The launch of Seismica: a seismic shift in publishing
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.26443/seismica.v1i1.255Abstract
Seismica, a community-run Diamond Open Access (OA) journal for seismology and earthquake science, opened for submissions in July 2022. We created Seismica to support a shift to OA publishing while pushing back against the extreme rise in the cost of OA author processing charges, and the inequities this is compounding. Seismica is run by an all-volunteer Board of 47 researchers who fulfil traditional editorial roles as well as forming functional teams to address the needs for technical design and support, copy editing, media and branding that would otherwise be covered by paid staff at a for-profit journal. We are supported by the McGill University Library (Québec, Canada), who host our website and provide several other services, so that Seismica does not have any income or financial expenditures. We report the process of developing the journal and explain how and why we made some of the major policy choices. We describe the organizational structure of the journal, and discuss future plans and challenges for the continued success and longevity of Seismica.
References
Adema, J., & Moore, S. A. (2018). Collectivity and collaboration: imagining new forms of communality to create resilience in scholar-led publishing. Insights, 31. https://doi.org/10.1629/uksg.399/
Aderhold, K., Wright, V., Burton, C., Scott Price, O., Madsen, S., & Duran, G. (2021). Groundswell Anti-Racism Action in the Geosciences. 2021.
Adoption of open access is rising – but so too are its costs. (2018). In Impact of Social Sciences. https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2018/01/22/adoption-of-open-access-is-rising-but-so-too-are-its-costs/
Aksnes, D. W., Langfeldt, L., & Wouters, P. (2019). Citations, citation indicators, and research quality: An overview of basic concepts and theories. Sage Open, 9(1), 2158244019829575.
Ali, H. N., Sheffield, S. L., Bauer, J. E., Caballero-Gill, R. P., Gasparini, N. M., Libarkin, J., Gonzales, K. K., Willenbring, J., Amir-Lin, E., Cisneros, J., & others. (2021). An actionable anti-racism plan for geoscience organizations. Nature Communications, 12(1), 1–6. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-23936-w
Ancion, Z., Borrell-Damián, L., Mounier, P., Rooryck, J., & Saenen, B. (2022). Action Plan for Diamond Open Access. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6282403
Baruch, Y., Konrad, A., Aguinis, H., & Starbuck, W. (2008). In Opening the Black Box of Editorship (p. 319). Palgrave MacMillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230582590
Becerril, A., Bosman, J., Bjørnshauge, L., Frantsvåg, J. E., Kramer, B., Langlais, P.-C., Mounier, P., Proudman, V., Redhead, C., & Torny, D. (2021). OA Diamond Journals Study. Part 2: Recommendations. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4562790
Benz, M., van Edig, X., Schulz, K., Finger, J., & Verbeke, D. (2022). Supporting Diamond Open Access: Research libraries as funders, intermediaries and publishers. Libraries in the Research and Innovation Landscape (LIBER 2022). https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6818082
Björk, B.-C. (2021). Why is access to the scholarly journal literature so expensive? Portal: Libraries and the Academy, 21(2), 177–192. https://doi.org/10.1353/pla.2021.0010
Björk, B.-C., Shen, C., & Laakso, M. (2016). A longitudinal study of independent scholar-published open access journals. PeerJ, 4, e1990. https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.1990
Bosman, J., Frantsvåg, J. E., Kramer, B., Langlais, P.-C., & Proudman, V. (2021). OA Diamond Journals Study. Part 1: Findings. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4558704
Butler, L.-A., Matthias, L., Simard, M.-A., Mongeon, P., & Haustein, S. (2022). The oligopoly’s shift to open access publishing: How for-profit publishers benefit from gold and hybrid article processing charges. Proceedings of the Annual Conference of CAIS / Actes Du Congrès Annuel de l’ACSI. https://doi.org/10.29173/cais1262
Casadevall, A., & Fang, F. C. (2014). Causes for the persistence of impact factor mania. MBio, 5(2), e00064-14. https://doi.org/10.1128/mBio.00064-14
cOAlition S. (n.d.). Plan S: Making full and immediate Open Access a reality. Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies.
Dodds, F. (2019). The future of academic publishing: Revolution or evolution revisited. Learned Publishing, 32(4), 345–354. https://doi.org/10.1002/leap.1258
Doumont, J.-L. (2009). Trees, Maps, and Theorems: Effective communication for rational minds. In Information Design Journal (Vol. 17/2, pp. 155–156). Principiae.
Dutt, K. (2020). Race and racism in the geosciences. Nature Geoscience, 13(1), 2–3. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-019-0519-z
Else, H. (2020). Nature journals reveal terms of landmark open-access option. Nature, 588(7836), 19–20. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-03324-y
Farley, A., Langham-Putrow, A., Shook, E., Sterman, L. B., & Wacha, M. (2021). Transformative agreements: Six myths, busted: Lessons learned. College & Research Libraries News, 82(7), 298. https://doi.org/10.5860/crln.82.7.298
Farquharson, J. I., & Wadsworth, F. B. (2018). Introducing Volcanica: The first diamond open-access journal for volcanology. Volcanica, 1(1), i–ix. https://doi.org/10.30909/vol.01.01.i-ix
Feldman, D. C. (2008). Building and maintaining a strong editorial board and cadre of ad hoc reviewers. In Y. Baruch, A. Konrad, H. Aguinis, & W. Starbuck (Eds.), Opening the Black Box of Editorship (pp. 68–74). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230582590_7
Fuchs, C., & Sandoval, M. (2013). The diamond model of open access publishing: Why policy makers, scholars, universities, libraries, labour unions and the publishing world need to take non-commercial, non-profit open access serious. TripleC: Communication, Capitalism & Critique, 11(2), 428–443.
Funning, G., Bruhat, L., van den Ende, M., Gabriel, A.-A., Hicks, S., Jolivet, R., Lecocq, T., & Rowe, C. (2021). Seismica: a community-led Diamond Open-Access journal for seismology and earthquake science. 2021. https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2021AGUFM.U43E..06F
Gabriel, A.-A., Bruhat, L., van den Ende, M., Funning, G., Hicks, S. P., Jolivet, R., Lecocq, T., & Rowe, C. (2022). Seismica: a community-led Diamond Open-Access journal for seismology and earthquake science. https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-egu22-11264
Grossmann, A., & Brembs, B. (2021). Current market rates for scholarly publishing services. F1000Research, 10(20). https://doi.org/10.12688/f1000research.27468.2
Haak, L. L., Fenner, M., Paglione, L., Pentz, E., & Ratner, H. (2012). ORCID: a system to uniquely identify researchers. Learned Publishing, 25(4), 259–264. https://doi.org/10.1087/20120404
Hodgkinson, G. P. (2008). Moving a Journal up the Rankings. In Y. Baruch, A. M. Konrad, H. Aguinis, & W. H. Starbuck (Eds.), Opening the Black Box of Editorship (pp. 104–113). Palgrave Macmillan UK. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230582590_11
Kahr, B., McHenry, L. B., & Hollingsworth, M. D. (2019). Academic publishing and scientific integrity: Case studies of editorial interference by Taylor & Francis. The Journal of Scientific Practice & Integrity, 1, 1–10. https://doi.org/10.35122/jospi.2019.848394
Khanna , S., Ball, J., Alperin, J. P., & Willinsky, J. (2022). Recalibrating the Scope of Scholarly Publishing: A Modest Step in a Vast Decolonization Process. SciELO Preprints. https://doi.org/10.1590/SciELOPreprints.4729
Khoo, S. Y.-S. (2019a). Article processing charge hyperinflation and price insensitivity: An open access sequel to the serials crisis. Liber Quarterly, 29(1), 1–18. https://doi.org/10.18352/lq.10280
Khoo, S. Y.-S. (2019b). Article Processing Charge Hyperinflation and Price Insensitivity: An Open Access Sequel to the Serials Crisis. LIBER Quarterly: The Journal of the Association of European Research Libraries, 29(1), 1–18. https://doi.org/10.18352/lq.10280
Lamport, L. (1985). LATEX: a document preparation system. Addison-Wesley.
Lange, J. (2022). Removing author fees can help open access journals make research available to everyone. The Conversation.
Lange, J., & Severson, S. (2021). What Are the Characteristics of Canadian Independent, Scholarly Journals? Results from a Website Analysis. The Journal of Electronic Publishing, 24(1). https://doi.org/10.3998/jep.153
Lange, J., & Severson, S. (2022). Work It: Looking at Labour and Compensation in Canadian Non-Commercial Scholarly Journals. KULA: Knowledge Creation, Dissemination, and Preservation Studies, 6(2), 1–21. https://doi.org/10.18357/kula.151
Lariviere, V., & Sugimoto, C. R. (2019). The journal impact factor: A brief history, critique, and discussion of adverse effects. In Springer handbook of science and technology indicators (pp. 3–24). Springer.
Liboiron, M. (2021). Decolonizing geoscience requires more than equity and inclusion. Nature Geoscience, 14(12), 876–877. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-021-00861-7
Needleman, M. H. (2012). NISO Z39.96-201x, JATS: Journal Article Tag Suite. Serials Review, 38(3), 213–214. https://doi.org/10.1080/00987913.2012.10765464
Office of Science and Technology Policy. (2022). Ensuring Free, Immediate, and equitable access to federally funded research. Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies.
Olejniczak, A. J., & Wilson, M. J. (2020). Who’s writing open access (OA) articles? Characteristics of OA authors at Ph. D.-granting institutions in the United States. Quantitative Science Studies, 1(4), 1429–1450.
Parks, B. (2020). AJP adopts double-anonymous reviewing. American Journal of Physics, 88(12), 1035–1035. https://doi.org/10.1119/10.0002460
Petersen, J., Hattke, F., & Vogel, R. (2017). Editorial governance and journal impact: a study of management and business journals. Scientometrics, 112(3), 1593–1614. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11192-017-2434-7
Pico, T., Bierman, P., Doyle, K., & Richardson, S. (2020). First authorship gender gap in the geosciences. Earth and Space Science, 7(8). https://doi.org/e2020EA001203
Puehringer, S., Rath, J., & Griesebner, T. (2021). The political economy of academic publishing: On the commodification of a public good. PloS One, 16(6), e0253226. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0253226
Shapiro, D. L., & Bartunek, J. (2008). Being an Ethical Editorial Board Member and Editor: The Integral Role of Earned Trust. In Y. Baruch, A. M. Konrad, H. Aguinis, & W. H. Starbuck (Eds.), Opening the Black Box of Editorship (pp. 88–96). Palgrave Macmillan UK. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230582590_9
Shipp, J. (2000). Commercial scholarly publishing: the devil incarnate or divine saviour? History of Economics Review, 32(1), 37–45. https://doi.org/10.1080/10370196.2000.11733339
Siler, K., & Frenken, K. (2020). The pricing of open access journals: Diverse niches and sources of value in academic publishing. Quantitative Science Studies, 1(1), 28–59. https://doi.org/10.1162/qss_a_00016
van den Ende, M., Bruhat, L., Funning, G., Gabriel, A.-A., Hicks, S. P., Jolivet, R., Lecocq, T., & Rowe, C. (2021). Creating a Diamond Open Access community journal for Seismology and Earthquake Science. https://doi.org/10.31223/X5304V
Zhang, X., Grebel, T., & Budzinski, O. (2021). The Prices of Open Access Publishing: The Composition of APC across Different Fields of Sciences. In The Prices of Open Access Publishing: The Composition of APC across Different Fields of Sciences (pp. 317–336). De Gruyter Oldenbourg. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110724523-014
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2022 Christie Rowe, Matthew Agius, Jaime Convers, Gareth Funning, Carmine Galasso, Stephen Hicks, Tran Huynh, Jessica Lange, Thomas Lecocq, Hannah Mark, Ryo Okuwaki, Théa Ragon, Catherine Rychert, Samantha Teplitzky, Martijn van den Ende
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.