NSF Public Access Plan 2.0

“NSF’s updated public access plan integrates new agency guidance issued by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy in August of 2022. This guidance, which includes zero-embargo public access for research publications and their supporting data, was developed with leadership from the National Science and Technology Council Subcommittee on Open Science, in which NSF has always been actively engaged. NSF developed its plan while considering issues of importance to our many partners across academia and industry, and in alignment with all other U.S. agencies which fund scientific research. This plan is a first step, and we look forward to its further evolution as we address changes in technology and in the needs of members across our communities. Promoting immediate public access to federally funded research results and data is a critically important aspect of achieving the NSF mission of promoting the progress of science, securing the national defense, and advancing the national health, prosperity, and welfare. Indeed, scientific openness, academic freedom, scientific integrity, equity in science, and fairness are American values that rest on the pillar of public access to federally funded research and data….

The sections of this plan describe how NSF will ensure: • That all peer-reviewed scholarly publications resulting from NSF-funded research will be made freely available and publicly accessible by default in the NSF Public Access Repository, or NSF-PAR, without embargo or delay. • That scientific data associated with peer-reviewed publications resulting from NSF awards will be made available in appropriate scientific disciplinary repositories. • That exceptions to the data-sharing requirements will be made based on legal, privacy, ethical, intellectual property and national security considerations. • That persistent identifiers, or PIDs, and other critical metadata associated with peer-reviewed publications and data resulting from NSF-funded research will be collected and made publicly available in NSF-PAR. • That the agency coordinates with other federal funders of scientific research in implementing new public access requirements….

Primary areas of interest that will shape NSF policy as implementation approaches are formulated include: • Minimizing the equity impact of over-reliance on article processing charges, or APCs, also known as the “Gold Open Access” publication model, including inequity for fields, organizations or researchers lacking access to funding; consequences of possible citation bias; the impact on ability to fund research and training activities; and potential negative impacts with respect to public trust. • Promoting use of author’s accepted manuscripts, or AAMs, as a no-cost option to comply with public access requirements. • Minimizing the consequences of changing publishing ecosystems, including impacts for organizations least able to weather dramatic changes to subscription policies, which can increase precarity for those affiliated with these organizations. • Ameliorating the possible impacts of large APCs on small awards. • Involving affected communities regarding issues associated with data collection, data governance, verifying permitted data access, and data destruction, particularly for groups that have previously suffered from the appropriation or misuse of data. 19 • Ensure accessibility of data and results, including access to data cyberinfrastructures for under-resourced and underserved institutions/researchers, as well as considerations for persons with visual disabilities. 20 • Maximizing the reach and impact of U.S. research while seeking to minimize both access barriers in underresourced and underserved communities and challenges related to the language or interpretability of data. • Identifying the full range of costs (tangible and intangible) associated with data provision and addressing any inequities introduced by these costs. • Developing processes for addressing inequities identified in sharing and accessing research findings….”

Book Bans Attack the LGBTQ+ Community, Open Access Is Part of Our Defense | punctum books

van Gerven Oei, V. W. J., & Joy, E. A. F. (2023). Book Bans Attack the LGBTQ+ Community, Open Access Is Part of Our Defense. Punctum Books. https://doi.org/10.21428/ae6a44a6.8634dbb0  

Paradox of Open: Responses – Open Future

“We received a number of responses to the Paradox of Open, which we published in the online anthology Paradox of Open: Responses. These include:

Misunderestimating Openness by James Boyle proposes three ideas for the open movement to thrive in the digital environment of today and tomorrow.
The Paradox of Growth – Unintended consequences of Open by Anna Mazgal suggests ways for the open movement to address the harms perpetrated in the platform ecosystem with “care protocols” online.
Openness and Digital Human Rights by Zuzanna Warso analyzes the complicated relationship between human rights and openness.
Beyond the Fetish of Open by Balázs Bodó questions openness as a goal per se, and invites to reflect on what are the objectives that openness can help to achieve.
Creative Communities by Jeni Tenisson highlights the need for the open movement to enable and nurture creative communities to thrive.
How Openness Becomes Exclusionary by Leonhard Dobusch describes the diversity deficits within the open movement.
Public Memory Challenges and the digital black hole by Carolina Botero takes stock of the digital public space’s role in preserving content, thus safeguarding public memory.
The Evolving Shape of “The Copyright Wars” by Derek Slater highlights how the “copyright war” should stay on the open movement’s radar as it has been evolving – and it is not over yet….”

Open Voices: Malavika Legge, OASPA, on the future of Open Access publishing

“With all this focus on Open, last year, I made the move to OASPA, which has been really wonderful! At OASPA I am Program Manager, which means I’ve got the privilege of having a couple of focused projects to deliver OASPA’s mission to make Open Access better. My role is focused on two interlinked projects. One is called the OA Market where we are looking at money flows that are sustaining Open Access, so, how Open Access is being achieved from a financial/economic perspective. The second project is Equity in Open Access, which is a linked issue, because we have some concerns that the way Open Access is being delivered, as we see when we study the OA Market, is exclusive and has some equity issues….”

OPERAS welcomes EU Council Conclusions ‘supporting diversity and ensuring equity in scholarly publishing’

EU Council May 23

The Council of the European Union adopted on May 23 conclusions on the ‘high quality, transparent, open, trustworthy and equitable scholarly publishing’, in which it calls for immediate and unrestricted Open Access in publishing research involving public funds (Council conclusion).

OPERAS welcomes this official positioning of the council on diversity and equity in publishing academic results and the emphasis on:

that immediate and unrestricted open access should be the norm in publishing research involving public funds, with transparent pricing commensurate with the publication services and where costs are not covered by individual authors or readers

(Council conclusion p. 5)

The OPERAS Research Infrastructure aims to make Open Science a reality for research in the Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) and achieve a scholarly communication system where knowledge produced in the SSH benefits researchers, academics, students and more generally the whole society across Europe and worldwide, without barriers.

To express our compliance with and pleasure about the conclusions we participate in a joint statement:

Open Science: stakeholders welcome European efforts towards publicly owned and not-for-profit scholarly communication

For European public research and innovation actors, scholarly knowledge is a public good. Publicly funded research and its results should be immediately and openly available to all without barriers such as subscription fees or paywalls. This is essential in driving knowledge forward, promoting innovation and tackling social issues.

Key representative organisations of the public research and innovation sector have welcomed today’s adoption of the ‘Council conclusions on high-quality, transparent, open, trustworthy, and equitable scholarly publishing’.

In a joint response, the signatories urge EU member states and institutions to continue their efforts towards a high-quality, transparent, open, trustworthy and equitable scholarly communication ecosystem, through stakeholder engagement, constructive dialogue with the public research and innovation sector, and with evidence-based reforms underpinned by the principles of open science.

Signatories include the European University Association (EUA), Science Europe, the Association of European Research Libraries (LIBER), the European Federation of Academies of Sciences and Humanities (ALLEA), the Association of ERC Grantees (AERG), the Marie Curie Alumni Association (MCAA), the European Council of Doctoral Candidates and Junior Researchers (Eurodoc), cOAlition S, OPERAS, and the French National Research Agency (ANR).

The public research and innovation sector is actively pursuing a not-for-profit scholarly communication ecosystem. Notable examples, among other initiatives, include: backing for not-for-profit open access publishing models (e.g. the Action Plan for Diamond Open Access); demand for more dependable and comparable data on the state of scholarly communication (e.g. the Journal Comparison Service); and emphasis on infrastructure development (e.g. OPERAS).

As such, the statement welcomes the Council of the EU’s encouragement of initiatives that align with the objective of developing a not-for-profit scholarly communication ecosystem and reiterates the signatories’ commitment to launch activities that will further engage their members in shaping the future of scholarly communication.

Joint statement

And OPERAS is especially delighted about the mentioning of Open Access books in the conclusions, a topic OPERAS has advocated for since its beginning:

ACKNOWLEDGES that publishing practices vary across disciplines, and EMPHASISES that some publication formats, such as monographs, books and long-text formats, especially in the social sciences and humanities, should continue to be supported, while promoting open access publishing and allowing for a diverse range of formats to co-exist, and for publishing in a range of languages

(Council conclusion p. 5)

The OPERAS Research Infrastructure develops services to directly support researchers, publishers, scholarly communication service providers and more on this path to publicly owned and not-for-profit scholarly communication. 

Besides the services catalogue OPERAS supports three EU-funded projects supporting community-driven pathways to equitable open scholarly publishing. OPERAS participates in CRAFT-OA and coordinates Diamas and PALOMERA. Despite their separate focus areas, together their efforts work towards a broad and common vision for a more open and equitable scholarly publishing ecosystem.

Join us on 20th June at 1 PM CEST to learn how three EU-funded projects – CRAFT-OA, DIAMAS, and PALOMERA – are working for an equitable future for scholarly communication, with academic communities at the centre.

In the webinar, you will be introduced to each project and their individual aims. Following this, the discussion will focus on how, despite their separate focus areas, their efforts work towards a broad and common vision for a more open and equitable scholarly publishing ecosystem.

CRAFT-OA empowers regional journal platforms and publishing service providers to upscale, professionalise, and reach stronger interoperability with other scientific information systems, by providing services and tools.

The DIAMAS project is developing common standards, guidelines and practices to build capacity for the Diamond publishing sector. Formulating recommendations of this kind aims to create a more sustainable future for Open Access Diamond Publishing in Europe.

PALOMERA has set out to provide actionable recommendations and concrete resources to support and coordinate aligned funder and institutional policies for Open Access books. Doing so involves assessing challenges and bottlenecks that currently slow the widespread implementation of Open Access book policy.

G7 Science and Technology Ministers’ Communique

“We share a growing concern that some actors may attempt to unfairly exploit or distort the open research environment and misappropriate research results for economic, strategic, geopolitical, or military purposes. This undermines the principles and values that underpin open, transparent, reciprocal, and accountable international research cooperation and the integrity of research and may pose security risks….

The G7 will collaborate in expanding open science with equitable dissemination of scientific knowledge and publicly funded research outputs including research data and scholarly publications in line with the Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable (FAIR) principles. This is so that researchers and people throughout the world can benefit from them as well as contribute to the creation of new knowledge, stimulation of innovation, democratization of access to knowledge by society and the development of solutions for global challenges. This will also help to build more reproducible and trusted research results.

We recognize openness, freedom, and inclusiveness should be enhanced globally for the sound development of scientific research. When making decisions about openness, the respect for universal human rights and the protection of national security are essential, and principles and rules related to academic freedom, research integrity, privacy, and protection of intellectual property rights should be applied and upheld.

We acknowledge that open science platforms can allow the rapid sharing of pathogen samples and pathogen genetic sequence data on a global scale. They should also enable early development and more rapid, effective, and equitable access to MCMs for the prevention and control of emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases. Robust multilateral data sharing is needed to ensure continued societal resilience to the global issues of today and the future….

The G7 also supports immediate open and public access to government-funded scholarly publications and scientific data, and supports the endeavors of the scientific community to address challenges in scholarly publishing for broader sharing of appropriate scientific outputs. To this end, we support the efforts of the G7 Open Science Working Group in promoting the interoperability and sustainability of infrastructure for research outputs, supporting research assessment approaches that incentivize and reward open science practices, and encouraging “research on research”, aimed at helping to shape a more effective evidence-based research policy…. ”

Principles of Diamond Open Access Publishing: a draft proposal | Plan S

“The Action Plan for Diamond Open Access outlines a set of priorities to develop sustainable, community-driven, academic-led and -owned scholarly communication. Its goal is to create a global federation of Diamond Open Access (Diamond OA) journals and platforms around shared principles, guidelines, and quality standards while respecting their cultural, multilingual and disciplinary diversity. It proposes a definition of Diamond OA as a scholarly publication model in which journals and platforms do not charge fees to either authors or readers. Diamond OA is community-driven, academic-led and -owned, and serves a wide variety of generally small-scale, multilingual, and multicultural scholarly communities. 

Still, Diamond OA is often seen as a mere business model for scholarly publishing: no fees for authors or readers. However, Diamond OA can be better characterized by a shared set of values and principles that go well beyond the business aspect. These distinguish Diamond OA communities from other approaches to scholarly publishing. It is therefore worthwhile to spell out these values and principles, so they may serve as elements of identification for Diamond OA communities. 

The principles formulated below are intended as a first draft. They are not cast in stone, and meant to inspire discussion and evolve as a living document that will crystallize over the coming months. Many of these principles are not exclusive to Diamond OA communities. Some are borrowed or adapted from the more general 2019 Good Practice Principles for scholarly communication services defined by Sparc and COAR1, or go back to the 2016 Vienna Principles. Others have been carefully worked out in more detail by the FOREST Framework for Values-Driven Scholarly Communication in a self-assessment format for scholarly communities. Additional references can be added in the discussion.

The formulation of these principles has benefited from many conversations over the years with various members of the Diamond community now working together in the Action Plan for Diamond Open Access, cOAlition S, the CRAFT-OA and DIAMAS projects, the Fair Open Access Alliance (FOAA), Linguistics in Open Access (LingOA), the Open Library of Humanities, OPERAS, SciELO, Science Europe, and Redalyc-Amelica. This document attempts to embed these valuable contributions into principles defining the ethos of Diamond OA publishing….”

Equitable Scholarly Publishing Systems Viewed as Key to Solving Development Challenges Identified by UN – SPARC

“If the United Nations’ development plans are going to succeed, all voices need a chance to contribute to and access knowledge.

Experts gathered on May 3 for an online discussion on the importance of embracing open science and equitable scholarly publishing ecosystems to help solve the world’s biggest problems. [See video recording here.]

The United Nations Dag Hammarskjöld Library and UNESCO hosted the event, which focused on recommendations on expanding access to scientific knowledge in service of the UN’s 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) – including the need for a Global Science Commons. The UN’s 2030 Agenda calls for mechanisms to advance science and technology through knowledge-sharing in open access, online platforms….”

English – Knowledge Equity Network

“For Higher Education Institutions

Publish a Knowledge Equity Statement for your institution by 2025, incorporating tangible commitments aligned with the principles and objectives below.
Commit to institutional action(s) to support a sustained increase of published educational material being open and freely accessible for all to use and reuse for teaching, learning, and research.
Commit to institutional action(s) to support a sustained increase of new research outputs being transparent, open and freely accessible for all, and which meet the expectations of funders.
Use openness as an explicit criteria in reaching hiring, tenure, and promotion decisions. Reward and recognise open practices across both research and research-led education. This should include the importance of interdisciplinary and/or collaborative activities, and the contribution of all individuals to activities.
Define Equity, Diversity and Inclusion targets that will contribute towards open and inclusive Higher Education practices, and report annually on progress against these targets.
To create new mechanisms in and between Higher Education Institutions that allow for further widening participation and increased diversity of staff and student populations.
Review the support infrastructure for open Higher Education, and invest in the human, technical, and digital infrastructure that is needed to make open Higher Education a success.
Promote the use of open interoperability principles for any research or education software/system that you procure or develop, explicitly highlighting the option of making all or parts of content open for public consumption.
Ensure that all research data conforms to the FAIR Data Principles: ‘findable’, accessible, interoperable, and re-useable.

For Funding Agencies

Publish a statement that open dissemination of research findings is a critical component in evaluating the productivity and integrity of research.
Incorporate open research practices into assessment of funding proposals.
Incentivise the adoption of Open Research through policies, frameworks and mandates that require open access for publications, data, and other outputs, with as liberal a licence as possible for maximum reuse.
Actively manage funding schemes to support open infrastructures and open dissemination of research findings, educational resources, and underpinning data.
Explicitly define reward and recognition mechanisms for globally co-produced and co-delivered open educational resources that benefit society….”

 

Knowledge Equity Network – Knowledge Equity Network

Imagine a world in which human knowledge is shared more equitably. Imagine what we can achieve if we work together.

We are a collaborative community of engaged institutions, organisations and individuals across the world. We need to act intentionally to change the way we share knowledge to make the most meaningful impact, for the benefit of all.

Our goal is to tackle global challenges through opening access to ground-breaking research and research-led, challenge-focused education.

We live in a time of climate crisis, economic instability, inequity, poverty and forced population displacements. These are challenges that threaten the health and wellbeing of people all over the world.

The global Higher Education sector can tackle these challenges, but only when knowledge is shared, unhindered by barriers of cost, time or national borders.

The Knowledge Equity Network encourages collaboration over competition in a culture of equity, diversity, inclusion and openness. We believe transformational change is possible.

Working in a global partnership and by sharing the power of knowledge, we will create a fairer and better world.”

Principles of Diamond Open Access Publishing: a draft proposal – the diamond papers

Introduction

The Action Plan for Diamond Open Access outlines a set of priorities to develop sustainable, community-driven, academic-led and -owned scholarly communication. Its goal is to create a global federation of Diamond Open Access (Diamond OA) journals and platforms around shared principles, guidelines, and quality standards while respecting their cultural, multilingual and disciplinary diversity. It proposes a definition of Diamond OA as a scholarly publication model in which journals and platforms do not charge fees to either authors or readers. Diamond OA is community-driven, academic-led and -owned, and serves a wide variety of generally small-scale, multilingual, and multicultural scholarly communities. 

Still, Diamond OA is often seen as a mere business model for scholarly publishing: no fees for authors or readers. However, Diamond OA can be better characterized by a shared set of values and principles that go well beyond the business aspect. These distinguish Diamond OA communities from other approaches to scholarly publishing. It is therefore worthwhile to spell out these values and principles, so they may serve as elements of identification for Diamond OA communities. 

The principles formulated below are intended as a first draft. They are not cast in stone, and meant to inspire discussion and evolve as a living document that will crystallize over the coming months. Many of these principles are not exclusive to Diamond OA communities. Some are borrowed or adapted from the more general 2019 Good Practice Principles for scholarly communication services defined by Sparc and COAR1, or go back to the 2016 Vienna Principles. Others have been carefully worked out in more detail by the FOREST Framework for Values-Driven Scholarly Communication in a self-assessment format for scholarly communities. Additional references can be added in the discussion.

The formulation of these principles has benefited from many conversations over the years with various members of the Diamond community now working together in the Action Plan for Diamond Open Access, cOAlition S, the CRAFT-OA and DIAMAS projects, the Fair Open Access Alliance (FOAA), Linguistics in Open Access (LingOA), the Open Library of Humanities, OPERAS, SciELO, Science Europe, and Redalyc-Amelica. This document attempts to embed these valuable contributions into principles defining the ethos of Diamond OA publishing.

 

Championing equitable access in Latin America –  Hola Arturo – DataCite Blog

“The Global Access Program (GAP) is DataCite’s initiative to improve access and enable communities in lesser-represented regions to further benefit from our open infrastructure services, launched with support from the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative (Grant 2022-316573). Throughout the next year, the program builds out DataCite’s international community with regional support and engagement in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. Through focused regional engagement in these regions, DataCite will better support equitable access to our infrastructure services, ensuring that researchers and research organizations globally have the opportunity to benefit from persistent identifiers and metadata….”