In January 2021, the groundbreaking open access publisher PLOS embarked on an innovative effort to help distribute publishing costs equitably among the institutions who support them. Community Action Publishing (CAP) aims to eliminate author APCs and make open access PLOS journals truly open to read and open to publish. In September, the CAP model was co-winner for PLOS of the 2021 ALPSP Awards for Innovation in Publishing.

Niamh O’Connor, chief publishing officer at PLOS, says the publisher’s focus is ensuring its portfolio includes the broadest range of researcher voices globally.

“Separate from our business models – but towards the same goal – is our work to expand our presence so that the members of PLOS staff who work with research communities understand the context and culture and the experience that researchers have and are much closer to them,” she tells CCC’s Chris Kenneally.

As Open Access Week returns for a fourteenth year, CCC joins the with all in the OA community – researchers, funders, publishers, and librarians – to share news and insights on the latest developments. CCC’s RightsLink for Scientific Communications supports PLOS’s CAP model by automating the management, collection, and funding of manuscripts. In partnering with PLOS on this important initiative, CCC helps provide the scale and automation required to support the needs of a growing community of stakeholders.

“Something that I’ve noticed over all my years of experience of partnering is it really, really matters that the partner understands the ecosystem – that they understand scholarly publishing and really understand how that works,” O’Connor says.

“That’s something that I’ve always experienced in working with CCC and that I think is part of what makes that partnering hugely valuable, where as a team, we can be stronger than either of us would be independently.”