Open Access (OA) is an international initiative to provide permanent, immediate and free access to the full text of publicly funded science and research results on the Internet. Texts published under open access can be copied, reproduced, printed, duplicated and searched without specific legal, financial or other restrictions.

OA is a response to the significant impact of the Internet on the dissemination of information and scientific knowledge and provides an alternative to the traditional publishing model of commercial publishers.

Neither green nor gold publishing means that the author avoids the peer-review process or the normal publishing process, and it is not self-publishing.

Just like publishing in traditional journals, open access publishing is also associated with publishing fees (article processing charge/article publishing charge). Most publishers publish the amount of the fee on their websites. In the context of OA, the OpenAPC project has been set up to publish fees for open access publishing from universities and research organizations. A number of these institutions also set up their own publishing support fund and APCs are an allowable cost in many research projects.

The primary goal of open access is to ensure rapid, barrier-free communication of scientific knowledge and thus enable faster development of scientific collaboration.

For guidance on how to make the results of your publishing work visible, see Pavla Rygel's publication Otevřený přístup: jak zviditelnit výsledky své vědecké práce.

Worried about open access? Read Myths about open access.

The term Open Access is also used to refer to the worldwide movement to promote the free and unrestricted publication of scientific knowledge and its effective communication. Three milestones in the emergence and spread of the Open Access movement are referred to by the first letter of the place of adoption as BBB initiatives.

The Budapest Initiative (Budapest Open Access Initiative, BOAI)

The initiative was adopted at a meeting of the Open Society Institute with the support of the Soros Foundation in February 2003 in the Hungarian capital Budapest. The document articulates the basic principles and rationale of OA and emphasizes its positive impact on barrier-free scholarly communication and calls for broad involvement of the scientific community.

Bethseda Statement on Open Access Publishing

The Bethesda Statement was adopted in April 2003 at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute headquarters in Chavy Chase, Maryland (USA). The primary aim of the document was to stimulate discussion in the biomedical scientific community about ensuring open access to the primary scientific literature. Sub-target groups were identified - scientists and scientific societies, libraries and publishers, grant agencies and other institutions funding scientific research - for whom specific steps were outlined to achieve the above described goal, taking into account their role (see the text of the Statement for more details).

Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities

The Declaration was adopted in October 2003 at the Max Planck Conference in Berlin. It builds on two previous documents. An important feature of the Declaration is the application of the concept of open access to the humanities. The list of signatories of the Berlin Declaration.

The Right to Research coalition was founded by students in 2009 to promote open access to scientific information. Members of this coalition believe that no student should be denied access to the articles they need because their institution cannot afford the often high cost of access.

In support of the Open Access movement, Open Access Week is an annual promotional event in October, during which various seminars and information sessions on OA publishing and the use of OA resources are held.

More information about Open Access Week is available at: http://www.openaccessweek.org/.

Since 2010, the University Library of the University of West Bohemia has also participated in the event.

Basic information about Open Access in Czech:

• http://openaccess.cz
• http://ikaros.cz/fenomen-open-access-v-informacni-spolecnosti

Basic information about Open Access in English: 

• http://oad.simmons.edu/oadwiki/Main_Page
• https://rcsproject.wordpress.com/oa-answers/
• http://digital-scholarship.org/tsp/w/tsp.html
• http://sparcopen.org/
• http://openaccess.eprints.org/

Publications on Open Access:

• publication Otevřený přístup k vědeckým informacím (Czech only)

Presentations on Open Access:

• presentation "Open Access (nejen) na ZČU" (.ppt, Czech only)
• presentation "DOI, Similarity Check, Open Science" (.pdf, Czech only)

You can send your questions about Open Access to digknih@uk.zcu.cz.

Videos on Open Access:

Open Access Explained!

Open Access: What's With All The Colors?