription fees were reduced for thousands of participating libraries around the world, making it possible to provide funds for these libraries to support SCOAP3.

Portugal is represented in the SCOAP3 consortium through FCCN, a unit of FCT responsible for two national initiatives in the field of scientific information: the Portuguese Open Access Scientific Repository (RCAAP) and the Online Knowledge Library (b-on).

The main objective of SCOAP3 is to grant unrestricted access to scientific articles published in scientific journals, which until now would only be accessible to scientists, in certain university libraries, and generally not available to the general public. For two decades, the open dissemination of preliminary information in the form ofpre-peer-reviewed articles has been the norm in High Energy Physics and other related fields. The SCOAP3 project extends this opportunity for sharing and allows for the expansion of a high-quality peer-review service, making it possible to make the final version of articles available, within the principles of Open Access and the free dissemination of science, without neglecting the intellectual property rights of authors, as well as general access for the reuse of content. In the SCOAP3 model, participating libraries and funding agencies pool resources currently used to subscribe to scientific journals to directly support the peer review system, in cooperation with publishers.

The SCOAP3 initiative hopes to establish new partnerships in the Asia-Pacific, Americas, Europe, Africa, and Middle East regions, where scientists will certainly enjoy the advantages of Open Access and many libraries and library consortia will benefit from reductions in subscription costs.