Category Archives: oa.obp

Open Book Publishers takes leading role in £5.8 million project to significantly expand open access book infrastructures

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“Open Book Publishers (OBP) is delighted to announce that we are part of a diverse international team leading a new open infrastructure initiative, Open Book Futures (OBF), to significantly advance the systems that support community-owned Open Access (OA) book publishing.

Funded by Arcadia and the Research England Development (RED) Fund and led by Lancaster University, Open Book Futures will build on the pioneering work of the COPIM project, in which OBP has been a key partner. This will involve a significant expansion of key COPIM infrastructures built by OBP developers Javier Arias and Ross Higman: the Thoth metadata management platform and the forthcoming Thoth Archiving Network. It will also include the development of technical protocols and infrastructure to enable presses to better integrate accessibility requirements into their workflows….”

£5.8 million funding to significantly expand and accelerate COPIM open access infrastructures | Community-led Open Publication Infrastructures for Monographs (COPIM)

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The Community-led Open Publication Infrastructures for Monographs project (COPIM) is delighted that Arcadia and the Research England Development (RED) Fund are supporting a new initiative that will build on the pioneering work of the COPIM project.

The Open Book Futures project (OBF), led by Lancaster University, will significantly expand key infrastructures created by COPIM to achieve a step change in how community-owned Open Access (OA) book publishing is delivered.

Open Book Futures will follow the principles of ‘Scaling Small’ that guided the work of the COPIM project, further developing the infrastructures, business models, networks and resources that are needed to deliver a future for Open Access books led not by large commercial operations, but by communities of scholars, small-to-medium-sized publishers, not-for-profit infrastructure providers, and scholarly libraries.

Among its activities, OBF will deepen and accelerate the work of:

the recently launched Open Book Collective, which makes it easier for academic libraries to provide direct financial support to small- and medium-sized OA publishing initiatives;

the Thoth metadata management and dissemination platform;

the Opening the Future revenue model;

the forthcoming Experimental Publishing Compendium; 

the forthcoming Thoth Archiving Network.

Open Book Futures, which will run from 1 May 2023 to 30 April 2026, will increase COPIM’s long-term impact and ensure that a wide range of voices have the opportunity to shape the future of open access book publishing. In order to amplify bibliodiverse and equitable community-led approaches to OA book publishing, OBF aims not just to strengthen existing networks in the UK and North America, but also to engage further with publishers, universities, and infrastructure providers in a diverse set of national and linguistic contexts, including Africa, Australasia, Continental Europe, and Latin America.

With that in mind, OBF will reunite many of the COPIM project partners, including Birkbeck, University of London, Coventry University, Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB), Jisc, Loughborough University, Open Book Collective (OBC), Open Book Publishers (OBP), punctum books, Thoth, and Trinity College, Cambridge University, and they will also be joined by a wide range of new partners including Continental Platform/University of Cape Town, the Curtin Open Knowledge Initiative (COKI), the Digital Preservation Coalition, the Educopia Institute, Knowledge Futures, Lyrasis, OPERAS, Public Knowledge Project (PKP), Research Libraries UK (RLUK), SciELO Books, Scottish Universities Press/SCURL, and SPARC Europe. The project is also supported by Lancaster University Library.

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£5.8 million project to deliver a more sustainable future for Open Access books | Lancaster University

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A new project that works to increase access to valuable research is to receive more than £5.8 million in funding.

Led by Lancaster University, the Open Book Futures (OBF) project will develop and support organisations, tools and practices that enable both academics and the wider public to make more and better use of books published on an Open Access basis. Open Access books can be accessed and used online free of charge.

In particular, the project, which is also supported by Lancaster University Library, aims to achieve a step change in how community-owned Open Access book publishing is delivered.

Funded by Arcadia and the Research England Development (RED) Fund, the project marks a shift in the ambition, scope and impact of community-owned Open Access book publishing.

It will significantly increase and improve the quantity, discoverability, preservation and accessibility of academic content freely and easily available to all.

This will be done by building the infrastructures, business models, networks and resources that are needed to deliver a future for Open Access books led not by large commercial operations but by communities of scholars, small-to-medium-sized publishers, not-for-profit infrastructure providers, and scholarly libraries.

This includes expanding the work of the recently launched Open Book Collective, which makes it easier for academic libraries to provide direct financial support to Open Access publishing initiatives, as well as the Thoth metadata management platform, the Opening the Future revenue model and the forthcoming Experimental Publishing Compendium.

Open Book Futures, due to start on May 1st, builds on the pioneering work of the Community-Led Open Publication Infrastructures for Monographs (COPIM) project. COPIM, a strategic international partnership led by Coventry University, began the work of establishing the key open, community-led solutions required to address the barriers to the wider impact of Open Access books.

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Job: Open Access Book Designer and Typesetter | Open Book Publishers

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Open Book Publishers, a non-profit open access academic publisher, is looking for a full-time Book Designer and Typesetter.

The successful candidate will be responsible for designing and typesetting open access books published by OBP. The duties will include formatting text, images and audio/visual files to create beautiful printed and digital books and covers, as well as creating and maintaining metadata for our titles. You will be expected to work collaboratively with our editorial and distribution teams and with authors in fulfilling your tasks.

The position will be particularly suitable for a person with good IT skills and a genuine interest in open access and academic book publishing. A good working knowledge of software packages such as InDesign, Photoshop, Word and Excel is essential. Expertise in LaTeX would be welcomed, as would experience in related areas such as Digital Humanities and Digital Publishing.

Starting Date: April 2023, or as soon as possible thereafter.

Location: Remote work. OBP is based in Cambridge, UK, but all work within the company is conducted remotely, although attendance at occasional physical meetings in Cambridge is expected (every two months on average).

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OA monograph costs | Open Research

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“The majority of University and scholarly society presses that publish on open access monographs do not charge authors or readers, except for those ordering print copies.The OAPEN-UK HSS Researcher Survey (between Feb-May 2012) examined the source of funding for research underpinning authors’ last HSS monograph and found that only 22% came from research council grants, whereas 62% came from core university funds or self-funding.

The Open Book Publishers membership scheme (OBP) is a new agreement from Jisc Collections that supports the publication of Open Access research monographs. By joining this scheme, member institutions will support the publication of at least twelve new Open Access research monographs every year. For an annual fee of £270 member institutions can also offer all staff, students and alumni with a discount on any print copies of OBP titles. Any print sales to member institutions are offset against membership fees in the following year.

How much do commercial publishers charge for OA monographs?

As with open access journals there is a need for a new business model. The Wellcome Trust extended their open access policy to include monographs in 2013. They estimate: “the fee for existing open access options – ensuring all published material is converted to XML, and then made available in html and PDF – for books currently averages around £9,500, and we anticipate the average cost to make a book chapter open access will be £1,800″.

This book price seems to be halfway between what is charged by traditional publishers offering and OA option, and OA only publishers. Prices seem to vary considerably (note prices from September 2018)…”

Open Book Publishers Joins the Open Book Collective | Feb 24, 2023

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“…We are joining the OBC because we believe that the best future for academic book publishing lies in collectively funded, equitable open access for books. We believe in the value of non-profit, community-owned open infrastructures to underpin this shift, and we support collaborative ways of working to achieve our goals. The OBC reflects all these values. The Collective realises the strength of collaboration and mutual effort in two ways: firstly, because it brings together a range of OA book initiatives that share core values and are seeking collective funding, forming a powerful collection of books and initiatives and making it easier for libraries to find, assess and support the OA books that these initiatives have to offer; secondly, because a proportion of the revenue a press receives from libraries via the OBC will go into a development fund to which any open access press or initiative can apply in order to strengthen their work….”

UMass Libraries Invest in New Publishing Models: Open Access Initiatives Deliver Thousands of New Book Titles to Patrons and the Public | UMass Amherst

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“The UMass Amherst Libraries have invested in three open access book publishing programs to bring thousands of new titles to patrons and the public at no cost to them. With the support of institutions like UMass Amherst, MIT Press Direct to Open (D2O) University of Michigan Press Fund to Mission (F2M), and Open Book Publishers will release at least 155 new books in 2022, which will be openly accessible to readers. With these investments, the campus community gains access to an additional 4,900 books published by MIT Press and the University of Michigan Press….”

Open Position: Software Engineer, 18 month full-time or part-time. FTE Salary £24-35k depending on experience @ Open Book Publishers

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One of COPIM’s consortial partners, Open Book Publishers, are looking for a software engineer who is enthusiastic about open source and Open Access initiatives, to join their small energetic team.

OBP is taking a leading role in developing open source infrastructure to support open access book publishing. They are presently:

responsible for the development of the Open Dissemination System and Archiving and Preservation services for open access books within the Research England and Arcadia Fund financed COPIM project

providing hosting services for a number of Open Access initiatives and projects

in the process of re-developing OBP’s own website to provide an open source and white label website for other Open Access book publishers to adopt

expecting to be involved in other similar initiatives over the coming months.

OBP are seeking a versatile software engineer to work alongside their existing development team across these development projects.

Open Position: Software Engineer @ Open Book Publishers | Community-led Open Publication Infrastructures for Monographs (COPIM)

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The successful candidate will be working directly with the Lead Software Engineer on these projects. The role will be varied and broad ranging, including: the development of open source infrastructure as well as maintenance and deployment of supporting scripts; designing and implementing sound data models; implementing unit and end-to-end tests to ensure the reliability of the software through its update cycle; writing documentation for any piece of software produced; designing backup and disaster recovery plans; and offering user support.

OBP are looking for somebody passionate about contributing to the open source and Open Access communities. The successful applicant is likely to have had previous work experience with web hosting at scale, containerisation and continuous delivery in a cloud computing platform (preferably AWS); using at least one interpreted language and one compiled language; and knowledge of Bash, a version control system (preferably Git) and SQL.

This is a full-time fixed term (18 month) position to support OBP’s development work through to the completion of the COPIM project, although OBP also welcome applications for those only interested in a part-time position.

What We Talk About When We Talk About… Book Usage Data

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“Over the last two-and-a-half years, we have been working as part of the EU-funded HIRMEOS (High Integration of Research Monographs in the European Open Science Infrastructure) project to create open source software and databases to collectively gather and host usage data from various platforms for multiple publishers. As part of this work, we have been thinking deeply about what the data we collect actually means. Open Access books are read on, and downloaded from, many different platforms – this availability is one of the benefits of making work available Open Access, after all – but each platform has a different way of counting up the number of times a book has been viewed or downloaded.

Some platforms count a group of visits made to a book by the same user within a continuous time frame (known as a session) as one ‘view’ – we measure usage in this way ourselves on our own website – but the length of a session might vary from platform to platform. For example, on our website we use Google Analytics, according to which one session (or ‘view’) lasts until there is thirty minutes of inactivity. But platforms that use COUNTER-compliant figures (the standard that libraries prefer) have a much shorter time-frame for a single session – and such a platform would record more ‘views’ than a platform that uses Google Analytics, even if it was measuring the exact same pattern of use.[2]

Other platforms simply count each time a book is accessed (known as a visit) as one ‘view’. There might be multiple visits by the same user within a short time frame – which our site would count as one session, or one ‘view’ – but which a platform counting visits rather than sessions would record as multiple ‘views’.

Downloads (which we also used to include in the number of ‘views’) also present problems. For example, many sites only allow chapter downloads (e.g. JSTOR), others only whole book downloads (e.g. OAPEN), and some allow both (e.g. our own website). How do you combine these different types of data? Somebody who wants to read the whole book would need only one download from OAPEN, but as many downloads as there are chapters from JSTOR – thus inflating the number of downloads for a book that has many chapters.

So aggregating this data into a single figure for ‘views’ isn’t only comparing apples with oranges – it’s mixing apples, oranges, grapes, kiwi fruit and pears. It’s a fruit salad….”

Jobs: Open Source & OA Software Engineer | Open Book Publishers

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We are looking for a software engineer who is enthusiastic about open source and Open Access initiatives, to join our small energetic team.  OBP is taking a leading role in developing open source infrastructure to support open access book publishing within the Research England and Arcadia Fund financed COPIM project. The OBP development team has responsibility for the technical development of the Open Dissemination System and Archiving and Preservation services for open access books. The Open Dissemination System is being developed in rust, and it consists of a PostgreSQL database and a GraphQL API, which is consumed by a WebAssembly application. Python and Bash are also used throughout development to aid with minor tasks, and all components of the system are deployed as docker containers.

The successful candidate will be working directly with the Lead Software Engineer on these projects. The role will be varied and broad ranging, including: the development of open source infrastructure as well as maintenance and deployment supporting scripts; designing and implementing sound data models; implementing unit and end-to-end tests to ensure the reliability of the software through its update cycle; writing documentation for any piece of software produced; and offering user support.

We are looking for somebody passionate about contributing to the open source and Open Access communities. The successful applicant is likely to have had previous work experience using at least one interpreted language and one compiled language; knowledge of Bash, a version control system (preferably Git) and SQL; and a good understanding of relational databases.

This is a full-time fixed term position, funded by the COPIM project, which will end with the completion of that project on 31 October 2022. The position will be available to start immediately. Gross annual salary will be in the range GBP £24,000-£30,000 (depending on experience). Open Book Publishers has offices based in King’s College, Cambridge, however presently all staff are working remotely. While we hope staff will be able to return to working in our office in due course, we are open to applications from people proposing to work remotely for the entire duration of the contract.

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Open Book Publishers are looking for an Editorial Assistant! | OBP

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Open Book Publishers is looking for an Editorial Assistant. This is a rare and exciting opportunity to gain first-hand editorial experience working for an innovative and fast-growing academic publisher.

Based in Cambridge, we are a not-for-profit, Open Access publisher of high-quality monographs in the humanities and social sciences. The position is ideally suited to a Master’s or PhD student in the humanities or social sciences, either currently studying or recently graduated. S/he must have a passion for academic publishing, a good eye for detail and a willingness to lend a hand in all aspects of the organisation. Knowledge of the Microsoft Office package, InDesign and Photoshop would be an advantage, although not essential.

Duties will include:

Copy-editing/proofreading manuscripts
Communicating with authors
Formatting indices and footnotes
Contributions to social media channels

The position is full-time (40hrs/week). Initially the work will be remote, but the candidate should be prepared to work from our offices in central Cambridge (UK) in the future. Salary will be competitive and commensurate with experience, starting at a full-time equivalent rate of £22,000-£25,000 per annum. Interviews will be held during the Summer. Closing date for applications: 20th of July 2020.

Further information about Open Book Publishers can be found on our website: www.openbookpublishers.com.
To apply, please email a CV and covering letter to Alessandra Tosi: a.tosi@openbookpublishers.com.

Open Book Publishers are looking for an Editorial Assistant! | OBP

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Open Book Publishers is looking for an Editorial Assistant. This is a rare and exciting opportunity to gain first-hand editorial experience working for an innovative and fast-growing academic publisher.

Based in Cambridge, we are a not-for-profit, Open Access publisher of high-quality monographs in the humanities and social sciences. The position is ideally suited to a Master’s or PhD student in the humanities or social sciences, either currently studying or recently graduated. S/he must have a passion for academic publishing, a good eye for detail and a willingness to lend a hand in all aspects of the organisation. Knowledge of the Microsoft Office package, InDesign and Photoshop would be an advantage, although not essential.

Duties will include:

Copy-editing/proofreading manuscripts
Communicating with authors
Formatting indices and footnotes
Contributions to social media channels

The position is full-time (40hrs/week). Initially the work will be remote, but the candidate should be prepared to work from our offices in central Cambridge (UK) in the future. Salary will be competitive and commensurate with experience, starting at a full-time equivalent rate of £22,000-£25,000 per annum. Interviews will be held during the Summer. Closing date for applications: 20th of July 2020.

Further information about Open Book Publishers can be found on our website: www.openbookpublishers.com.
To apply, please email a CV and covering letter to Alessandra Tosi: a.tosi@openbookpublishers.com.

Fair OA publishers, infrastructures and initiatives supported by KU Leuven | KU Leuven Open Science

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KU Leuven promotes non-commercial and community-owned approaches of OA, especially through the KU Leuven Fund for Fair OA. On the one hand, the fund supports innovative publishing initiatives and infrastructures. On the other hand, the fund covers membership costs for consortia and advocacy organizations focusing on a non-commercial approach to scholarly communication. On this page you can find an overview of everything that KU Leuven endorses.

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OBP’s draft response to the UKRI Open Access consultation

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“Here we share our draft response to the UKRI Open Access consultation. We will answer the questions that pertain to books and chapters, since that is our area of expertise.

Please annotate this post with any thoughts or relevant evidence you wish to share (we have integrated Hypothes.is to make this easy to do). Please also feel free to draw on our answers when writing your own response, if you are submitting one.

If you would like to express support for the arguments made here, you can sign this Google doc, which will be submitted as part of our response. If we make any changes to this draft response, they will be posted on this blog by noon on Thursday 28 May (24 hours before UKRI’s deadline) in case you wish to see the final version before signing….”