Elsevier: Bumps On Road To Open Access

An academic is asking researchers and librarians to send him more examples of cases where open access article fees have been paid to the publisher Elsevier but the article in question remains behind a paywall. The call has been made by Peter Murray-Rust, reader in molecular informatics at the University of Cambridge, after Elsevier admitted it had charged some people to reuse articles published with open licences.

On its Elsevier Connect website, the world’s largest publisher of science, technology, engineering and mathematics journals admits that it has erroneously charged 50 people a total of about $4,000 (£2,400) to reuse content published using licences permitting free reuse. It pledges to refund the people concerned since it has “never been our intention to charge for material or rights that should be free”...