In a pioneering move to enhance Open Science practices, SCOAP3 has established a new mechanism for the contractual period 2025-2027 (Phase 4). This new mechanism involves an annual assessment of these elements with publishers’ financial compensation adjusted based on the results. The outcome of this first evaluation can be found here.
This initiative aims to incentivize publishers to improve their Open Science practices by comparing their individual achievements on predefined Open Science Elements such as implementation of persistent identifiers (i.e. ORCiD, ROR,..), completeness of metadata, choice of open peer review offered to authors, compliance with accessibility standards, transparency around values defined by the SCOAP3 community.
By introducing this novel evaluation and incentive system, SCOAP3 is breaking new ground in the pursuit of more transparent, equitable, and sustainable open access publishing.
A SCOAP3 Forum will be held online on June 18th, 2025 and is open to all interested participants. In-depth information about the SCOAP3 contracts for Phase 4 and Open Science elements will be shared. Mark your calendars! More information will be sent in due time.