Open for business: Open access journals in commercial databases

Abstract

In this investigation the availability of Open Access journals in three commercial databases commonly licensed by libraries, as verified by reference to the Directory of Open Access Journals title list, ranged from 10.91% to 29.18%. A more in-depth analysis of sample Open Access titles available through these databases revealed that the databases varied from 0% to 96.72% in regards to clearly identifying Open Access content and between 83.33% and 96.72% in enabling full access to these sample titles. The inclusion of Open Access content also increased overall title counts in these commercial databases between 6.24% and 10.40%, raising the question of whether some databases include Open Access content to increase title counts and justify higher subscription fees.