This year's Open Access Week is themed “Community over Commercialization”. Every day of the Week we will spotlight an initiative – ranging from journals to publishers to infrastructures – that helps you publish equitably and openly, and that we support through the VU Open Access Innovation Fund. Today: ResearchEquals.
What is ResearchEquals?
ResearchEquals is a modular publishing platform that allows you to publish every step of your research process, not just the final report. From conference abstracts and grant proposals to collected data, code, images, and videos—anything you produce during your research can be shared. It's a powerful way to rethink what counts as publishable and go beyond the traditional journal article format.
“Modular publishing is a way to break free from the limitations of papers. 45% of researchers who publish one research module on ResearchEquals, come back to publish a second module”, says Chris Hartgerink, founder of ResearchEquals. “To me, this affirms there is a need for more diverse output formats than just papers.”
Why should you use ResearchEquals?
This open-access platform is free for both readers and authors, letting you focus on sharing your work without worrying about costs. Each "research module" receives a DOI, making it easy to find and cite by others. By publishing the different stages of your research, you can better track its evolution and give credit to everyone involved. This is particularly useful for long-term projects, as it breaks down your work into smaller, manageable, and publishable units. Furthermore, having the multiple stages of you research be open to anyone, can help the broader public understand how scientific work gets done. Platforms like ResearchEquals might therefore contribute to boosting trust in science.
“ResearchEquals is a great example of a community-led publishing initiative”, says Anne van den Maagdenberg, Open Access Librarian of VU Amsterdam. “The researchers involved in the platform get a direct say in how the platform is governed, making it a true community effort.”
Why an Innovation Fund?
Since 2023, the VU Open Access Innovation Fund supports journals, publishers, and infrastructure that are that are committed to ‘Diamond Open Access’, allowing researchers to publish without having to pay. This is a fairer and more open alternative to journals from large commercial publishers that charge high fees for Open Access. However, choosing ‘Diamond Open Access’ is not yet evident for all researchers: the journals and platforms are often smaller, making them harder to find, and there are often questions about the quality, susutainability, and prestige of publishing ‘Diamond Open Access’. The VU Open Access Innovation Fund was established to show researchers that there are high-quality, equitable, Diamond publication alternatives available that allow them to contribute to more inclusive (open) science.
