Changes to OSA's Backfile Policy Effective 1 January 2017

For nearly 100 years, OSA has worked hard to achieve its mission of advancing the science of light around the globe. As the optics and photonics field has grown and changed during this time, our publishing portfolio has done the same. Today we publish a collection of 17 high-quality publications that collectively receive the largest number of article citations (40%) of any other publisher within the Optics category (Journal Citation Reports ®, Thomson Reuters, 2016).

As a publisher that is dedicated to delivering high quality content and products to our community, OSA has made significant investments in its journal program and platform over the last 6 years. This has been done to ensure that your patrons have the best possible user experience when accessing our content.

In light of the significant and ongoing investments that OSA has made, we have made the difficult decision to change our backfile policy effective 1 January 2017.

Under the new policy, institutions subscribing to any of OSA's package products in 2017, including any Print plus Online Combo package, E-combination package, Optics InfoBase or Optics InfoBase Premium package, will continue to receive complimentary access to the full backfile for those journal titles included in the package to which they are subscribed.

For those institutions who subscribe to an individual title or titles, OSA will provide complimentary access to the prior 10 years in addition to newly published content in 2017 (or from 2007-2017). We will also provide several options for individual title subscribers to continue to offer their patrons access to the complete backfile to individual titles that they subscribe to. These options include:

  1. ADDING THE EXTENDED BACKFILE FOR AN INDIVIDUAL TITLE OR TITLES TO THE PURCHASE OF THEIR SUBSCRIPTION. OSA will be offering single title subscribers the option to lease the backfile content to their single title subscriptions for a small fee. Adding the lease option on to your subscription will enable you to maintain access to all backfile content for an individual title or titles going back to volume 1.
  2. UPGRADING TO AN E-COMBINATION (E-COMBO) 3 or 4 PACKAGE. The E-Combo 3 package enables subscribers of any 2 of OSA's core journals, which includes Applied Optics, the Journal of the Optical Society of America A, the Journal of the Optical Society of America B, and Optics Letters, to add OSA's high-impact review journal, Advances in Optics and Photonics to receive complimentary access to the entire backfile for each of the titles selected as part of this package. A subscription to E-Combo 4 does the same but includes subscriptions to 3 of these core journals plus Advances in Optics and Photonics.
  3. PURCHASING ONE OF THE NEW SINGLE-TITLE DIGITAL ARCHIVE PRODUCTS. Starting in 2017, OSA will offer Digital Archive products for a few of our single-title products. Now your institution can purchase perpetual access to the archives of Applied Optics, Optics Letters, the Journal of the Optical Society of America A, and/or the Journal of the Optical Society of America B. Each single title Digital Archive will include access to all content published for that journal—from issue 1 to 2006. Since all 2017 journal subscriptions provide access back to 2007, a purchase of one of these single-title Digital Archives will enable you to provide complete access to all content for the single title(s) purchased.
  4. PURCHASING ONE OF OSA'S DIGITAL ARCHIVE PACKAGE OPTIONS. Institutions interested in providing access to the full backfile or portions of it in perpetuity can make a one-time purchase for one of OSA's Digital Archive package products. They include the OSA Centennial Archive (which includes more than 256,000 journal articles and conference proceedings from 1917 to 2015); the OSA Digital Archive 1 (which includes roughly 135,000 journal articles and conference proceedings published between 1917 and 2005); and the OSA Digital Archive 2 (which includes more than 121,000 journal and conference proceeding articles published between 2006 and 2015).

We are grateful for your continued patronage and look forward to continuing to serve you and your patrons in 2017. We know that changes to content access can be challenging, and we are happy to talk with you about the various options and what might work best for your library. Should you have any questions about the backfile policy and your options, please do not hesitate to contact your local sales agent or OSA representative.