Every June, the scholarly publishing ecosystem undergoes a familiar ritual. Inboxes and industry feeds flood with identical, celebratory corporate press releases as Clarivate drops the latest Journal Citation Reports (JCR). But for publishing executives navigating a market defined by massive commercial consolidation, the real value of these metrics lies beneath the surface. The true strategic question isn't "Did our scores go up?" but rather, "What do these metrics tell us about the structural shift in where researchers want to publish?"

As the research community navigates recent Office of Management and Budget (OMB) revisions, a seductive argument has surfaced in the debate over open science: why do we need article processing charges (APCs) at all when Green (repository deposit) and Diamond (institutionally subsidized) OA models exist?

At JMIR Publications, we believe that choosing the right journal is one of the most critical steps in a researcher’s journey. For over two decades, we have supported open-science frameworks that provide diverse, reliable pathways to measure a paper’s reach and community impact.

Open-access publishing is built on a promise: research funded by the public should be freely available to the public. A sweeping new proposal from the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) threatens to break that promise by fundamentally rewriting how federal grants are awarded, managed, and published.

JMIR Publications, a leading publisher of academic journals dedicated to digital health and open science, today announced it has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for a three-year partnership with MetaROR (MetaResearch Open Review). The collaboration will focus on integrating MetaROR’s publish-review-curate platform with JMIR’s innovative publishing ecosystem—specifically its JMIRx overlay journal series, including JMIRx Med and JMIRx Bio.

For over 25 years, JMIR Publications has operated on a simple premise: health research should be immediately and freely accessible to all. However, recent policy changes from major funders like Cancer Research UK (CRUK) now threaten to dismantle the very "Full Open Access" model that made this possible. By cutting all APC support, these policies risk stifling independent, scholar-led publishers while leaving the massive revenue streams of legacy publishers untouched. Below, we share our response to CRUK and propose five alternatives that reform the system without sacrificing the progress of the last two decades.

In response to "Is Subscribe to Open Good for Libraries?" Three librarians explain the model’s appeal and explore the challenges it presents. By Laurie Taylor, Miranda Bennett and Katherine Brooks | 02.17.2026

The transition to Open Access (OA) is no longer a distant goal; it is a rapidly accelerating reality. As we navigate this shift, the ESAC (Efficiency and Standards for Academic Collecting) Initiative is a useful compass, tracking the rise of Transformative Agreements (TAs) globally.

As I am preparing for my trip to Austin for the ER and L conference, I am thinking a lot about the conversations I have had with librarians over the past year, especially at Charleston in November. The consistent theme of each conversation was uncertainty—often budgetary, but also regulatory and administrative. Everywhere, libraries are under pressure to do more with less, leaving many to ask: how to manage library budget cuts while transitioning to open access? It’s clear that librarians are no longer just managing collections;  they’re navigating a total systemic shift.

Since its inception in 1999, JMIR Publications has been more than just a publisher—it has been a laboratory for the future of scholarly communication. As one of the world's first open-access publishers, JMIR has consistently pushed the boundaries of how scientific knowledge is captured, shared, and preserved.