Copernicus Open Access publishing requires the author or a supporting institution to pay the Article Page Processing Charges (APPC). These cover the cost of the review process, typesetting, web publication and long term archiving, upon publication. Copernicus also gives the author the choice of customization, using a complex system for calculating its APPCs based on the number of pages published and the format of the material submitted. As Copernicus puts it, “authors can directly influence the price of the publication.”
Accordingly, what makes the financing models at Copernicus variant and flexible are charges that are based on article length and sources files (Word/LaTeX). For example, publishing a 10 page article (without calculating the additional tax) in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics could vary from €792 when using the publisher’s LaTeX template, to €1122 when using a different LaTeX template. Another option might be to use the publisher’s Word template and pay €957, or else pay €1287 when using another Word template. Surely, there is always the author’s choice between the publisher’s LaTeX and Word templates; i.e. between paying €792 or €957 respectively. Of course, fewer pages would cost the author even less.
In addition, Copernicus Publications provides several agreements where settlement of payments can be done directly between the publisher and the respective institution, given that members of those institutions opt to use Copernicus’s templates. For example, members of ETH Zurich, do not pay any publication fees for any of Copernicus’s journals if they use their LaTex or Word template. However, if an author does not use one of these templates, Copernicus will charge the difference to the author.
As to authors who lack financial support, Copernicus waivers policy provides another way to lower the price as they can benefit from the budget of free pages which is assigned by the chief editor of each journal.

Cite as:

Salhab, J. (2014). Copernicus Publications: When length of articles and choice of templates matter. Sustaining the Knowledge Commons / Soutenir Les Savoirs Communs. Retrieved from https://sustainingknowledgecommons.org/2014/10/23/copernicus-publications-when-length-of-articles-and-choice-of-templates-matter/