MathOA

What is MathOA?

A member of the Fair Open Access Alliance, MathOA is a foundation that aims to help mathematics journals migrate from a commercial publisher to an open access solution. For example, several journals have already taken the plunge and moved from a fee-based publisher to an open access publisher. In 2015, LingOA was created and helped four linguistics journals migrate from a traditional publisher to an open access publisher. 2016 saw the creation of MathOA and the journal Algebraic Combinatorics went open access in 2016. In 2018, PsyOA was created in the field of psychology.

To find out more about why these journals have left established publishers such as Elsevier, you can read the Open Science blog post New journals for more open access.

The actions of MathOA

The MathOA project can be summed up in this extract from their Proposal for editorial boards about emancipating their journals, published on 29 September 2017: « The entire point of this project is to remove as many obstacles as possible from editors in order to minimize their work ». The MathOA team is therefore present to support the change of platform: advice on the choice of the new title, support throughout the change process, contact with open access publishing platforms, administrative support, funding options, help with communication about the new journal, etc.

It is also possible to consult the list of journals that have left commercial publishers on the MathOA website.

The principles of Fair Open Access

• « The journal has a transparent ownership structure, and is controlled by and responsive to the scholarly community.
• Authors of articles in the journal retain copyright.
• All articles are published open access and an explicit open access licence is used.
• Submission and publication is not conditional in any way on the payment of a fee from the author or their employing institution, or on membership of an institution or society.
• Any fees paid on behalf of the journal to publishers are low, transparent, and in proportion to the work carried out ».

The Ouvrir la science blog provides a translation in its article Des nouvelles revues pour plus d’accès ouvert

• The ownership structure of the journal is transparent, and it is controlled by and responsive to the scholarly community;
• The authors of the articles in the journal retain the copyright;
• all articles are published as open access and an explicit open access license is used;
• submission and publication are in no way conditional on the payment of fees by the author or the institution employing him or her, or on membership of an institution or society;
• the fees paid to publishers on behalf of the journal are low, transparent and commensurate with the work done.