Category Archives: oa.green

Current State and Future Directions for Open Repositories in Europe

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“In January 2023, OpenAIRE, LIBER, SPARC Europe, and COAR launched a joint strategy aimed at strengthening the European repository network. As a first step, a survey of the European repository landscape was undertaken in February-March 2023. The survey found that, collectively, European repositories acquire, preserve and provide open access to tens or possibly hundreds of millions of valuable research outputs and represent critical, not-for-profit infrastructure in the European open science landscape. They are used for sharing articles that may be pay-walled in published journals, but also for providing access to a large variety of other types of research outputs including research data, theses/dissertations, conference papers, preprints, code, and so on. 

However, in order to ensure the European repository network is fit for purpose and able to support the evolving needs of the research community, the survey also identified three areas in particular that could be strengthened: maintaining up-to-date, highly functioning software platforms; applying consistent and comprehensive good practices in terms of metadata, preservation, and usage statistics; and gaining appropriate visibility in the scholarly ecosystem.

Despite the challenges, the current climate offers exciting opportunities for repositories. Many funders are actively promoting the repository route for articles because of their role in supporting equitable access to content (i.e. no fees to access or deposit). The value proposition for open science is growing and repositories are increasingly recognised as the main mechanism for collecting and providing access to a wide range of other research outputs. Add to this, the nascent, but growing, interest in the publish-review-curate model in which repositories have a central function, and it seems they are well placed to expand their current role in the ecosystem. 

The survey provides essential data that will help shape a joint strategy to enhance and strengthen European repositories that will be developed over the next several months.”

Practices for enhancing research visibility, citations and impact: review of literature | Emerald Insight

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“Institutional and subject repositories are excellent locations to make research outputs publicly accessible. Researchers can share their research with the public through a variety of alternative dissemination mechanisms, including Research Gate, Academia.edu and others. One of the best effective techniques to boost a research paper’s visibility and number of citations is through open-access (OA) publication, because it makes the study publicly accessible from the very beginning. Researchers can boost their visibility, preserve their work and make it available for use in the future by making all of their outputs publicly accessible. Ogunleye (2019) made a study on “Some determinants of visibility boost for research publications among early career educational researchers in southwest, Nigeria”. In this study, he described that the early career of educational researchers in Southwest Nigeria looked into some determinants (shared reference databases, research profiles, publishing in OA, self-archiving, publication metadata, researcher profiles and social media platforms) for boosting visibility of the publication. A structured questionnaire on factors determining publication boost (r = 0.81) was utilised to collect data, and multiple regression analysis and the Pearson’s correlation approach were employed to evaluate the data. A significant positive correlation between each of the following was discovered in the results: joint reference databases (r = 0.17), Publication metadata (r = 0.23), result profiles (r = 0.44), open-access publishing (r = 0.27), self-archiving (r = 0.52), social media networks (r = 0.43) and accessibility of published work are all positively correlated with each other. The six variables had a positive correlation with the publication visibility (R = 0.60), and they were responsible for 32.9% of the gains invisibility of early career researchers’ publications. Norman (2012) conducted a research on “Maximizing Journal Article Citation Online: Readers, Robots, and Research Visibility”. Then he explained that online academic publications with peer review provide numerous advantages for researchers. They can enhance an article’s popularity and publicity, connect someone’s research to the relevant web of existing literature rapidly and add other scholars’ attention who will use it, increasing the likelihood of it being used. Also provided five basic areas to make the literature more popular which are choosing a search engine-friendly title, writing of abstracts and introductions, making the article easy to find, using of media and links, dissemination of articles after publication and emphasised on increasing a piece of content’s prospects of future downloads, citations and visibility.”

Open Repositories Team Lead – Careers Portal Careers

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“We are looking for a repository manager to join the team to implement and lead a programme of work to review, update, host and maintain the current institutional repositories ePubs and eData.  In addition to developing the current research outputs repositories, you will build a team of data stewards who will curate the content of the repositories and any new repositories that are in development.

The post will be part of an Open Science theme of work within the Scientific Computing Department. We deliver services to researchers across STFC and have staff based at both the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL) in Oxfordshire and the Daresbury Laboratory (DL) near Warrington. The Group is responsible for the development and operation of library services, open access and open data services including two institutional repositories (ePubs and eData). It also undertakes research and development in open science practices and supporting technologies such as Persistent Identifiers, FAIR data and works with UKRI on Open Science Policy. Additionally members of the Group are active in national and international networks including the Research Data Alliance.

You will lead a review to identify a new repository platform for our existing repositories ePubs and eData and for several new repositories that are under development. Following the review, you will implement a change programme to install, configure and migrate data from our current repositories to a new platform(s)….”

The critical role of repositories in advancing open scholarship | ID: 27ceeede-448d-45e5-beb1-01c2351fa42c | Hyku

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Abstract:  There are thousands of repositories worldwide, which collectively preserve and provide access to hundreds of millions of scholarly resources. These repositories – mainly hosted by libraries, universities, governments and research centres – represent critical public infrastructure enabling researchers, students and the general public can reap the benefits of research. Yet, there are also challenges for optimizing this global network, which include a lack of interoperability and insufficient resourcing. This talk will discuss the benefits of open science, provide an overview of the current repository landscape, and identify the specific actions being undertaken by COAR and others to advance our collective vision.

 

CARL, OCUL, and University of Toronto Libraries Sign MOU Outlining Collaborative Intent to Develop a National Institutional Repository Service – Canadian Association of Research Libraries

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“The Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL), the Ontario Council of University Libraries (OCUL), and University of Toronto Libraries are pleased to announce their signing of an MOU outlining our collaborative intent to develop a National Institutional Repository Service to be hosted by Scholars Portal.  

The agreement establishes a framework for collaboration among the three parties involved in the planning, hosting, supporting and providing access to the service. It articulates a cooperative planning process for piloting and hosting a production implementation of the open-source software, DSpace. The University of Toronto Libraries will be responsible for managing the software which will be available to institutions across Canada through Scholars Portal. 

Starting with a pilot program of a limited number of institutions, the ultimate goal is to create a robust and scalable multi-institutional national repository service – one that is strengthened by a responsive, collaborative community of experts and repository practitioners. Scholars Portal will provide reliable technical hosting, security measures, monitoring, and technical support in line with other services currently being offered, with the potential for integrating digital preservation and other services/workflows, as a benefit to participating organizations….”

ResearchGate and MDPI Partner to Boost the Visibility of Open Access Content through Journal Home

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“This new partnership will expand the reach and visibility of MDPI’s participating flagship journals with ResearchGate’s highly relevant community of more than 25 million researchers globally.

Around 210,000 version-of-record articles from these 10 titles will be readily available on ResearchGate, including the full archive material and all new articles as they are published. These journals also benefit from enhanced brand visibility with dedicated journal profiles, prominent representation on all associated article pages and all relevant touchpoints across the ResearchGate network – keeping the journals top of mind with their reader and author audiences. All articles covered by the new partnership will automatically be added to the authors’ publication records in ResearchGate. This not only reduces MDPI authors’ needs for direct management but also offers them valuable insights in to the impact of their work, including data about readership and citations….”

IR @ INFLIBNET: Open Access Repository and Availability of ETDs in Nepal

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Abstract:  Most of the research work done around the globe as an academic mandate does not get published. Some of the researchers who publish their work in academic journals are not easily accessible to the general public due to their high subscription costs. Very few of them get published in an open-access repository accessible to all interested. Electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs) are very important to the university students and other researchers because of their academic value. Despite its importance, the archived ETDs in the institutional repository of the universities abroad (western countries) are not accessible to the public. To fulfill this gap in scholarly communication, Nepali universities and some other institutions in Nepal have initiated digital archiving in an open-access medium. This paper tries to show the situation of digital repositories in Nepal. Ten major digital repositories of universities, research institutions, the United Nations Resource Centre in Nepal, and the digital repositories run by the organisations of Nepal government, as well as non-government organisations, have been selected for this study. They archive a variety of items including books, journal articles, book chapters, ETDs, reports, conference papers, and images while major collections in the university repositories are ETDs. Most of these repositories are open-access.

 

UKCoRR Members’ Day – CORE Panel Session – CORE

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“The UKCoRR Members’ Day took place on November 13th and, at very short notice, was held online due to the ongoing technical problems currently being experienced by The British Library, who were the original hosts for the day long event.

Our panel session, entitled “CORE, repositories and supporting UKRI OA Policy” saw substantial participation with more than 120 people from U.K. HEIs in attendance. The session opened with a presentation from Professor Petr Knoth, Head of CORE. This presentation detailed CORE’s recent advancements and developments planned for the coming months, with the focus on how the tools and services being built by CORE can best serve the repository communities’ needs, with particular regard to the UKRI’s Open Access policy.

To be considered compliant with UKRI’s open access requirements, research articles made available via repositories are required to meet the following technical requirements. The relevant CORE Dashboard tool for each requirement is shown in orange:

“PIDs for research outputs must be implemented according to international recognised standards. …” (OAI Resolver)

“article-level metadata must be implemented according to a defined application profile that supports the UKRI Open Access Policy …” (Rioxx metadata validator)

“… deposit the Author’s Accepted Manuscript (or Version of Record, where the publisher permits) in an institutional or subject repository at the time of final publication …” (OA Compliance module)

“… common unique PIDs for research management information (for example identifiers for funders or organisations) are strongly encouraged. ORCID, the researcher identifier, must be supported …” (Enrichments tab)…”

Open Access und ein Blick auf das wissenschaftliche Publikationswesen | PsychArchives

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Open Access (OA) bezeichnet die freie Verfügbarkeit von wissenschaftlichen Publikationen mit Nachnutzungsrechten für alle weltweit, z.B. durch die Verwendung von Creative Commons Lizenzen. Im Vortrag soll ausgeführt werden, dass es mittlerweile möglich ist mit etwas Ressourcen (Zeit, Geld, Infrastruktur) so gut wie alle Forschungspublikationen in Open Access zu veröffentlichen. Dabei werden die verschiedenen Wege Green, Gold und Diamond OA kurz vorgestellt. Weiterhin wird gezeigt, wie Bibliotheken die einzelnen Wissenschaftler*innen dabei unterstützen. Mit zunehmendem Maße an frei verfügbaren Publikationen wird das Identifizieren und Bewerten von inhaltlich geprüften Informationen, beispielsweise durch einen Begutachtungsprozess in OA-Zeitschriften, auch für die Literaturrecherche bei studentischen Haus- oder Abschlussarbeiten immer wichtiger. Preprints sind dahingegen meist noch nicht geprüft, geben dafür aber einen sehr frühen Einblick in die aktuelle Forschung. Abgerundet wird der Vortrag mit einem kritischen Blick auf die Publikationslandschaft insgesamt und auf die aktuellen Entwicklungen. Das Erkennen von offensichtlichen Predatory Publishers ist wichtig, aber sollte nicht dazu führen, dass man nur noch Zeitschriften von großen Verlagen oder mit einer langen Historie (und damit verbundenen Kennzahlen wie dem Impact Factor) vertraut. Vielmehr ist eine Bibliodiversität wünschenswert. Aktuelle Entwicklungen zu immer kürzer werdenden Begutachtungsfristen sind vor dem Hintergrund von artikel-basierten Open-Access-Finanzierungsmodellen erklärbar, aber nicht unbedingt wünschenswert.

US Repository Network launches pilot to enhance discoverability of Open Access content in repositories

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“In November, the US Repository Network (USRN) will launch a pilot project aimed at improving the discoverability of articles in repositories. This pilot project involves the use of services from CORE, a not-for-profit aggregator based at Open University in the UK, to evaluate and improve local repository practices. Additional technical support will be provided by Antleaf Ltd.

As part of the project, CORE will aggregate the metadata and full text of articles from a subset of US repositories, allowing them to be findable through a centralized discovery service with prominent links back to the original full text of the repository. At the same time, the project will assess current practices related to metadata quality, the tracking of Open Access deposits, the use of PIDs, technical support for OAI-PMH, and the adoption of more recent protocols, such as FAIR Signposting. At the level of the centralized aggregation, CORE will enrich the existing US metadata with information from its larger international aggregation. A Dashboard service for participating institutions will be provided, enabling them to assess, validate and monitor their practices.

The one-year project involves 18 repositories representing a variety of institutions, software types and repository models and will result in concrete recommendations and best practice guidelines for machine and human discoverability of research articles in US repositories.”

US Repository Network launches pilot to enhance discoverability of content in repositories

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“COAR has been working with the US Repository Network (USRN) to connect and strengthen the position of repositories in the US.  With the advent of the recent OSTP Memorandum requiring Ensuring Free, Immediate, and Equitable Access to Federally Funded Research – which directs government research funders and agencies to adopt policies that require adopt immediate public access to articles – the need has become more urgent, especially in terms of effectively tracking research outputs.

The USRN is launching a pilot project aimed at improving the discoverability of articles in repositories. This pilot project involves the use of services from CORE (a not-for-profit aggregator based at Open University in the UK) to evaluate and improve local repository practices. Additional technical support will be provided by Antleaf Ltd.

The one-year project involves 18 repositories representing a variety of institutions, software types and repository models and will result in concrete recommendations and best practice guidelines for machine and human discoverability of research articles in US repositories.  The project will also lead to greater international interoperability of US research outputs.”

Who should pay for open-access publishing? APC alternatives emerge

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“When publishers first introduced APCs, the expectation was that these fees would be relatively small and a temporary measure that would provide an incentive for publishers to move to open access. “It’s one of those things that looked like a good idea at the time,” says Johan Rooryck, executive director of cOAlition S, a group of research funders and organizations supporting the shift to immediate open-access academic publishing. The coalition developed Plan S, a 2018 agreement originating in Europe, whereby research funders mandate full open access for the work that emerges from their support….”

The state of green open access in Canadian universities | The Canadian Journal of Information and Library Science

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Abstract:  This study investigates the use of institutional repositories for self-archiving peer-reviewed work in the U15 (an association of fifteen Canadian research-intensive universities). It relates usage with university open access (OA) policy types and publisher policy embargoes. We show that of all articles found in OpenAlex attributed to U15 researchers, 45.1 to 56.6% are available as Gold or Green OA, yet only 0.5 to 10.7% (mean 4.2%) of these can be found on their respective U15 IRs. Our investigation shows a lack of OA policies from most institutions, journal policies with embargoes exceeding 12 months, and incomplete policy information.

 

Communication Scholarship and the Quest for Open Access

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Abstract:  The advent of black, green, and gold open access publication models poses unique questions  for scholars of communication. Plato’s (1956) classic critique of writing in the legend of Theuth and Thamus warned that the printed word “rolls about all over the place, falling into the hands of those who have no concern with it” (pp. 69–70). More than 2 millennia later, scholars and administrators at all levels of the discipline face just such a phenomenon. As scholars of cyberspace debate whether “information wants to be free” (Levy, 2014), a communication perspective involves consideration of the importance of authorship and attribution amid an ever-shifting array of digital publishing options and subversions. The purpose of this study is to investigate the ongoing transformation of academic publishing by examining black, green, and gold open access models, the responses of the communication discipline, and ongoing questions surrounding the nature and extent of accessibility. As access options for research and publication continue to evolve, this study hopes to provide coordinates for administrators seeking to navigate questions concerning the what, how, and why of communication scholarship in a digital age. 

IPLC Response to the Article Development Charge Proposed by the American Chemical Society – Ivy Plus Libraries

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“The 13 Ivy Plus libraries are both surprised by and united in opposition to the zero embargo option announced by the American Chemical Society (ACS) on 21 September 2023. This unexpected new charge is a clear challenge to both authors’ rights and the developing scholarly communications ecosystem. According to this policy, an Article Development Charge (ADC) of $2,500 would be charged to authors who seek to retain and exercise the right to deposit a pre-publication version of their article in an open repository once their manuscript enters the ACS peer review process….”