Open Access Publishing: Evaluating

Not all journals are equally appropriate for your work, so you'll want to research the journal before signing the publication agreement.  You can read their website, look at print issues, see if your institution subscribes to the journal already, and talk to your colleagues and librarians.

It's true that charging fees for open access publishing may seem counterintuitive.  It's supposed to be free, right?

However, fees are often necessary to cover publication and editorial costs, the costs of the double-blind peer review process, and the technical requirements for hosting articles and making them available online.

If you can't afford a publication fee, many publishers offer waivers.  Your grantor, institution, school, or department may also have funds budgeted to help faculty and staff publish in their fields.

Within the topic of open access publishing, there is concern about "predatory journals," which are generally defined as journals that purport to provide open access and charge a publication fee (sometimes an excessively high one), but do not provide the same level of editorial attention and peer-review process as a reputable journal.

There's no one list or tool that will tell you which open access journals are "predatory," but here are some resources to help you understand and vet a journal before publishing in it.  You can start with Declan Butler's checklist:

Buyer beware: A checklist to identify reputable publishers

• Check that the publisher provides full, verifiable contact information, including address, on the journal site. Be cautious of those that provide only web contact forms.
• Check that a journal's editorial board lists recognized experts with full affiliations. Contact some of them and ask about their experience with the journal or publisher.
• Check that the journal prominently displays its policy for author fees.
• Be wary of e-mail invitations to submit to journals or to become editorial board members.
• Read some of the journal's published articles and assess their quality. Contact past authors to ask about their experience.
• Check that a journal's peer-review process is clearly described and try to confirm that a claimed impact factor is correct.
• Find out whether the journal is a member of an industry that vets its members, such as the Directory of Open Access Journals or the Open Access Scholarly Publishers Association.
• Use common sense, as you would when shopping online: if something looks fishy, proceed with caution.