This month, the Nature Publishing Group (NPG) announced Scientific Reports, a new online, open access journal. The new journal is reminiscent of PLoS One, which has the same liberal criteria for acceptance: All original and technically valid papers are accepted.

This move is a little surprising, because in the past Nature has accused PLoS One of relying on "bulk, cheap publishing of lower quality papers to subsidize its handful of high-quality flagship journals." Perhaps their change of mind has something to do with the recent uprise against NPG's increased subscription fees, in which the University of California threatened to boycott all Nature journals.

Nevertheless, I think it's a very good thing that one of the most distinguished publishers in the world has joined in the open access movement.

And now we can all have a Nature publication!