Article Processing Charge (APC): Fee paid to a publisher by the author, author’s institution or funder, for Gold Open Access.
Author final manuscript: Final, accepted, peer-reviewed version of a publication, before the publisher’s copy-editing, proof corrections, layout and typesetting. Compare publisher PDF and version of record.
CC BY: Creative Commons Attribution Licence. This licence lets others distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon a work, even commercially, as long as they credit the rightsholder(s) for the original creation. The most accommodating of the Creative Commons licences and the one that RCUK and the Wellcome Trust require.
CentAUR: University of Reading’s institutional repository
Embargo: A delay period imposed by a publisher on making full text available in institutional and subject repositories (see Green Open Access). Deposit should be immediate upon acceptance for publications, as long as access is restricted.
Gold Open Access: Immediate Open Access on the publisher site, usually in exchange for a fee (see Article Processing Charge).
Green Open Access: Depositing research in an institutional or subject repository. The version deposited is normally the author final manuscript.
Hybrid journals: Traditional subscription journals that offer authors a Gold Open Access option for an individual article, involving payment of an Article Processing Charge.
Institutional repository: Online digital archive and showcase of an institution’s research. See CentAUR for University of Reading research publications.
Open Access: Making research freely available online.
Open Access journals: Journals in which all articles are Open Access. These journals may also be called Pure Gold or Gold Open Access journals. An Article Processing Charge (sometimes labelled ‘publication fee’) is usually payable for every article. Examples include Public Library of Science (PLoS), PeerJ and BioMed Central journals. Compare subscription journals, hybrid journals.
Prepayment or membership deals: Arrangement whereby an institution deposits a lump sum with a publisher to cover Article Processing Charges, instead of being invoiced for each paper. The publisher usually offers a discount.
Publisher PDF: Version of a publication that appears on the publisher website after publication, including the publisher’s copy-editing, proof corrections, layout and typesetting. Compare author final manuscript.
REF: Research Excellence Framework
Subject repository: Digital archive of Open Access literature in particular fields. PubMed Central and arXiv are the best-known.
Subscription journals: Journals published under a traditional subscription model, whereby institutions and individuals pay an annual fee, or pay per view, to access content. Compare Open Access journals.
Transitional/Transformative agreement: A transformative or transitional agreement is a deal between institutions (or often large groups of institutions or consortia) and journal publishers. The agreements aim to change the business models of publishers and help them transition to a fully Open Access model. They are often referred to as 'Read and Publish' deals as they incorporate journal subscriptions and the ability of authors to publish their work Open Access with the publisher. The idea of the agreements is to reduce the costs for institutions and lead to a shift in publisher business models towards Open Access. In the UK, the agreements are negotiated by JISC.
Transitional/Transformative journal: A transitional/transformative Journal (TJ) is a subscription (hybrid) journal that has actively committed to transitioning to a fully Open Access journal under an agreement with JISC. In addition, a Transformative Journal must agree to gradually increase the share of Open Access content and offset subscription income from payments for publishing services (to avoid double payments - often called 'double dipping').