The Shifting Sands of Open Access Publishing,a Publisher's View

Abstract

This paper sets Open Access (OA) publishing in the context of today's scientific, technical, and medical (STM) publishing trends. Four areas are covered: (a) a brief overview of STM publishing and its value today; (b) OA's place in the industry; (c) the underlying economics of OA, particularly its author-pays model; and (d) directions in moving towards “universal access” to STM information, where both researchers and the public have access to the scientific information they need.     

The Shifting Sands of Open Access Publishing, a Publisher's View

This paper sets Open Access (OA) publishing in the context of today's scientific, technical, and medical (STM) publishing trends. Four areas are covered: (a) a brief overview of STM publishing and its value today; (b) OA's place in the industry; (c) the underlying economics of OA, particularly its author-pays model; and (d) directions in moving towards “universal access” to STM information, where both researchers and the public have access to the scientific information they need.     

Preserving Electronic Scholarship for the Future: An Overview of LOCKSS,CLOCKSS, Portico,CHORUS, and the Keepers Registry

Electronic resources are becoming the backbone of many library collections. Electronic journals in particular have become the default format for most periodical literature in all fields of scholarship. The mission of librarians, the publishing industry, and nonprofit organizations is to ensure that electronic scholarship remains accessible to future generations in an affordable and sustainable manner. The focus for the first edition of “In Layman's Terms” is on LOCKSS, CLOCKSS, CHORUS, Portico, and the Keepers Registry, five initiatives dedicated to the preservation and to the perpetual access of electronic scholarship. It includes a brief history of each initiative. It looks at their missions and their different roles in preserving and providing access to electronic resources and the benefits and costs in joining them and being involved with them. It identifies the relationships among these initiatives.     

Rock is a Way of Life: The World of Rock ‘n’ Roll Fanzines and Fandom

Abstract

While advantages of electronic publications are obvious and far reaching, most electronic journals are still published also in print since libraries do not acquire electronic journals but only access them through licenses. Libraries with substantial electronic publications, however, no longer “compile” collections in a traditional sense. One consequence of electronic only access is that the permanent availability of information that implicitly used to be found in print collections is no longer guaranteed. Digital publishing dramatically alters both the roles of libraries and publishers in preserving records of science. This article discusses the contribution of national libraries, particularly the Koninklijke Bibliotheek (KB; National Library of the Netherlands), to cooperate with publishers to secure the permanent archiving of electronic publications.     

Discipline-Specific Literature Bases: A View of the APS Model

Abstract

Librarians see the large quantities of literature and the complete writing/publishing/world as a complete system. Changes to one piece (e.g., making publishing or reading electronic) will not fundamentally change the process. The pieces of the system are there, not for technological reasons, but for reasons of authority, validation, and self-correction in the process of scholarly communication. Electronic publishing will cause great changes, but the changes will not eliminate roles that now exist. The changes will be to enhance our abilities to better do that which we do now, whether that be to edit, review, referee, write, or manage the information flow.     

An Interview with Ellen Finnie Duranceau

In June 2006, Lisa Harrington interviewed Ellen Finnie Duranceau, scholarly publishing and licensing consultant at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Libraries in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In this interview, Duranceau discusses a range of topics including her views on the future of electronic resources, the online public access catalog, libraries, and how she thinks we can meet the needs of users.     

Cultural Anthropology and Open Access—Interview With Dominic Boyer,Cymene Howe,and Marcel LaFlamme

Abstract

In this installment of “Conversations,” Dominic Boyer, Cymene Howe, and Marcel LaFlamme, of the Cultural Anthropology editorial team, discuss the ins and outs of publishing a gold open access journal in the field of anthropology. Highlights of the discussion include Cultural Anthropology’s move to open access, the ethics of open access, the growth of international readership, ongoing publishing challenges in open access, and the role libraries can play with open access publishing.     

Research Online: Digital Commons as a Publishing Platform at the University of Wollongong, Australia

Since 2006, Research Online, the University of Wollongong's open access institutional repository has utilised Bepress' Digital Commons software to make available published research outputs and digital theses. This article discusses the outcomes of recent academic demand for its use as a publishing tool of university journals and conference proceedings. The Journal of University Teaching and Learning Practice is provided as an example. Digital Commons includes the editorial management software, EdiKit, which assists in managing submissions, editorial functions, and peer review. Also considered are changes to scholarly communication patterns arising out of the new open access, electronic only, publication regimes.     

A new nonparametric procedure designed for simulation studies

This paper demonstrates how certain statistics, computed from a sample of size n (from almost any distribution) may be simulated by using a sequence of substantially less than n random normal variates. Many statistics, θ, including almost all maximum likelihood estimates, can be expressed in terms of the sample trigonometric moments, STM. The STM are asymptotically multivariate normal with a mean vector and variance-covariance matrix easily expressible in terms of equally spaced characteristic function evaluations. Thus one only needs to know the Fourier transform or equivalently the characteristic function associated with elements of any moderate to large i. i. d. sample and have access to a normal random number generator to generate a sequence of STM with distributional properties almost identical to those of STM computed from that sample. These STM can in turn be used to compute the desired statistic θ.     

Open Access: A Review of an Emerging Phenomenon

Discussion about Open Access (OA) has dominated industry news for the past two years. Librarians and publishers alike are attempting to fully grasp the implications of different business models on various issues, including costs, peer review, funding mechanisms, value, and archives. While there is general agreement about the importance of broadening access to scientific literature, there is disagreement on how this is best achieved in a financially responsible fashion. This article looks at some of the questions surrounding Open Access journals as well as the role publishing plays in the continuum of science in general, particularly with regard to membership organizations.     

Open Dialog: SciELO’s Approach to Open Access Publishing

Abstract

For over 20 years, Scientific Electronic Library Online (SciELO) has been engaged in an ambitious program of open access journal publishing. In Brazil and 15 other countries, society journals and other publications rely on SciELO for online publishing infrastructure and a platform that gives visibility to a global audience. SciELO’s network of national level collections has expanded to 16 countries and provides an alternative model to approaches centered around commercial publishers or new open access journals.     

Open Access: A Review of an Emerging Phenomenon

Abstract

Discussion about Open Access (OA) has dominated industry news for the past two years. Librarians and publishers alike are attempting to fully grasp the implications of different business models on various issues, including costs, peer review, funding mechanisms, value, and archives. While there is general agreement about the importance of broadening access to scientific literature, there is disagreement on how this is best achieved in a financially responsible fashion. This article looks at some of the questions surrounding Open Access journals as well as the role publishing plays in the continuum of science in general, particularly with regard to membership organizations.     

Electronic journals and the paradigm shift: 1995 Spring forum of the Canadian Serials Industry Systems Advisory Committee

Abstract

Since 2006, Research Online, the University of Wollongong's open access institutional repository has utilised Bepress' Digital Commons software to make available published research outputs and digital theses. This article discusses the outcomes of recent academic demand for its use as a publishing tool of university journals and conference proceedings. The Journal of University Teaching and Learning Practice is provided as an example. Digital Commons includes the editorial management software, EdiKit, which assists in managing submissions, editorial functions, and peer review. Also considered are changes to scholarly communication patterns arising out of the new open access, electronic only, publication regimes.     

Major Chinese Full-Text Electronic Information Resources for Researchers and Scholars

China's electronic publishing industry has developed very rapidly over the past decade. China has become one of the electronic publishing centers in Asia and will continue to flourish in the future. Chinese electronic databases provide the most efficient way for scholars, researchers, and students to perform searches, as well as to provide information for businesses and governments. In this article the author gives a brief overview of selected databases that represent a small portion of the Chinese electronic resources and will serve as a reference to Chinese scholars worldwide.     

Looking at Journals from Both Sides

The author, a professor in the field of communication, describes his contrasting experiences with publishing an open access society journal and advising a regional association in regards to turning over publication of its journal to a major commercial publishing firm. Using his experience of producing an open access journal as a foundation, he argues for the intrinsic importance of establishing credibility and exercising personal care in the production and maintenance of a journal. The author argues that current efforts by some societies to increase access to their journals through outsourcing to commercial publishers may be counterproductive to the fundamental goal of disseminating knowledge.     

Abstracting and Indexing Adapts to the Internet Era

Abstract

With the role of libraries evolving from warehousing data sources to controlling the dissemination of information sources, A&I (abstracting and indexing) information services must also evolve and play an equally important and challenging role. With over forty years of A&I publishing experience, CSA (formerly Cambridge Scientific Abstracts) has adapted A&I publishing methods to new technologies and Web-based publishing. The editorial basics of producing A&I journals and databases are unchanged; however, new production technologies, such as electronic feeds between primary and secondary publishers, electronic directory services, and machine-aided indexing, can provide efficiencies. Once just roadmaps pointing to information, A&I services are now conduits delivering information directly to the user. Serials Review 2003; 29:221–223.