2nd Helsinki Initiative Webinar on Multilingualism in Scholarly Communication, Dec 1, 2023, 3pm (CET) | helsinki-initiative.org

Helsinki Initiative organizes a webinar series on Multilingualism in Scholarly Communication with speakers representing different expert communities and strands of work. This event includes three presentations ranging from language policies to the role of national language journals and translations in science. The event is free and open for everyone to participate without registration. A recording will be made available after the event. 

Date & time: 1 December 2023 15:00-16:30 CET

Zoom-link: https://tsv-fi.zoom.us/j/82347877173?pwd=gMmrAnbYpZa74tNR1lD13Qh5TGYM38.1 

Programme

Michael D. Gordin: The Inevitably of Translation in Scientific Communication

Science for millennia in Europe and Asia has been strongly shaped by frequent and repeated translations of scientific texts among multiple vehicular languages. As multiple vernacular languages started to displace Latin in European scientific communication in the seventeenth century, and then recede in the face of English and Russian — and eventually just English as the overwhelmingly dominant tongue — in the twentieth, the activity of translation has receded into the background but has remained no less constant. Despite some of the claims for DeepL and AI (English-)text generation, the activity of translation in scientific communication is unlikely to diminish in importance in the twenty-first century, although its modes and visibility will surely shift.

Lucía Céspedes: Implicit and explicit linguistic policies for scholarly communications in Latin America

Drawing inspiration from categories developed by the current known as Latin American Thought on Science, Technology and Development, this presentation seeks to analyze whether explicit linguistic policies for scholarly communications exist in Latin America. In such case, are they aligned with researchers’ linguistic ideologies and representations, and do they foster or hinder the region’s intrinsic multilingualism?

Vincent Larivière: The importance of French language journals for Canadian research

Many Canadian scholarly journals in the social sciences and humanities are distinguished by use of French language. This presentation discusses, based on a new study co-authored with Simon van Bellen, the relevance of national French-language journals for Canadian researchers, their role in the dissemination of knowledge on national themes, as well as the viability and sustainability of these journals.

The event is hosted by Emanuel Kulczycki and Janne Pölönen.

For further information email helsinki-initiative@tsv.fi.

 

Diamond Open Access: Researcher’s Best Friend or just a Distant Relative? | Septentrio Conference Series

“The costs of Open Access publishing increase year by year (e.g. Zhang et al. 2022). Diamond Open Access (OA), in which journals and platforms do not charge fees to either authors or readers, has been hoped to provide solutions for the current situation. Also, the Council of the EU highlights the importance of Diamond OA in the recent Council Conclusions (8827/23). Various incentives, such as Action Plan for Diamond Open Access, DIAMAS and Craft-OA are established to support the development of Diamond OA. However, do researchers really use Diamond OA publication venues? Is Diamond OA a researcher’s best friend or just a rarely met distant relative?…”

Costs of scientific journals have reached unsustainable level – The future of subscriptions in jeopardy – FinELib

“Publishers are demanding increasingly higher fees for reading scientific journals and open access publishing, even though the scientific community can’t sustain even the current costs. The expenses have risen to a level that doesn’t correspond to the benefits received from the services….

The consortium is prepared that if the goals are not achieved, it’s possible that not all current scientific journal agreements can be continued….”

 

Tenure track position (Assistant Professor, Associate Professor or Professor) in Information studies – Academic Positions

“Information studies at Tampere University, Faculty of Information Technology and Communication Sciences, hosts internationally acknowledged researchers studying information management, information practices, information searching, and other information-related phenomena. In Information Studies, the need for research and teaching in the areas of Open Science has gained importance in recent years. Open Science and pursuing open research are central themes in raising research quality and sustainable access to information. 

We are seeking a highly motivated and accomplished academic who will be an active and innovative co-builder of the research and teaching area of Information Studies. The final profile of the position can be tailored according to your specific expertise and can include, for example, the following themes:

Scholarly publishing: open access publishing in its various forms, open access, and scholarly communication research.
Open data and open research materials:  open research data and its archiving,  metadata and data re-use, interoperability of open data and research materials.
Research processes: open research processes, research ethics in open science, research infrastructures for open science.
Scholarly impact in open science: open research and its impact, social media and open research, altmetrics, scientometrics, and informetrics….”

Tenure track position (Assistant Professor, Associate Professor or Professor) in Information studies / Tenure track -tutkijan, -professorin tai professorin tehtävä (Informaatiotutkimus)

“Information studies at Tampere University, Faculty of Information Technology and Communication Sciences, hosts internationally acknowledged researchers studying information management, information practices, information searching, and other information-related phenomena. In Information Studies, the need for research and teaching in the areas of Open Science has gained importance in recent years. Open Science and pursuing open research are central themes in raising research quality and sustainable access to information. 

We are seeking a highly motivated and accomplished academic who will be an active and innovative co-builder of the research and teaching area of Information Studies. The final profile of the position can be tailored according to your specific expertise and can include, for example, the following themes:

Scholarly publishing: open access publishing in its various forms, open access, and scholarly communication research.
Open data and open research materials:  open research data and its archiving,  metadata and data re-use, interoperability of open data and research materials.
Research processes: open research processes, research ethics in open science, research infrastructures for open science.
Scholarly impact in open science: open research and its impact, social media and open research, altmetrics, scientometrics, and informetrics….”

Responsible research assessment principles for research information management

“This paper introduces the main documents currently defining responsible research assessment and how their principles and guidelines address research information management. The issue is further examined in the context the Finnish research information portal, Research.fi. Research.fi is a pilot case in an EU-funded project that supports the merging policy reforms and paves the way towards an open science aware responsible research assessment system. As part of the project an analysis of Research.fi in terms of its current activities as well as future ambitions in the context of responsible research assessment is conducted. The paper presents preliminary results as well as initial conclusions from the on-going analysis….”

Editors’ note: On rent extraction in academic publishing and its alternatives | Suomen Antropologi: Journal of the Finnish Anthropological Society

Abstract:  In this editorial we introduce new members of our editorial team and the contents of this issue. In addition we discuss open access developments of the journal, namely our new license policy, which allows authors to choose a Creative Common license that best suits their needs or the requirements of their funders. This change in licenses makes our journal also compliant with the Plan S programme, which several large European research funders have signed, in order to promote open access publishing. We support such initiatives, but note that they are designed mainly to push large commercial publishers to publish publicly funded research in open access. While the Plan S is a welcome program, commercial for-profit publishers charge exorbitant charges for open access, usually paid for by the researchers’ institutions. We note that these charges are a form of rent extraction, which produces little added value, as the commercial publishers rely on the free labor of researchers and publicly funded research to fill their journals’ pages. More so, due to these charges the public ends up paying again for the research it funded in the first place. We argue that public support for both institutional and independent non-profit open access publishing is a socially more just and sustainable model.

Diamond future of open access | Publication Forum

“In Finland, the expenses of open access publishing were calculated as part of the open science and research monitoring exercise in 2022. According to the monitoring, 4 million euros were used in Finnish research organisations for APCs and book processing charges (BPCs) in 2021.

This development has caused critique across the science community and reinforced the movement towards charge-free open access publishing, i.e. diamond open access. Science Europe, an association representing major public organisations funding or performing research in Europe, defines diamond open access as follows:

“Diamond Open Access refers to a scholarly publication model in which journals and platforms do not charge fees to either authors or readers. Diamond Open Access journals are community-driven, academic-led, and academic-owned publishing initiatives. Serving a fine-grained variety of generally small-scale, multilingual, and multicultural scholarly communities, these journals and platforms embody the concept of bibliodiversity. For all these reasons, Diamond Open Access journals and platforms are equitable by nature and design.”

Science Europe and cOAlition S, an international consortium of research funding and performing organisations, published the OA diamond journals study in 2021. It includes a report of the global situation of diamond open access journals and recommendations for funders, institutions and societies. 

The study finds that there are a few main concerns which many diamond journals share. These are, for example, lack of technical skills and resources to publish their content in a format which fulfils the standards specified in Plan S technical requirements. As a cause and effect of this, a large share of OA diamond journals are not included in established indexes for open access journals, such as DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals).

The study highlights that the editorial tasks of the journals are mainly based on the voluntary work of researchers, because the funding is not on a permanent basis. Voluntary work, e.g. editorial tasks or peer-review, is either not taken into account enough, for example, in institutions researchers’ assessment policies.

The study shows that despite common concerns the landscape of diamond journals is very diverse and fragmented. In conclusion, the study recommends measures for better utilising and sharing know-how and resources….”

Tampere University Automating its Open Access Management through ChronosHub – ChronosHub

“ChronosHub and Tampere University are proud to announce a collaboration to guide authors through the publishing process, making funder policies and open access (OA) agreements transparent and automating the management of article processing charges (APCs).  

As the first institution in Finland, Tampere University takes its OA management to the forefront by leveraging the ChronosHub platform. The platform supports an automated APC funding approval workflow by combining integrations with publishers, and AI-powered scanning of author-submitted acceptance letters and APC invoices. This provides Tampere with a single approval dashboard covering all articles across all publishers, with automated funding eligibility checks and full insights into its APC expenditure. …”

The Fundamental Right to Education and Science: Constitutional Law vs Copyright Law – LIBER Europe

“In October 2022 we witnessed a significant development in Finland, with the Parliament’s Constitutional Law Committee concluding that the government’s draft implementation of the Copyright in the Digital Single Market Directive is not in line with the Finnish constitution. In particular, the Committee found that it conflicted with human rights – namely the right to education and science under Section 16 of the Finnish Constitution….

Until developments in the autumn of this year in the Finnish Parliament, we have been unaware of the fundamental human right to education and science being used in practice by European legislators[1] to challenge the broadening scope of exclusive rights under copyright law….”

Monitoring of open science and research

The objective of the monitoring of open science and research is to support the development of open science and research in organisations, support and verify the achievement of the objectives agreed in the Declaration and policies for open science and research, and form an overall view of the state of openness in Finnish science and research. The monitoring will use as much available, comparable data collected in the National Research Information Hub as possible. The monitoring also involves collecting data using a survey. The role of the survey as a source of monitoring data will decrease as more data accumulate in the National Research Information Hub. Initially, the survey plays a key role. The first year of monitoring is 2022. The results of the monitoring are published in research.fi and the survey results are stored for public open access. Monitoring will be carried out during the monitoring years as follows:

Job: Software Developer (PHP). End of play: Dec 12, 2022 | tsv.fi

The Federation of Finnish Learned Societies is looking to employ a Software Developer (PHP) to work in a three-year EU-funded project starting from February 1, 2023 or on agreement.

We are looking to employ a Software Developer to work on a PHP-based open source publishing system. The Federation of Finnish Learned Societies maintains nationally significant services for open publishing in Finland.

You will participate in an international EU-funded project which aims to advance the European infrastructure for open access publishing. Besides the Federation of Finnish Learned Societies, the project includes around twenty other European organizations. You will take part in developing a platform called Open Journal Systems intended for managing and publishing scholarly journals and will work with other project partners and the Public Knowledge Project (PKP), which leads the developer community of the system.

Tasks include:

Designing, documenting and developing new features for Open Journal Systems based on the goals set in the project
Presenting the results of the work in project meetings
Collaborating with the project partners and the developer community

Requirements:

University degree in computer science or other related field
Very good knowledge of PHP and relational databases
Knowledge of HTML, CSS and Javascript
Experience in maintenance of web applications
Good knowledge of English
Ability to work responsibly in a team and independently

Desirable:

Experience in software development projects and international projects
Familiar with Laravel, Vue.js, XML, Git and Github
Knowledge of scientific publishing and software used for scientific publishing, especially Open Journal Systems
Knowledge of Finnish (not required)

The position is for a fixed-term of three years starting from February 1, 2023 or on agreement. The probationary period is 6 months. The office of the Federation of Finnish Learned Societies is located at Kirkkokatu 6, 00170 Helsinki, Finland. We also offer flexible options for remote work.

The salary, based on the general collective agreement for the private teaching sector in Finland, is 3800–4000 €/month, depending on  how the requirements for the position are met.

 

Open science and research | Uniarts Helsinki

“The Uniarts Helsinki Open Access policy describes the general principles of publishing. The policy applies to researchers, staff and students working at the University of the Arts Helsinki. Publications of the University of the Arts Helsinki are typically both artistic and scientific in nature.

We follow the guidelines on responsible conduct of research determined by the Finnish National Board on Research Integrity (TENK) in the publishing and openness of our research results.
Uniarts Helsinki requires open access publishing when possible.
Uniarts supports publishing in Gold open access publication channels through a centralized APC fund, subject to specified criteria.
Uniarts recommends the use of Creative Commons licences in publishing text-based research outputs. If the research funder is the Academy of Finland or the European Commission, CC BY 4.0 should be used. When publishing with open licenses, the author(s) retains the copyright.
Uniarts recommends that researchers register their ORCID iD and add it to their publication data.
Uniarts requires that researchers self-archive their scientific and peer-reviewed research publications when allowed by the publisher. Uniarts recommends researchers to upload the Final Draft (Author Accepted Manuscript, AAM) or the Publisher’s PDF to Uniarts Helsinki’s institutional repository. Artistic research publications or their parts are linked to the metadata in the repository.
The author is responsible for evaluating the quality and responsibility of the publication channel they have chosen to publish in.
The theses of master’s, licentiate’s and doctoral (both scientific and artistic) degrees are published, as appropriate, in Uniarts Helsinki’s open institutional repository Taju and also for example in Research Catalogue.
Training, support and guidance is provided for open access publishing.
The progress of open access publishing is monitored at Uniarts through the strategic goals of research….”

How society publishers practice open science beyond open access publishing? | PUBMET

Abstract:  Scholarly publishing has rapidly moved towards open access (OA) over the last few decades. However, OA publishing is only one part of a larger open science movement. The recent UNESCO recommendation for open science (UNESCO, 2021) defines open science broadly to cover the openness of scientific knowledge, science infrastructures, engagement with societal actors, and dialogue with other knowledge systems. In its recommendations, open scientific knowledge includes OA to scientific publications but also open research data, metadata, open educational resources, software, and source code and hardware. Earlier research about open scientific knowledge from the point of view of academic publishers has mainly been focused on one element such as OA publishing and neglected other elements.

This paper aims to fill this gap by surveying how society publishers in Finland adopted other elements of open scientific knowledge. In Finland, learned societies account for 70% of national journal output (Late et al., 2020) and their publishing model is mainly diamond open access, which excludes author processing charges and relies on publishing subsidies (Pölönen et al., 2020). Furthermore, their activities often go beyond scholarly publishing to include education and research activities such as funding research and collecting and storing research data (Korkeamäki et al., 2019).

We conducted an electronic survey addressed to Finnish learned societies in November 2021 to answer the following research questions: “To what degree society publishers take up the elements of open scientific knowledge including open access to publications, open data, and open education?” (RQ1) and “Are elements of open scientific knowledge cumulative?” (RQ2)

In total 97 society publishers responded (40% response rate). We analysed their responses through nine variables measuring how they adopted different elements of open scholarly knowledge (Table 1) in view of the UNESCO recommendations for open science.

The results show elements related to open scholarly publications prevail. Almost 70% of respondents publish either gold, green, or hybrid OA publications. Most society publishers reported to support open data policies only some do collect, store, and provide open access to research datasets. Furthermore, only a few societies offer training for opening research data. Even so, a high share of publishers offers open education, and some share their educational materials openly. Although earlier studies have reported differences in adopting open science between disciplines (Rousi & Laakso, 2020), our analysis does not support these findings.

However, it has confirmed that adopting the elements of open scholarly knowledge is cumulative, as OA publishers are more likely to take up other elements of open scholarly knowledge. However, adopting all elements is not yet common. Since activities (e.g. collecting research data, offering education, etc.) of publishers other than societies seem to influence the take up of these elements, further research of their activities is needed. For example, it will show how often and how openly these other publishers provide research data or education beyond.