Dear Colleagues,

In a context where various public policies seek to promote open science, the measurement of developments in this field is the subject of numerous contributions. The intended target is 100% of scientific production in open access (OA). Thus, both in high-income countries and in emerging countries with a strong incentive towards OA (e.g., Latin America), measuring OA uptake is important to monitor progress towards public policy objectives. Therefore, it is imperative to have an OA “dashboard” in order to streamline decisions and support arbitrations in favor of OA.

Measuring uptake of OA is not an easy task. Several factors can affect results and should be considered, such as: disparities in how publications are identified as OA from one database to another; the types of OA that are analyzed; and the types of publications taken into account (e.g., with or without DOI, document types). In addition to the issues related to the data used, the question of the measures/indicators is of particular importance. Thus, OA publishing practices may vary across disciplines. Even if the objective is to reach 100% of publications in OA, the starting point is not the same according to the communities.

A last point, and not the least significant, is that of economic models and the cost linked to OA publications, as "open" does not necessarily mean "free" whatever the model adopted. It would be useful for stakeholders in scholarly publishing to have a reflexive analysis of the different models and their optimality. Insights resulting from econometric viewpoints or agent-based simulations will be warmly welcomed. We would also like to encourage colleagues from different scientific fields (biomedical, engineering, philosophy, etc.) to contribute and report their experiences within the context of the topics raised in the form of opinions, perspectives, reviews or original research articles.

Contributions may relate to the following topics (non-exhaustive list):

• Measurement of open access: databases and indicators;
• Analysis of scholarly publishing economic models;
• Analysis of OA adoption around the world (including in emerging countries);
• Initiatives and public policies to promote OA.

Prof. Dr. Francesco De Pretis
Guest Editor
Ahmad Yaman Abdin
Guest Editor Assistant

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Publications is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• open access
• economic model
• bibliometrics
• article processing charges
• scholarly publishing
• databases
• international comparisons