A model of distributing scientific publications and other unpublished effects of scientific activity (e.g. conference posters, multimedia presentations), under which the author independently deposits and makes their work available on the Internet (self-archiving).
When an author publishes their text in a journal with a traditional subscription-based publishing model, usually when entering into a contract with the publisher, the author waives some or all of their copyrights to the article. However, this does not mean that the author loses the right to disseminate the work on their own. Most publications have an OA policy under which authors can share their publication with others on specific terms.
One practice commonly used by publishers is a time embargo during which an article will only be available on the publisher’s website. Another frequent practice is to allow the self-archiving of only certain versions of the article. For example, the publisher may agree to make available a preprint (i.e. a pre-review article) or postprint version (i.e. the final, reviewed version of the article, but without the editorial cover of the journal), while prohibiting the distribution of the publisher version, i.e. the version that can be found in the journal. Publishers often also determine the licence under which publications are made available.
Keep in mind that every journal adopts its own OA rules, so before publishing anything on the Internet, the author should make sure that they have the right to do so. The first place to visit is the Sherpa/RoMEO database, which gathers information on the OA policies of publishers. The database can be browsed by publisher name, journal title or ISSN. Information on the form and manner in which the author can disseminate their article should also be available on the journal’s website or can be obtained by contacting the editorial team.
After verifying the possibility of self-archiving, it is time to decide where to place your work. Depositing it in an open repository is the best solution. Repositories provide adequate infrastructure for long-term storage and sharing of files. Moreover, many resources are indexed in various bibliographic and abstract databases, and scientific search engines, especially in Google Scholar. Indexation significantly improves online visibility, which in consequence may also have a positive impact on the number of citations.
The repository should be selected based on the scientific discipline and the institution with which it is affiliated. There are repositories which collect publications from specific disciplines, such as arXiv or ChemRxiv. Another type of repositories are institutional repositories, intended for the academic staff of a given university. The MOST Wiedzy is one such example. There are also “orphan repositories”, providing access to works from various disciplines and institutions, such as the Open Science Centre Repository. Also remember that depositing an article in one repository does not restrict the author from placing the same text in other repositories. OpenDOAR (Directory of Open Access Repositories) can help you choose a repository. One should also keep in mind that social networks for researchers, e.g. Academia.edu and ResearchGate, are not repositories. This is important primarily in the context of the OA policies of publishers, who often emphasise that their consent to share an article applies to repositories, but not websites, such as ResearchGate.