Utah State University Press to become open access

A statement from Utah State University Press and Merrill-Cazier Library on Monday November 2, 2009 announced that USU will join Rice University and the University of Michigan where their university press has merged with the library and developed an online, open access model of publication.

From the announcement:

USU Press will adopt a new publication model, with open access as a central component and will move toward increased digital delivery of books. The library’s position will be enhanced as well, as academic libraries nationally take on a stronger role in the evolution of scholarly publishing.

“This move directly serves the needs of the university,” Clement said. “Open access allows us to go back to where university presses began — to publish work by all faculty in every discipline.”

At the same time, USU Press remains a refereed scholarly press, with the standards of rigorous peer review appropriate to a university publisher.

In an article by Scott Jaschik of Inside Higher Education today he notes that:

For the last nine months, the survival of the Utah State University Press has been in doubt, with fears that deep cuts being made to public higher education in Utah would end up killing off the publishing outlet.
This week comes news that the press will survive -- in part by embracing a new model of organization (becoming part of the university library) and a new business model (embracing open access, in which most publications would be available online and free).

Computers and Composition Digital Press is a USU Press imprint.

Open Access Week, October 19 - 23, 2009

October 19-23, 2009 is the first international Open Access Week.

Open Access Week is intended to broaden awareness and understanding of Open Access to research within the international higher education community and the general public.

Last years Open Access Day organizers SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing & Academic Resources Coalition), the PLoS (The Public Library of Science), and Students for FreeCulture are joined for 2009 by OASIS (the Open Access Scholarly Information Sourcebook); Open Access Directory (OAD); and eIFL.net (Electronic Information for Libraries).

Activities around the world are listed at Open Access Week.
Check out the week of talks at the University of Puerto Rico, the pre-week activities in Ireland, the PLoS competition for the best medical paper and the spirit of open access haiku contest from SHERPA.

Income models for supporting open access

A new guide "Income Models for Supporting Open Access" has been published by the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition, or Sparc for publishers who want to support open access. From the guide:

Developing a sound business model is a critical concern of publishers considering open-access distribution. Selecting the model appropriate to a particular journal will depend not only on the expense hurdle that must be cleared, but also on the publisher’s mission objectives, size, business management resources, risk tolerance, tax status, and institutional or corporate affiliation.

This Web site and accompanying guide provide an overview of income models currently being used to support the open-access distribution of peer-reviewed scholarly and scientific journals. These resources will be a useful tool both for publishers exploring new potential sources of income and for libraries weighing where to direct meager library funds.

Defining noncommercial use study

The report and raw data from a year long study, Defining Noncommercial, on how people view noncommercial use was released Monday, September 14, 2009 by Creative Commons. The study was conducted by Netpop Research.

An excerpt from the press release.

Creative Commons noncommercial licenses preclude use of a work “in any manner that is primarily intended for or directed toward commercial advantage or private monetary compensation.” The majority of respondents (87% of creators, 85% of users) replied that the definition was “essentially the same as” (43% of creators, 42% of users) or “different from but still compatible with” (44% of creators, 43% of users) theirs. Only 7% of creators and 11% of users replied that the term was “different from and incompatible with” their definition.

Study noted by the 'In the News' email newsletter on digital copyright from the Center For Intellectual Property at the University of Maryland University College.



Study was discussed in Plagiarism Today blog from Johnathan Bailey.

Compact for open access publishing equity

Scott Jaschik reports in the September 15, 2009 edition of Inside Higher Ed that five major research universities, MIT, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, Harvard University and the University of California at Berkeley, pledge to set up system of payments for work their professors publish in free, online journals -- aiming to shift economic model of scholarly communication, the "Compact for Open Access Publishing Equity".

Specifically, the universities have each committed to "the timely establishment of durable mechanisms for underwriting reasonable publication charges for articles written by its faculty and published in open access journals and for which other institutions would not be expected to provide funds."

Here's the same story from the Chronicle of Higher Education's Wired Campus blog posted by Ben Terris on September 14, 2009.

Speak Now, or Forever Hold Your Copyrights!

Speak Now, or Forever Hold Your Copyrights! is an article by Steve Kolowich on the next deadline of the Google book settlement from Inside Higher Ed, September 4, 2009.

[Judge Denny] Chin, the federal judge who is presiding over Author’s Guild et al. v. Google, Inc., has been inundated with letters and amicus briefs in advance of the September 7 deadline for participants in the class action to opt out of a settlement over the company's controversial Google Books project that has received preliminary approval from the court. A handful of the documents have come from professors, university libraries, and advocacy groups.

Auraria Library students and faculty search Lexis Nexis Federal and State case law or Lexis Nexis Law reviews using these links.

"Google's Book Search: a disaster for scholars"

This review from the Chronicle Review on August 31, 2009 by Geoffrey Nunberg brings to light some of the problems of re-publishing works without metadata, or to be exact, sloppy and incorrect metadata. It also points out the problem with depending solely on automated processes.

While many web users focus on the idea more than on when an idea was published or it's author, scholars need to know the truth. There is a useful comment on this review by John Wilkin, Executive Director of the Hathi Trust.

The review is at http://chronicle.com/article/Googles-Book-Search-A/48245/. Auraria Library users who are off campus will need the information at this link to see the article.