PRESS RELEASE FROM NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
1 August 2006
Embargo: for immediate release

NPG journals to open access to online archives

Nature Publishing Group (NPG) is pleased to announce that its academic
and society journals will be opening access to all online content
published before January 2003.  The archives will be accessible from
January 2007.  

This policy helps clarify content associated with a site license.  From
January 2007, site license access to any NPG publication will include
content from the current year plus a four-year rolling archive, with the
exception of those journals which already offer an open archive after 12
months.

The decision to open the journal archives has been made jointly by NPG
and by the societies for whom we publish.  Making each journal's older
content freely accessible will encourage wider usage.  The policy also
helps to address the issue of perpetual access to archives of
society-owned journals that transfer between publishers.

The society-owned NPG journals which already open their archives on a
12-month rolling basis are unaffected by this policy change.  

For Nature journals, as we have previously announced (see "Nature
Publishing Group introduces post-cancellation rights to licensed web
content", September 2005), a site license starting in 2007 will include
content from the current year plus a four-year rolling archive. Archive
content not included in the license agreement will be available to
purchase. However, site licenses starting in 2006 will have
post-cancellation rights to all the current licensed content (e.g. back
to 1997).

NPG remains committed to publishing the highest impact research, with
the widest possible readership. We will continue to innovate and develop
new publishing models in order to meet the individual needs of our
society partners and their journals, while ensuring we deliver a high
quality service to our readers and institutional customers.

Nature Publishing Group (NPG) is a division of Macmillan Publishers Ltd,
dedicated to serving the academic, professional scientific and medical
communities. NPG's flagship title, Nature, was first published in 1869.
Other publications include Nature research journals, Nature Reviews,
Nature Clinical Practice and a range of prestigious academic journals
including society-owned publications. NPG also provides news content
through news@nature.com and scientific career information through
Naturejobs.

NPG is a global company with headquarters in London and offices in New
York, San Francisco, Washington DC, Boston, Tokyo, Paris, Munich, Hong
Kong, Melbourne, Delhi, Mexico City and Basingstoke. For more
information, please go to www.nature.com.
 
Contact details:                        
Suzanne Kidd
Communications Marketing Manager
Nature Publishing Group, London
T: +44 (0)20 7843 4891
E: s.kidd@nature.com

Sue Deeley
Associate Director, Academic Journals
Nature Publishing Group, New York
E: s.deeley@natureny.com  

Links:
"Nature Publishing Group introduces post-cancellation rights to licensed
web content" - http://npg.nature.com/pdf/cancellation.doc

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For all NPG press releases, go to www.nature.com/press_releases.html.