Guest access policy
The Berkeley Electronic Press has pioneered an innovative guest access policy for scholarly journals. This policy offers a middle ground between the existing poles of free open access and fee-based subscription access.
Guest access balances the need for cost recovery against authors' and editors' desire for maximum readership and distribution. Those without subscriptions can access any article by filling out a short form that allows us to inform their library of their interest in reading our journals. When libraries are convinced of sufficient interest in the journal, they subscribe. Afterwards, access for all faculty, staff, and students at that institution is immediate and there are no more forms to fill out.
Why do libraries subscribe to Berkeley Electronic Press journals? One simple reason is that if one's community uses the journals, paying for them is the right thing to do. Beyond these moral obligations, our data indicate that readers completing the guest access forms represent somewhere between one-tenth and one-quarter of an institution’s likely readership. They are the tip of the iceberg when it comes to institutional interest.
This means that by subscribing, a library will provide its community with 4 to 10 times the usage-value that it would have from guest access alone. Additionally, subscribing guarantees ongoing access. A library is therefore not just buying this year's downloads and next year’s downloads, but downloads forever.
In part, the system depends upon the good faith of librarians. Putting our own faith in the good faith of librarians has been a favorable gamble for us. We have worked this way since 2001 with positive results. We hope to continue guest access forever and will continue this policy as long as librarians respond to interest on their campus with subscriptions. This model is similar to the National Public Radio model in the United States, where listeners foot the bill with contributions, but must suffer periodic "Pledge Breaks" where the stations ask for contributions. In our case, however, the Pledge Breaks constitute a short web form and only those who don't contribute suffer them.
We are not fanatical about our guest access policy. It is one model among many. We see both virtues and drawbacks in other models. For example, fully open access such as the Public Library of Science avoids the inconvenience of our web forms but requires cost recovery from authors and foundation support. The Berkeley Electronic Press strikes a balance between maximizing distribution and finding an equitable way to cover costs among those who benefit.