# WikiJournal User Group/Comparison to other journals

Throughout history, scholarly journals have been published. Subscription has been required for access to copyrighted journals. Alternatively, an article can be purchased, one must be an enrolled college or university student to access an article, or a user can search for free open-access journals, which have existed long before WikiJournal. Publishers of open-access journals have required charges for authors to publish their own works. Like many subscription-based journals, the peer review processes for most of those journals have been nontransparent. Publishing articles into WikiJournal, on the contrary, requires no charge. Moreover, at WikiJournal, comments by peer reviewers will be made publicly available once an article is either submitted or accepted; peer reviewers can be either anonymous or non-anonymous. Authors must consider whether licenses that WikiJournal accepts and/or transparency of comments by peer reviewers suit their needs and wishes before choosing WikiJournal for free publication. If licenses and/or transparency do not, then other non-Wikimedia journals may be more appropriate choices for them.

## Comparison to open-access journals

    Note: The table may not list all publishers and journals due to the length and size of the website and various devices.
* NC = noncommercial; ND = no derivatives

### Open-access journals using neither NC nor ND licenses

| Journals / Publications | Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) | Other acceptable licenses | Publication fees | Transparency of peer reviews |
| WikiJournal | By default | CC BY-SA CC Zero GFDL | No charges | Public peer review (either throughout process, or upon article acceptance) Either anonymous or non-anonymous reviewers |
| SciPost | Mandated | None | No charges | Reviews are public for accepted articles. Reviewers choose to be anonymous or not. |
| European Geosciences Union (webpage) | Mandated | Open Government Licence | Varies | Public peer review (either throughout process, or upon article acceptance) Either anonymous or non-anonymous reviewers |
| F1000 Research | Mandated | CC Zero (only data) | APC: US$150–1000 | Public peer review (either throughout process, or upon article acceptance) Names and affiliations of reviewers are revealed. |
| PeerJ | Mandated | None | Article Processing Charges (APC): US$900–1100 Membership: US$400–500 | Authors decide if reviews are public. Reviewers choose to be anonymous or not. |
| BioMedCentral (webpage) | By default | CC Zero (only data) | Varies | Non-transparent, though one or a few journals conduct trial experiments on transparent peer reviews |
| PLOS (webpage) | Mandated | Probably none | Varies | Non-transparent |
| Redfame Publishing | Mandated | None | APC: US$200–400 | Non-transparent |
| Frontiers | Mandated for articles published on July 2012 and thereafter | For articles published before July 2012: CC BY-NC Publisher's own license These licenses are no longer used for newer articles. | A-type: US$950–2950 B-type: US$700–1850 C-type: US$450 D-type: Free | Non-transparent, though names of reviewers are revealed when articles are published. Reviewers who have withdrawn during the review process before publication shall remain anonymous. |
| BioCore | Mandated | None | High-income (countries): 1st (article): US$899 2nd: US$799 Others: US$699 each Middle-income: 1st: US$599 2nd: US$499 Others: US$399 each Low-income: 1st and 2nd: US$299 Others: US$199 each | Apparently non-transparent |
| MDPI (webpage) | Open Access only | Probably none | APC varies in individual journals; a few offer free publication fees | In some journals, authors decide if reviews are public. Reviewers choose to be anonymous or not. |

### Open-access journals allowing NC and ND licenses

| Journals / Publications | Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) | Other acceptable licenses | Publication fees | Transparency of peer reviews |
| Elsevier (webpage) | Gold only | Gold and green: CC BY-NC-ND Open archive: User license | Gold: US$150–5000 Green: No charge | Non-transparent, with plans to introduce more openness |
| Karger (webpage) | Gold only; additional requirements also apply for funding bodies to use the license | Gold: CC BY-NC-ND (default) CC BY-NC Green: Limited | Gold: Varies Green: Subscribing institutions pay the fees; no additional charges | Non-transparent |
| SAGE Publishing (webpage) | Gold only | Gold and SAGE Choice: CC BY-NC CC BY-NC-ND Green: Limited | Gold: Varies SAGE Choice (Hybrid Open Access): US$3000 plus fees Green: Unknown, but possibly no charge | Non-transparent |
| American Mathematical Society (webpage) | Gold only | Gold: CC BY-NC Green: Transferred to publisher unless otherwise | APC (Gold): US$1500–2750 Green: Free Membership: US$16–2940 | Non-transparent |
| Wiley (OA website) | By default | CC BY-NC CC BY-NC-ND | Varies | Non-transparent |
| Oxford Univ. Press (webpage) | Yes | CC BY-NC CC BY-NC-ND | £1000–£2500 plus additional fees | Non-transparent |
| Nature Research (webpage) | By default | Some other journals use other CC licenses, like CC BY-NC | Varies | Non-transparent |
| De Gruyter (webpage) | No | CC BY-NC-ND | Open Access (full): €500–1500 Open Access (Hybrid): €2000 Additional fees also apply to both methods | Non-transparent |
| PAGEPress Publications | Probably no | CC BY-NC | APC: Varies, though some journals do not require authors to pay the charges Membership: €100–600 plus applicable VAT | Non-transparent |
| Medknow Publications | Probably no | CC BY-NC-SA | Varies, though some journals may require no fees | Non-transparent |
| Scientific Research Publishing | Yes | CC BY-NC CC BY-NC-SA | US$99–1299 | Non-transparent |
| OpenEdition Journals | Maybe some journals | Varies; other journals use other CC licenses, like ones below: CC BY-NC CC BY-NC-SA CC BY-NC-ND Some or many other journals do not state which licenses to use. | Varies; some or many journals do not require fees | Apparently non-transparent in most journals |

### Notes about above publications

* 1 2 3 4 version 4.0 International is the version of Creative Commons licenses used for more recent and current articles. Older articles may have been released under prior versions of CC licenses.
* ↑ uncertain whether CC BY-SA 4.0 is acceptable as it is not considered suitable for Wikipedia articles
* ↑ only if added with another compatible license; text content released on 15 July 2009 and thereafter under only this license cannot be imported into any project.
* ↑ only if affiliated with the British Government and its institutions
* ↑ Some discounts may apply but cannot be combined, especially for a single article.
* ↑ CC Zero can be used for articles if releasing the work into the public domain is required by law.
* ↑ One of the journals previously used CC BY and CC BY-NC simultaneously, but that turned out to be an error. The correct license is CC BY instead.
* ↑ Fees can be waived to "journal reviewers and editorial members" who perform their tasks under guidelines.[
* ↑ An update to a licensing allowing commercial use, like CC BY or CC BY-SA, can be requested.
* ↑ MDPI was listed in 2014 in Jeffrey Beall's list of predatory open-access publishers. In 2015, it was de-listed from the list, which was later shut down in 2017.
* ↑ Accepted manuscripts using the Green Open Access option must attach the CC BY-NC-ND license
* 1 2 Elsevier and Wiley's (mis)usages of the CC BY-NC-ND license were discussed in Creative Commons's 13 March 2015 weblog post
* ↑ Policies (journals) from Nature Research
* ↑ included in Beall's List (shut down in 2017) as predatory publisher
* ↑ Some other articles use this CC BY-NC-SA, but whether the publisher still offers the CC BY-NC-SA option is uncertain

## Comparison between open-access and other journals

| | Open-access journals | Subscription-based journals |
| Access to articles | Available to public, variably either immediate or delayed | Must do one of the following pay subscription fees to access articles sign in an account (most likely college or university) to access them buy an article |
| Usage and licensing of content | Various journals have licenses that can allow one or more following uses Commercial use Noncommercial uses Modifications Derivative uses Reproduction and distribution | Usually personal, noncommercial uses may be allowed. Permission is required for other uses, like reprinting and/or commercial uses. |
| Transparency of peer reviews | Varies; most of peer reviews at WikiJournal are public via either process or article acceptance | Non-transparent |

## Dubious and predatory publications

Journals and publishers that are considered dubious and/or predatory are not (supposed to be) listed in this page. If a listed journal or publisher is found to be dubious and/or predatory, it can be either marked as dubious and/or predatory, or removed from one of the lists above. Authors willing to publish their own works to non-Wikimedia journals should be aware of such journals and publishers and be certain how authentic they are before submitting works to them. The below links can further explain how to tell whether a journal or publisher is highly reputable.
* "Quality" at OpenAccess.nl
* "Dubious OA Publishers" at Lund University Library
* "Free Access to Scholarly Research and Unrestricted Reuse" at Enviro Research Publishers
* "'Fake,' 'Predatory,' and 'Pseudo' Journals: Charlatans Threatening Trust in Science" at the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors

## Content licensing

"Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International" (CC BY 4.0) is the default license for articles in WikiJournal. Upon request, other acceptable licenses include any Wikipedia-compatible license or multi-licensing thereof. However, "noncommercial" and "no derivatives" licenses are not acceptable at Wikimedia projects. If an article is to be used for only noncommercial uses and/or cannot be derived into other works, other existing non-Wikimedia journals may be more suitable for those needs. See also WikiJournal User Group/Ethics statement#Copyright and licensing.
Articles published on or before 1 January 1929 are in the public domain in the United States and are more suitable for Wikisource, Wikimedia Commons, Internet Archive, and other websites that can hold public domain content.

## Publication charges

Many publishers and journals require monetary charges for authors to release their works into Open Access. This is also true for works published under CC BY or CC BY-SA. WikiJournal, on the other hand, does not; rather publishing an article into one of its journals requires no costs. However, authors must consider how their works are to be distributed and used (see #Comparison to open-access journals or #Content licensing) before choosing WikiJournal for free publication.

## Transparency of peer reviews

All comments made from peer reviewers will be made publicly available, at the latest upon article submission. The identities of peer reviewers are preferably made publicly available, but they may choose to be anonymous.
Peer review comments are generally made available publicly directly by direct wiki addition, or added as soon as possibly after reception by an editor. In some cases, the author may request that the peer review process is kept non-public. Many journals do not accept submissions that have been in the open at any time, and thereby authors may be harmed by premature disclosure of any or all of an article submission's details. In such cases, the peer review will be made public first after article publication.

### Why transparency?

WikiJournals are unusual in their level of transparency. Transparent peer reviews allows for readers to get a deeper understanding of the material, particularly where it may be contentious. Also, even after at least 2 peer reviews, there may still be errors in the article, and open peer reviews allows readers to check whether these have been discussed earlier. Open peer reviews thereby give readers the ability to perform further quality checking of works.
Transparency is one of guiding principles valued and unanimously passed on 30 May 2013 as part of a resolution by the Wikimedia Foundation.