Open access is a publishing model for scholarly communication that makes research available to readers at no cost, as opposed to the traditional subscription model in which readers have access to scholarly information by paying a subscription (usually via libraries). A publication is defined as “open access” when there are no financial, legal or technical barriers to accessing it--that is to say when anyone can read, download, copy, distribute, print, search for and search within the information, or use it in educational or any other way within legal agreements.

In open access publishing the production costs involved--ones that used to be covered by subscriptions or arrangements with publishers--are paid for by authors, their institutions or other funders. This could mean that journals receive a subsidy from the hosting university or professional society or that journals charge a processing fee on accepted articles, to be paid by the author or the author's sponsor (employer, funding agency, etc.). Another way of covering these costs is via so-called “transformative agreements” between universities, libraries, research institutes and publishers.

In 2018, a coalition of European research funders signed a plan to speed-up full open access publishing across all scholarly disciplines. This group goes by the name of cOAlition S and their initiative is called "Plan S". Several American charitable organizations, such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, have also signed on to Plan S. In August 2022, the White House’s Office of Science and Technology issued a guidance directing Federal agencies to update their public access policies in order to make research funded by taxpayers publicly accessible without an embargo period or cost no later than the close of 2025.

In this lightning round session we hope to inform American historians, journal editors and members of affiliated learned societies about the principles, demands and opportunities of open access publishing, to present several European open access initiatives, and to consider the implications of open access for publishing historical scholarship on both sides of the Atlantic.