The “diamond” model of journal publishing rests on the premise that knowledge should be free for all to disseminate and free for all to read. Diamond Open Access therefore refers to a scholarly publication model in which journals and platforms do not charge fees to either authors or readers. Such an approach offers opportunities for diverse and inclusive participation, giving voice to communities and groups that are otherwise marginalised and underrepresented in mainstream scholarly communications. The diamond model is one where publishing costs can be facilitated not only by academic institutions, but also by community groups and organisations, nonprofits and governments. This potentially makes it possible for communities beyond the Academy to disseminate their ideas freely to all, for open to be everyone’s business.
Internationally, interest in the value of this publishing model is increasing with a number of new diamond publishing initiatives, including the DIAMAS and CRAFT-OA projects and the Plan for Diamond Open Access. In 2020 an international diamond OA journals survey was conducted by Science Europe and cOAlition S with a final report released in 2021 and in 2023, the inaugural Global Summit on Diamond OA brought together over 700 international delegates who presented a set of pledges for furthering the diamond model. Yet so far there have been no specific initiatives that comprehensively address diamond publishing in Australasia.
A report by Open Access Australasia into open access initiatives in Australasia, based on data collected at the end of 2022, evidenced significant uptake of the diamond open publishing model in the university sector where more than half of the institutions examined had some form of open publishing, though other sectors showed little involvement. We will present a brief overview of diamond open publishing in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand based on recent updates to this report.
We will then showcase examples of how diamond open access journals can allow diverse communities and underrepresented perspectives to be heard. From Australia, we will present examples from Queensland University of Technology’s Open Press, and from Aotearoa New Zealand we will look at the diverse groups represented on the Tuwhera open access platform hosted by Te Wānanga Aronui o Tāmaki Makau Rau/Auckland University of Technology.
We will conclude by describing the formation earlier this year of a vibrant diamond open access publishing community of practice, a forum where those interested in starting a diamond journal and those already involved in running one can interact to promote best practice and tackle challenges together. We discuss the priorities this CoP is focusing on in 2024 and why, and look at the applicability of the diamond publishing approach to the wider OE community.
Included in
[Session 6C]: Repositories, Pedagogy, Practice and Policy in OEReferencesDiamas (2023). Developing Institutional Open Access Publishing Models to Advance Scholarly Communication. https://diamasproject.eu/about/ CRAFT-OA (2023). CRAFT-OA (Creating a Robust Accessible Federated Technology for Open Access). https://www.craft-oa.eu/ Ancion, Z., Borrell-Damián, L., Mounier, P., Rooryck, J., Saenen, B. (2022). Action Plan for Diamond Open Access. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6282402 Catterall J, Barbour V. Open access initiatives by research active institutions in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand: a snapshot of the landscape in 2022. Zenodo. June 26, 2023. doi:10.5281/zenodo.8081166
Author KeywordsInclusion diversity equity and access, Open access publishing, Open licencing, Open practitioners
