Fundamentals of Open Access

This paper provides a background to open access, examines what is it and how it came about. It provides an analysis of the fundamentals of open access against the provisions of the Budapest Open Access Initiative (BOAI) and examines the barriers to open access, (price, technology and legal). It also looks at some of the fields related to open access such as, open educational resources and public sector information. The final section of the paper examines strategies to achieving open access and concludes with licensing, focusing on creative commons