JISC has released Modelling Scholarly Communication Options: Costs and Benefits for Universities.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement (announcement includes podcast):

The key findings from the report show

• The annual savings in research and library costs of a university repository model combined with subscription publishing could range from £100,000 to £1,320,000
• Moving from Open Access journals and subscription-funding to per-article Open Access journal funding has the potential to achieve savings for universities between £620,000 per year and £1,700,000 per year if the article-processing charge is set at £500 or less
• Savings from a change away from subscription-funding to per-article Open Access journal funding were estimated to be between £170,000 and £1,365,000 per year for three out of the four universities studied when the article-processing charge is £1000 per article or less
• For the remaining university in the study a move from subscription-funding to the per-article Open Access journal funding saw the university having to pay £1.86m more in this scenario

See also the related documents: How to Build a Case for University Policies and Practices in Support of Open Access and Publishing Research Papers Which Policy Will Deliver Best Value for Your University?.

Brian D. Edgar and John Willinsky have self-archived "A Survey of the Scholarly Journals Using Open Journal Systems" on the Public Knowledge Project website.

Here's an excerpt:

A survey of 998 scholarly journals that use Open Journal Systems (OJS), an open source journal software platform, captures the characteristics of an emerging class of scholar-publisher open access journals (with some representation from more traditional scholarly society and print-based titles). The journals in the sample follow traditional norms for peer-reviewing, acceptance rates, and disciplinary focus, but are distinguished by the number that offer open access to their content, the growth rates in new titles, the participation rates from developing countries, and the extremely low operating budgets. The survey also documents the limited degree to which open source software can alter a field of communication, as OJS appears to have created a third path, dedicated to maximizing access to research and scholarship, as an alternative to traditional scholarly society and commercial publishing routes.

CMAJ, which has been an open access journal since 1995, will cease being so in January 2010, when some content will be restricted to subscribers.

Here's an excerpt from the "No Longer Free for All":

The harsh economic reality is that CMAJ, like many others in the publishing industry, has experienced a considerable decline in advertising revenue over the past two years. This loss necessitated an extensive examination of other business models to adequately address today’s economic challenges.

Benjamin J. Keele has self-archived "Examining Law Journal Publication Agreements for Copyright Transfers and Self-Archiving Rights" in SSRN.

Here's an excerpt:

This study examines 78 law journal publication agreements and finds that a minority of journals ask authors to transfer copyright. Most journals also permit author to self-archive articles with some conditions. The study recommends journals make their agreements publicly available and use licenses instead of copyright transfers.

Brill, an international academic publisher located in Leiden and Boston, has launched Brill Open.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

This new author service offers the option of making articles freely available upon publication. Brill Open enables authors to comply with research funding bodies and institutions which require open access.

The Brill Open option will be available for all 135 journals published under the imprints Brill, Martinus Nijhoff and VSP. Articles will be put in online open access in exchange for an article publishing fee to be arranged by the author.

Sam Bruinsma, Brill's Business Development Director, explains:"We are launching this new service in answer to a growing number of research funding bodies and universities announcing their compliance with the open access model. With Brill Open our journals are ready to meet the expected increase in contributions under this model."

In order to ensure that authors' funder requirements have no influence on the editorial peer review and decision-making, Brill Open will be made available to authors only upon acceptance of their paper for publication. Those authors who do not wish to use this service will be under no pressure to do so, and their accepted article will be published in the usual manner.

Brill's strategic intent is to adjust the future subscription price of a journal to reflect an increase in Brill Open fees. Sam Bruinsma comments: "Our view on open access developments is positive. We accept that over time an increasing part of our revenues will come through this new model. This will have an impact on the revenues from our library subscription service. The combination of these two business models will continue to support a healthy and sustainable journal program attractive to the best authors in the field."

DeepDyve has launched a rental service for scholarly articles.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

DeepDyve today unveiled the world 's largest online rental service for scientific, technical and medical research. From a growing database spanning thousands of journals, DeepDyve now gives consumers and professionals access to more than 30 million articles for as little as $0.99 per article.

"The web is transforming the publishing industry and creating opportunities for new users to access our content," said Martin Frank, Ph. D., executive director of the American Physiological Society. "The rental model that DeepDyve has pioneered enables us to serve these new users without compromising the products we offer to our traditional subscription customers." . . .

DeepDyve . . . offers an array of features and benefits to enrich the searching and reading experience, including:

• Free search & preview: Researchers can be certain of an article's relevance before renting.
• Personalized suggestions: DeepDyve will automatically display suggested articles based on a user 's profile.
• Bookmarks: Favorite articles are saved and displayed on a user 's MyDeepDyve home page for easy access.
• Email and RSS alerts: Users can receive regular updates of new articles and search results delivered directly to their email inbox or RSS reader.
• More Like This: DeepDyve offers links to related content with every search result and article page. . . .

DeepDyve is currently offering a risk-free, 14-day trial that allows users unlimited access to thousands of authoritative journals at no cost. Users enjoy continuous access to any article until their Free Trial expires, after which they may join one of three plans:

• Basic Rental Plan: For just $0.99 per article, users of this “pay-as-you-go” plan can rent and read a premium article from one of the many prestigious journals available through DeepDyve. Articles can be read multiple times for up to 24 hours.
• Silver Monthly Plan: For $9.99 per month, users can rent and read up to 20 premium articles per month. Each article can be read multiple times for up to seven days.
• Gold Monthly Plan: For $19.99 per month, users can rent and read an unlimited number of articles for an unlimited amount of time. There is no expiration date.

The Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association has made available a Webinar of a question-and-answer session with five open access publishers.

The UK's National Institute for Health Research has inked a Supporter Membership arrangement with BioMed Central that will allow researchers supported by the NIHR and its partners to get a 15% discount on BioMed Central publication fees.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

Under the terms of the NIHR's Supporter Membership arrangement, all NHS researchers supported by the NIHR and its partners will benefit from a 15% discount on publication fees when publishing in any of BioMed Central's 200 peer-reviewed open access journals. Researchers are expected to acknowledge NIHR support.

The NIHR is part of the Department of Health, which is a strong advocate of access to the results of research and a partner in the UK PubMed Central open access digital archive project. In 2007 it made a statement confirming official policy in support of open access. http://www.nihr.ac.uk/files/pdfs/OpenAccessPolicyStatement.pdf

With support through the NIHR, researchers already publish hundreds of open access articles each year in BioMed Central’s journals, and Supporter Membership will further encourage open access publication, increasing public access to the results of taxpayer funded research whilst saving money.

The International Association of Scientific, Technical, and Medical Publishers has released The STM Report: An Overview of Scientific and Scholarly Journal Publishing.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

Annual revenues generated from English-language STM journal publishing are estimated at $8 billion in 2008, up by 6-7% compared to 2007, within a broader STM publishing market worth some $16 billion. About 55% of global STM revenues (including non-journal STM products) come from the USA, 30% from Europe, 10% from Asia/Pacific and 5% from the rest of the world.

Continued growth in output, particularly from China and East Asia, will put further pressure on the system, especially when combined with funders’ desire for greater return on research investments and the pressures on researchers to accelerate the research cycle.

There are approximately 2000 journal publishers globally, and the main English-language trade and professional associations for journal publishers include 657 publishers producing around 11,550 journals—about 50% of the total journal output by title. Of these, 477 publishers (73%) and 2334 journals (20%) are not-for-profit.

There were about 25,400 active scholarly peer-reviewed journals in early 2009, collectively publishing about 1.5 million articles a year. The number of articles published each year and the number of journals have both grown steadily for over two centuries, by about 3% and 3.5% per year respectively. The reason is the equally persistent growth in the number of researchers, which has also grown at about 3% per year and now stands at between 5.5 and 10 million, depending on definition, although only about 20% of these are repeat authors.

SPARC has released Income Models for Open Access: An Overview of Current Practice.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

"Who pays for Open Access?" is a key question faced by publishers, authors, and libraries as awareness and interest in free, immediate, online access to scholarly research increases. SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) examines the issue of sustainability for current and prospective open-access publishers in a timely new guide, "Income models for Open Access: An overview of current practice," by Raym Crow.

"Income models for Open Access: An overview of current practice" examines the use of supply-side revenue streams (such as article processing fees, advertising) and demand-side models (including versioning, use-triggered fees). The guide provides an overview of income models currently in use to support open-access journals, including a description of each model along with examples of journals currently employing it. . . .

Developing a sound business model is a critical concern for all publishers and the process can be especially challenging for those considering open-access distribution. The guide recognizes that the needs of individual journals differ, and that publishers will apply a variety of income models to support open-access distribution. The right model must take into account not only the publisher's need to cover expenses, but also the organization's mission objectives, size, business management resources, and other factors. . . .

"Income models for Open Access: An overview of current practice" is available for free to read or download online. The guide is supplemented by an extensive Web resource, which invites community discussion on models described as well as contributions related to new and other models. The resource is online at http://www.arl.org/sparc/publisher/incomemodels/.