Article Sharing

Athena International Publishing believes that scholarly research is by its nature collaborative and that sharing of information is a crucial factor for advancing human knowledge and understanding. The ways by which scholarly information is delivered and consumed is rapidly evolving. As the use of sharing networks grows, the ambiguity over how to access, share and use articles on platforms and tools like scholarly collaboration networks (SCNs) has become apparent. The STM Association has established a core set of principles that clarify how, where and what content should be shared using SCNs and websites, and to improve this experience for all. These Voluntary Principles for Article Sharing on Scholarly Collaboration Networks aim to allow publishers and scholarly collaboration networks to work together to facilitate sharing, which benefits researchers, institutions, and society as a whole. Athena International Publishing endorses these principles which form the basis of the article sharing policy below.

Article Sharing Policy

Athena International Publishing endorses the STM Association's Voluntary Principles for Article Sharing on Scholarly Collaboration Networks as we believe that scholarly sharing is essential to maximize the dissemination of knowledge and to enable research collaboration. Authors who publish in Athena publications can share their research in various ways depending on the article version that they wish to share:

Preprints. Authors can share their preprint anytime anywhere. If accepted for publication, we encourage Authors to link from the preprint to the final published article via its Digital Object Identifier (DOI). Millions of researchers have access to formal publications, so these links will help users to find, access, cite and use the best available version. Note that some society-owned publications, as well as publications which operate double- or triple-blind peer review, may have different preprint policies which can be found on the relevant publication homepage if applicable. Under no circumstances should preprints be added to or enhanced in any way to appear more like, or to substitute for, the final versions of articles.
Accepted Manuscripts. Authors can share their accepted manuscript immediately via their non-commercial personal homepage or blog, by updating a preprint with the accepted manuscript in preprint databases such as arXiv or RePEc, by providing copies to their students or to research collaborators for their personal use, via their institutional repository or other non-commercial hosting platforms, or via commercial websites with which Athena International Publishing has an agreement. In any case, accepted manuscripts should: (a) link to the final published article via its DOI; (b) bear a valid Creative Commons user license; (c) if aggregated with other manuscripts, for example in a repository or other website, be shared in alignment with our hosting policy; (d) not be added to or enhanced in any way to appear more like, or to substitute for, the final published article.
Final Published Articles (a.k.a. ‘versions of record’). These may be shared according to the relevant user license and should contain the applicable end-user license and a DOI link to the citable version of record on the Athena platform. Note that this means that any articles bearing a non-commercial (NC) Creative Commons license cannot be shared publicly on commercial platforms or scholarly collaboration networks such as ResearchGate and Academia.edu.

For more information about all aspects of scholarly sharing and for practical tools on how and where an article can be shared, please visit http://www.howcanishareit.com/.