How to make your research open access - For authors of journal articles (SPARC)

If you’ve written an article for submission to a scholarly journal, consider publishing in an open-access journal. You can find a list of open-access journals in your field in the Directory of Open Access Journals: http://www.doaj.org/
If you decide not to publish in an open access journal, try to publish in a journal that allows open access self-archiving. Search journal policies in the SHERPA/RoMEO database: http://www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo.php.

Before you sign a publication agreement, make sure you understand your rights under the agreement. Protect your rights by using the SPARC Author Addendum: http://www.arl.org/sparc/author/
Consider applying a Creative Commons license to your article. (Many open access journals use a Creative Commons license automatically.) Visit Science Commons’ Scholar’s Copyright Project for more information, or go to Creative Commons to get
started. (If you’re not sure which license to choose, see Peter Suber’s newsletter from September 2004, the Definition of Free Cultural Works, or the Open Knowledge Definition).

Once your article has been accepted for publication and you have signed an agreement with the publisher, self-archive a copy of your article, if you have retained your right to do so or if the journal permits it. It only takes a few minutes of your time to make your article available.

If your institution hosts a repository, you may deposit your article there. See the Directory of Open Access Repositories (openDOAR) and Registry of Open Access Repositories to search for your institution.
If your institution does not host a repository, you may deposit your article in a repository of work in your discipline. Visit openDOAR to search for repositories by discipline.
If no institutional repository or subject repository is appropriate for your work, upload your article to your personal Web site.

How to make your research open access - For authors of journal articles