Do anyone related to scientific publishing has experience using EOI's as the identifier for the articles in a journal? I'm part of the editorial committee of a small open access ecology journal that is slowly growing Currently, our journal doesn't have the means to pay for the doi service, but we found this service which offers a different identifier, the EOI. We asked for additional information and some of the claims the state are:
&quot;You will be eligible to get EOI for any number of papers for your publication.&quot;
&quot;You need to pay one-time membership charges USD $100...&quot;
&quot;No charges per EOI.&quot;
&quot;For DOI you need to pay USD $2 per DOI, which cost really high for journals and membership charges ranges from USD $300 to USD $100000.&quot;
&quot;Both these objects serve the same purpose, but in EOI we provide more flexibility &amp; tools will be provided periodically for submission, no charges for errors (will be corrected by Citefactor staff)&quot;
They also list a sample of journals that use their service, which are not necessarily highly recognized, but then it would be also our case.
Is there any other alternative around to have a proper unique identifier for our articles?
I'm Ed Pentz, Executive Director of Crossref. I don't know anything about EOI so can't comment on it. I did want to correct the information you've been provided. Crossref charges annual membership fees from US$275 to US$50,000 but many smaller members join via a Sponsoring Organization and pay much less - please contact a sponsor if there is one in your country. We charge US$1 per current journal article and US$0.15 for older content. Fees for preprints, books and grants are different - full information on membership and fees is available. We have over 13,000 members in 139 countries so are very inclusive. It's not just about the identifier - registering content with Crossref means it's discoverable along with over 114 million other content items. Feel free to email member@crossref.org with any questions.