Category — General

Harvard, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of California, Berkeley, Cornell and Dartmouth have announced their joint commitment to a compact for open-access publication.

The economic downturn underscores the significance of open-access publications. With library resources strained by budget cuts, subscription and licensing fees for journals have come under increasing scrutiny, and alternative means for providing access to vital intellectual content are identified. Open-access journals provide a natural alternative.

Happy Monday.

This post was written by The Alliance of German Science Organisations’ Open Access Working Group. The guest authors were:  Sünje Dallmeier-Tiessen, Heinz Pampel and Rubina Vock.

The Alliance of German Science Organisations’ Open Access Working Group and the project partners of the information platform open-access.net support the broad participation of German science institutions in international Open Access Week.

The coordinating committee with representatives of the working group and open-access.net encourages scientific and scholarly organisations in Germany to take part in Open Access Week to broaden awareness and understanding of Open Access among scholars and scientists. It is the aim of this group to support scientific and scholarly organisations with planning educational materials and events at their institutions within the framework of international Open Access Week in Germany.

The German Library Congress 2009 (the largest librarians meeting in Germany) offered us the chance to approach and inform over 3000 participants about Open Access Week. This meeting was instrumental in providing us with an opportunity to meet key players and allowed us to present the international Open Access Week and (possible) German contributions.

Our exhibit booth, located at a prominent corner of the fair hall, had been set up nicely with customized posters from Open Access Week. We displayed customized slides on Open Access Week, a poster from the information platform open-access.net and provided informational materials on different German open access projects.

Photo courtesy of Rubina Vock.

One highlight that also attracted many random visitors were the Open Access buttons (or perhaps it was the fresh and juicy strawberries that we also offered!).

Photo courtesy of Heinz Pampel.

It was impressive to see how more and more participants of the congress wore a button! Many participants of the congress got in contact with the representatives of the coordinating committee - questions varied from the general principles of open access publishing to support requests as well as requests for materials.

The whole activity was considered a great success not only because of the overwhelming response by the congress participants, but also by the many institutions willing to support and participate in Open Access Week.

Downloadable customized German and international materials - will be made available on the information platform open access.net. Moreover, all German institutions are invited to enhance their public visibility and publicise their activities and events at Open Access Week by registering with the information platform open-access.net.

“The woods are full of misunderstandings about OA.  They thrive in almost every habitat, and the population soars whenever a major institution adopts an OA policy.  Contact between new developments and new observers who haven’t followed the annual migrations always results in a colorful boomlet of young misunderstandings.

Some of these misunderstandings are mistaken for one another, especially in the flurry of activity, because of their similar markings and habitat.  Some are mistaken for understanding by novices unfamiliar with the medley of variant plumage, adaptive camouflage, and deceptive vocalizations.  This field guide should help you identify 25 of the most common visitors to your neck of the woods.

Leave your binoculars at home.  All of these can be seen with the naked eye.  With no more than this guide, and some patient observation, every trip to a conference, and even an occasional faculty meeting, can be an enjoyable and educational outing”.

The above courtesy of Peter Suber’s blog, learn more about the misunderstandings here and help to correct them.

The Open Access world has seen a few red letter days over the past few weeks.

Today, Lund University announced that they have established an OA publication fund and set up a relationship with PLoS. Below is an excerpt from their Press Release:

In accordance with its commitment to ensure public availability of its research output, the Lund University (LU) has reached an agreement with the Public Library of Science (PLoS) for the central funding of publication fees of LU scientists without burdening the budget of the individual researcher.

Like many Open Access journals, PLoS journals charge a fee for publication. For papers accepted in PLoS journals after March 1st 2009, LU will pay the publication fee directly to PLoS from central funds for all articles where the corresponding author is affiliated with a LU department.

“Lund University is committed to the movement towards open access to scientific information and PLoS is a top quality Open Access publisher” says Lars Björnshauge, Director of Libraries, Lund University.

Last week, MIT unanimously adopted a university wide OA mandate which is best summed up by quoting MIT Faculty Chair Bish Sanyal, who said that the vote was “a signal to the world that we speak in a unified voice; that what we value is the free flow of ideas.” Peter Suber’s blog reported this story.

In addition, Harvard’s Kennedy School also embraced OA last week and adopted a Mandate, that’s in addition to the historic vote by the Faculty of Arts and Sciences’s (FAS) in February, 2008. In the words of Kennedy School Dean, David T. Ellwood “In the developing world especially, where access to expensive journals is rare, there is a pressing need for access to the latest policy advice and scholarship coming from HKS faculty”. You can read more in the Library Journal.

Finally earlier this month, Oregon State University Library Faculty Adopted a  Strong OA Policy, the first library faculty in the USA to do so.