Four Factors to Consider When Deciding Between an Open Access or Traditional Journal:
1. Visibility
Publishing your article in an OA journal means that more people are likely to see it, simply because more people will be able to access it.
2. Cost
Both traditional and OA journals may charge a small fee at the time of submission to cover editorial and peer review-related costs. The difference arises in the post-acceptance fees.
3. Prestige
Some researchers are more reticent to publish in OA journals because they may not be as Well-known as some of the larger, more well-established journals in a given field.
4. Speed
The speed from submission to first decision plays a very important or quite important role in a decision of where to publish.
Though expensive sometime but definitely open access journal allows your article more visibility and many who are interested in reading your work are helped by letting them have free access.
Open access means the authors pay to publish; anyone can read. This might have made sense before the invention of the arXiv, hal (or RG, for that matter) for allowing broader access to research results, but it doesn't make sense since.
So it's incorrect to claim that open access journals are the only way (or even the ``best'' way) for visibility and free access to the results of research. They're, just, another way of paying for journals.
Open access simply describes a way of funding journals, that doesn't allow economies of scale. It implies that funding, that could go to actually doing research, by buying equipment, paying for internships, fellowships and travel, would pay for the right of anyone to access research, that they can access, already, free of charge, since open access repositories, like the arXiv, hal, or RG, exist.
Journal funding makes more sense, if at all, on a scale much larger than that of an individual researcher or research group (e.g. on a scale of a university or a national or multinational research funding agency, as a separate item, distinct from individual research grants).
Open access Journal is off-course good option to increase the visibility of the article. Same time there is need to reduce the publishing charges so that more people can publish their research.
Open access is an option in most of the SCI/SCOPUS indexed journal and if one wish to pay the open access charge then the paper will be open access.Similarly most of the non index journal also charged compulsory open access charge which is high but it has no value.So as per my suggestion one must be chhose a best indexed journal rather than an open access journal.
I believe that Open access journal is good for you in terms of visibility, good for other researchers to make use of your fruitful research results. However, you need to pay for these advantages.
This form of publication is more democratic and allows greater visibility, even if readers are not so specific. I always prefer to use this feature. What good is a publication to be restricted, like a book on a shelf without consultation? The applicability of the publication makes a big difference.
No. In each field, there are reputable journals that evaluate each article using high standards. In my case, ASCE geotechnical journal and Geotechnique. Unfortunately, they charge you to read their articles. Most universities pay these fees and faculty have free access.
yes, it is useful. The articles in Open access journal can be obtained more quickly than the one in conventional journal. Moreover the manuscripts can be published fast for Open Access. The last but not least, the number published paper is not unrestricted generally, because the papers is published by electrical version without printed version
The greatest benefit of open access is that it enables the results of scholarly research to be disseminated more rapidly and widely:
More people can read the results of scholarly research, including those who would otherwise not be able to access that information because they cannot afford the subscription to an expensive journal, for example.
New ideas can be dispersed more rapidly and widely, which in turn triggers new research studies; it serves as an impetus for knowledge.
Businesses also have broad access to the most recent scientific ideas, which they can then build on. Open access contributes to the knowledge economy and provides an economic boost.
Since open access also implies wider reuse, recent knowledge can be put to immediate use in teaching.
The basic motive behind research is to enlighten or educate society on the various changes it goes through whether social, economic, political and cultural phases. If society cannot access these scholarship and build on their intellectual abilities, then why researching. To me open access journals gives the researcher or the learner the opportunity to learn and update himself without any restrictions.
From Publisher's aspects, I think the major advantages for publishing with OA are: (i) Fast Publishing Process; For an OA journal, when your article is accepted, normally it will be online very soon and can be cited immediately. But for the subscription journals, it takes time to put an accepted article online and/or into a subscribed database , since these are generally some complicated copyright issues need to be cleared up. (ii) Wide Exposure; For subscription journals, the authors should be very cautious about putting their published articles onto the internet (such as putting the articles on some academic or non-academic social medias), since there are always some copyright issues around. However, for OA journals, the copyright is so simple and clear (the Authors own the copyright). Thus, the authors can put their published article anywhere they want to improve the impact of their articles.
Even though there are some apparent advantages for OA journals camparing to subscription journal, several authors are still complaining about OA journals, particularly for the expensive article publication charge (APC) fees for some OA journals. As publishers, we are trying to improve these things, in order to build up a worthy and impactable OA publishing platform.
Look at both sides of the same coin! Whilst it is better to find your scientific contribution freely accessible by all which may boost citation and general impact, most journals that call themselves open access are not credible enough and also not indexed in credible databases. Moreover, the very credible one do place an exorbitant APC on the author (which sometimes may go up to USD5000). For me, this is unfortunate since poor researchers who do not have the means are completely marred from publishing their insightful research findings (particularly when they did not secure any funding). Is it not another way to prevent publishing and to cover up knowledge? If I am to meat such APC conditions to go open access, then it only makes practical sense to me to publish without open access.
In my view, open access journals are better to submit your article because other researchers can read your article, and consequently they will cite you to increase your citation.
Yes, open access journal is better to increase the citation . But the charges are high and always go only for reputed publisher and journals if you want to publish your work in open access.
Publication in an OA journal may be a good option for researchers . These journals allow authors to pay an extra “open access fee” to ensure free access to their article.
The criteria of journals is not depend on the open publishing. Mostly (95%) high impact journal is not open access. It is better to open acess is better but oren access journal is not good.
Krishna points an important point out. The best journals so far that are highly indexed with the highest impact factors are not the so called open access journals but those that are not open. People should publish in best journals and stop lamenting and calling for expensive open access journals.
Open Acesss or not; academic research must follow the requisite scientific approach and arrive at logical conclusions that will be impactful not only to philosophers like ourselves but also to the larger society we are meant to be researhing for. To a large extent, our work must influence policy. Attraction of citations ? An author of a well researched article need not weep over citation but should hope that the research will be better channelled to meet human needs. Open Access or no Open Access should be the politics of the publishing houses, not mine.
OA is better for its rapid publication time and for the wide exposure the paper will get. After acceptance, the paper is put directly online and it can be also cited.