Editing PLOS (section)

== Financial model ==
To fund the journals, PLOS charges an [[article processing charge]] (APC) to be paid by the author or the author's employer or funder. In the United States, institutions such as the National Institutes of Health and the [[Howard Hughes Medical Institute]] have pledged that recipients of their grants will be allocated funds to cover such author charges. The Global Participation Initiative (GPI) was instituted in 2012, by which authors in "group-one countries" are not charged a fee and those in "group-two countries" are given a fee reduction. (In all cases, decisions to publish are based solely on editorial criteria.)

PLOS was launched with grants totaling US$13 million from the [[Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation]] and the [[Sandler Family Supporting Foundation]].<ref>{{Cite journal
 | author = Declan Butler
 | title = Open-access journal hits rocky times
 | journal = [[Nature (journal)|Nature]]
 | volume = 441
 | page = 914
 | date = June 2006
 | doi = 10.1038/441914a
 | pmid = 16791161
 | issue = 7096
 | bibcode = 2006Natur.441..914B
 | author-link = Declan Butler
 | doi-access = free
 }}</ref> PLOS confirmed in July 2011 that it no longer relies on subsidies from foundations and is covering all of its operational costs.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://blogs.plos.org/plos/2011/07/2010-plos-progress-update/ |title=2010 PLOS Progress Update &#124; The Official PLOS Blog |publisher=Blogs.plos.org |date=2011-07-20 |access-date=2012-02-27}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.nii.ac.jp/sparc/en/publications/newsletter/14/fa1.html |title=How far has open access progressed? |first=Shigeki |last=Sugita |publisher=SPARC Japan |year=2014 |access-date=2015-10-26}}</ref> Since then, the PLOS balance sheet has improved from $20,511,000 net assets in 2012–2013 to $36,591,000 in 2014–2015.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.plos.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Progress-Update_FINAL_hyperlinked-091813.pdf |title=2012-2013 Progress Update |publisher=PLOS |date=2013-09-19 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141007113622/http://www.plos.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Progress-Update_FINAL_hyperlinked-091813.pdf |access-date=2014-01-01|archive-date=7 October 2014 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.plos.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Progress-Update_FINAL_LO_RES_Update-9.15.15.pdf |title=2014-2015 Progress Update |publisher=PLOS |date=2015-09-15 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304202614/https://www.plos.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Progress-Update_FINAL_LO_RES_Update-9.15.15.pdf |access-date=2015-10-26|archive-date=4 March 2016 }}</ref>