Archives
Opening up Scientific Data
Because those tools can take us into a new era: the era of open science. I’m in no doubt we are entering that phase: and that the impact will be good for citizens, good for scientists and good for society.
Neelie Kroes.
Hot off the press: The Determinants of Open Access Publishing: Survey Evidence from Germany
We discuss the results of a survey conducted in fall 2012 and covering 2,151 researchers in Germany. We show that there are significant differences between the scientific disciplines with respect to researcher’s awareness of and experience with both open access (OA) journals and self-archiving. Our results reveal that the relevance of OA within a discipline may explain why researchers from particular disciplines do (not) publish OA. Besides, several aspects like copyright law, age, profession or the inherent reward system of a discipline play a role. As a consequence, the paper emphasizes that a “one-size-fits-all” approach as promoted by most recent policy approaches is little promising for providing an effective framework for shaping the future of scholarly publishing.Abstract.
Crowdfunded science exhibit encourages duplication
The United Nations Education, Science and Culture Organization headquarters in Paris recently hosted the launch of IMAGINARY, a new platform for collaborative mathematics and maths art, or open mathematics. The launch was part of the Mathematics of Planet Earth Day and the opening of the first international crowdsourced science, open source exhibition hosted by the platform: Mathematics of Planet Earth.
How institutional repositories are already working to solve the Open Access problem
Natalia Madjarevic, Dave Puplett, and Neil Stewart clarify the existing capabilities of institutional repositories and highlight the powerful transitional role they can play in providing greater access and benefits for individuals, institutions and disciplines.LSE Blog.
We Need Open Data To Change The World
Social sector organizations are in the business of changing the world, and the information they collect and use should be the catalyst for making that happen. Courtesy of broadband Internet and mobile wifi we now have global, low-cost ways to share data that every social-purpose organization can plug into. From it, they should be able to draw what they need about previous experiments, effective practices, and achieved outcomes, as well as what has failed and why. That way, local social entrepreneurs can mimic what works elsewhere and share their ideas, successes, and failures.
HBR Blog Network.
Are Some Current Open Access Mandates Backfiring on the Intended Beneficiaries?
The OA bargain is becoming a bit more fraught as more people get involved and as founding concepts are stress-tested by practical matters. If the OA movement remains dogmatic about the details, and is not willing to compromise or improve on ideas established years ago and never thoroughly validated on a large scale, it run some serious risks of losing support in the wider world.Times Higher Education.
Open Access, “Neoliberalism”, “Impact” and the Privatisation of Knowledge
Martin Paul Eve, Lecturer in English Literature, University of Lincoln on the economies of knowledge.American Anthropological Association Will Experiment With Open Access
The public currently has to wait 35 years after publication to have free access to articles, according to a spokeswoman for the group. That will change early next year, when the journal Cultural Anthropology switches over to a fully open-access model.The Chronicle.
Shareconomy: The most important „open“ initiatives
Check the initiatives listed on Open Data, Open Government, Open Access, Open Education, Open Content, Open Hardware/Open Compute.
Article in German.
Open Access server of the German National Library of Economics
EconStor is the new Open Access server of the German National Library of Economics – Leibniz Information Centre for Economics. EconStor provides a basis for the free publication of academic literature in economics. Any research facility wishing to publish and permanently preserve relevant publications in economics under the terms of Open Access can do so on EconStor. EconStor offers a full service for entire working paper series and e-journals. This includes the uploading of PDF files as well as the processing of all corresponding title data such as abstracts, keywords and JEL codes. Scholars have the option of self-archiving their so-called postprints (free author’s versions of articles from publishers’ journals) to make them accessible. At “Publisher copyright policies & self-archiving (SHERPA/RoMEO database)” authors can find out whether a publisher permits parallel, free publication of previously published articles as postprints on EconStor.
Live Chat: Should scientific articles be free?
Read the archived chat between Heather Joseph, who advocates for open access as the executive director of the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition, and Frederick Dylla, who has expressed concerns about the implementation of open access as executive director of the American Institute of Physics.
Science Magazine.
Call for proposals: Open access advocacy campaigns
Following the success of 2012 and 2011 grant competitions, the EIFL-OA programme invites new proposals for organising national or institutional open access advocacy campaigns to reach out to research communities. We particularly wish to involve researchers and students, research administrators and policy makers, university presses and society publishers.
“A MODERN DIGITAL LIBRARY OF ALEXANDRIA”
Preparations are underway for the much-anticipated launch of the Digital Public Library of America. The public unveiling is to occur on April 18th and 19th at the Boston Public Library. This ambitious project, envisioned by Harvard University Librarian, Robert C. Darton to be an important step towards “a modern Digital Library of Alexandria”.
Interview with PeerJ Editor Fabiana Kubke
This is the second in our Series of Interviews with PeerJ Editors, giving them a voice to express their thoughts about academic publishing, open access and PeerJ. This time around we spoke to Fabiana Kubke who is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Medical Sciences (Department of Anatomy with Radiology) and a member of the Centre for Brain Research at the University of Auckland in New Zealand.
Why We’re All in Open Source Now
Check this Wired-article on the GitHub-generation.Open Education Week
Starts today!Open Education Week is taking place from 11-15 March 2013 online and in locally hosted events around the world. The purpose of Open Education Week is to raise awareness of the open education movement and opportunities it creates in teaching and learning worldwide. Participation in all events and use of all resources are free an open to everyone.
Implementing the UK Open Access policy: The embargoes for Green
Anyone who has been tracking the rapid transition from the recommendations of the Finch Group to the emergence of RCUK’s policy must admit that the horse-trading around OA embargoes caused considerable confusion. The House of Lords Science and Technology Committee report into the policy published on 22 February 2013 produced this graphic to highlight how it should work.
Growth in use of the CC-BY license
A total of 252,418 articles were published with the CC-BY license during the period shown above.
Wiley extends open access license choice for authors publishing OnlineOpen
Blog entry on wiley blog.Students: Get Your University Press to Support FASTR
Ask your university press todisavow the AAP stance on FASTR. Universities, as major recipients of federal funding for research, should be in support of a strong public access bill; their own publishing shops should not, by default, subscribe to the AAP’s position.Letter to use provided on website.
Fun and games ‚can save the planet‘
A project has been launched to see whether games can help increase people’s interest in environmental issues. “Play is, has and always will be part of human nature” (Ed Gillespie).BBC News.