Scientific publisher Nature Publishing Group (NPG), UK, has announced that 49 journals it publishes now support Creative Commons through an annual donation. Based on the 1,113 open access articles published in 2011 in these journals, NPG and its partners are donating $22,260 to Creative Commons (CC).
NPG announced its annual contribution to CC in January 2011, for Scientific Reports and the 22 other journals NPG owns which offer an open access option, including Nature Communications. NPG's academic and society partners in the US, Europe and Australia have now joined the scheme, adding 26 further titles. The donation is equivalent to $20 per article processing charge (APC) paid for publication on open access articles in these journals. At the beginning of 2011, NPG donated $15,560 to CC for the 778 open access papers published in its owned journals from 2005 to the end of 2010.
Of the 1,113 open access papers published in 2011, 205 (18%) were published in the open access, multidisciplinary Scientific Reports, which launched in June 2011. 201 papers (18%) were published in Nature Communications, which offers authors an open access option. NPG's academic and society titles published 707 articles in open access journals or journals with an open access option.
Authors choosing to make their research paper open access in NPG titles have a choice of two non-commercial CC licenses. In 2011, 39 percent of authors opted for the Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported license that permits derivative works; while 61% opted for the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. On titles supporting CC, authors are also eligible for complimentary membership of the CC network, an international online community of people who support open access and open educational resources.
NPG publishes 57 journals that have an open access option, or are entirely open access. 55 of its 59 academic and society publications (93%) have introduced open access options or are open access journals. NPG plans to launch further open access journals in 2012.
