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The OLEcon team supports journal editors in the change to scholar-led Diamond Open Access and in setting up a sustainable funding model.
The call for tenders for the year 2025 starts.
We have launched another call for tenders in 2024. Apply now for funding.
OLEcon contributes to the increased financial effort during the transformation with transitional funding. Transitional funding can be used for staffing costs as well as material costs. These can be costs to make the back issues of a journal available in Open Access or personnel support for organising the journal’s transformation.
We already build a sustainable financing structure for the funded journals during the term of the transitional funding.
The OLEcon team advises you during the transformation of your journal to Open Access and/or another funding model. Our team has many skills and much experience in the area of publishing services and negotiations with publishers. We are happy to support you, if needed, in any questions arising during the transformation of your journal. We can help you e.g. by planning the time schedule or costs issues regarding the transformation, or we can support you, when negotiating with your current publisher.
We help you communicate the transformation of your journal through ZBW public relations channels.
There are two options for the hosting of your journal.
a) REMAINING:
You can stay with your current hosting provider as a service provider. For this, the service provider needs to comply with certain technical criteria of quality. This applies regardless of whether your service provider is a non-commercial provider, such as a university library, or a commercial publisher.
b) CHANGING:
You can change to the non-commercial scholarly service provider TIB Open Publishing. TIB Open Publishing is the cooperation partner of OLEcon. TIB Open Publishing offers the following services in cooperation with OLEcon:
— Technical setup of the journal and support for the software Open Journal Systems (OJS)
— Trainings for the software OJS
— Semi-automatic production of articles
— Indexation of the journal in pertinent databases
— Use of Crossref Similarity Check software for plagiarism checks
— Crossref DOI registration
— Registration or transfer of an eISSN
— Ingest into the Open Access Repository EconStor
— Long-term digital preservation
— Conformity with data protection requirements
You can find more information about their services on the website of TIB Open Publishing.
Both options are financially supported by OLEcon.
OLEcon is addressed to editors of scholarly journals that …
Editors can apply who:
The ZBW puts particular emphasis on compliance with quality standards in OLEcon. A peer review process is a prerequisite for funding from OLEcon.
We also have technical standards for quality which the service provider hosting the journal must comply with. The quality of the journal’s content is the responsibility of the journal’s editors.
After the transformation to Open Access, the journals should comply with the criteria of “real” Open Access as laid down in the Berlin Declaration on open access to knowledge in the sciences and humanities. This includes publication under a Creative Commons CC-BY licence for scholarly content. An easy introduction to Creative Commons licences can be found in the flyer produced by the OGeSoMo project (University Duisburg-Essen).
We welcome the open publication of research data together with their related scholarly papers. Editors of OLEcon journals can use a ZBW web service for the publication of research data, if required: the Journal Data Archive.
The decision for funding by OLEcon is made through a grant procedure. It serves to ensure transparency, non-discrimination, and efficiency in funding. The formal invitation to tender is published on an online portal.
The grant procedure has two steps:
The first step is the expression of interest. Here you need to give some information about the journal. During this step we check if the journal fulfils formal criteria. A comparative evaluation of all journals follows in the second step. At the end a grant for funding is made.
The procedure takes approximately six months.
Do you have any questions about the grant procedure? Get in touch with us.
Subject: Funding
My journal does not belong to the field of economics. Can I still apply?
Application is open only to journals from economics and from related disciplines. The decisive criterium is the collection profile of the ZBW. Journals that fit the collection profile are usually indexed in the ZBW search engine EconBiz. If you are unsure, you’re welcome to contact us.
Can I apply to OLEcon with an idea for founding a new journal?
Yes, newly-founded journals can apply. Please get in touch with us to discuss the details of further planning.
The ZBW’s engagement for Diamond Open Access with OLEcon does not end when the transitional funding stops. The ZBW as an information infrastructure institution organises a collaborative funding of the OLEcon journals and will also act as a main sponsor of the consortial funding.
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