Month: July 2009

Word + SWORD + Ingester = Word to DSpace Deposit

In "Direct from MS Word to DSpace via SWORD," Stuart Lewis describes how to get documents into DSpace from Word via SWORD and a custom DSpace ingester.

Here's an excerpt:

This complete end to end process allows you to create Word templates, and to mark them up with required and optional fields. It also allows you to embed details of the SWORD deposit repository URL (so the users do not need to know what it is) within the template for easy deposit. This could be used for example for a journal editor to provide a template and a deposit location for new paper submissions all-in-one.

Peter Suber to “Step Back” from Blogging on Open Access News

Peter Suber will "step back from systematic daily blogging" on Open Access News so that he can focus on his new job at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.

The open access movement owes a huge debt of gratitude to Peter and to Gavin Baker (who joined OAN on February 03, 2008) for their incredible work on OAN, which passed 15,000 posts on September 29, 2008. Unless you have done it, it's difficult to appreciate how time-consuming doing this kind of high-volume news and commentary blogging is, which involves a considerable amount of effort to identify, filter, summarize, and comment on relevant and timely news items. OAN is not just an excellent current news source—it's an important advocacy platform and the best historical chronicle of the open access movement that exists.

Here's an excerpt from "Housekeeping":

Today I step back from systematic daily blogging in order to free up time for my new position at the Berkman Center. 

The blog itself will continue and Gavin will continue at something like his current pace.  I will continue my daily crawl for OA-related news.  I'll continue to tag what I find for the OA tracking project (OATP).  I'll continue to write the monthly SPARC Open Access Newsletter (SOAN).  I'll continue to work full-time for OA. 

I'll even continue to blog, though only sporadically.  Open Access News (OAN) will be smaller and more selective than in the past.  I cannot assure you that the news it covers will be the most important subset.  (That presupposes that Gavin and I will be on top of all new developments and in a position to pick the most important.)  I'll blog what I notice, what moves me, and what I have time for, with the accent on the third criterion.  It should be a eclectic bunch.  I know that I'll notice a lot of important news, thanks to OATP, and I know that I'll be moved to blog a lot of it.  But because of my new projects, even the most important news will be important news that I only have time to tag, not to blog.

For a comprehensive source of OA news, subscribe to the OATP feed, which is available by RSS, email, and a blog-like web page with the most recent items displayed first.  The OATP feed has been more comprehensive than this blog since April and it grows more comprehensive and useful every day.  To help the cause, please join OATP as a tagger and help select new items for inclusion in the feed.  For more details, see the OATP home page or my SOAN article about it from May 2009. 

Oxford University Press Backs Google Book Search Settlement

In "Saving Texts From Oblivion: Oxford U. Press on the Google Book Settlement," Tim Barton, President of Oxford University Press, discusses the Google Book Search Settlement Agreement.

In conclusion. he states:

So we at Oxford University Press support the settlement, even as we recognize its imperfections and want it made better. As Voltaire said, "Le mieux est l'ennemi du bien," the perfect is the enemy of the good. Let us not waste an opportunity to create so much good. Let us work together to solve the imperfections of the settlement. Let us work together to give students, scholars, and readers access to the written wisdom of previous generations. Let us keep those minds alive.

Stuart Shieber on “University Open-Access Policies as Mandates”

In "University Open-Access Policies as Mandates," Stuart M. Shieber, Director of Harvard's Office for Scholarly Communication, discusses the difference between university open access policies and university open access mandates and whether it matters.

Here's an excerpt:

Try the following thought experiment. Suppose a policy on faculty were established that granted to the university a license in faculty articles but did not explicitly provide for a waiver of the license. Now imagine that a faculty member has an article accepted by a highly prestigious journal that does not allow for author distribution and will not accept an amendment of its copyright transfer policy. Perhaps the author is a junior faculty member soon up for tenure, whose promotion case will be considerably weakened without the publication in question. The author might naturally want to have the license waived even though no waiver is explicitly provided for. The faculty member is likely to storm into the dean’s office, howling about the unconscionable practice of taking rights even when it harms the faculty member. Is the university going to distribute the article anyway against the express wishes of the faculty member? Be serious. The dean says "Fine, we won’t make use of the license for this article." Voilà, a waiver. So much for university rights retention mandates.

Copyright and E-Reserves: Update on Cambridge University Press et al. v. Georgia State University

In "Interesting Development in Georgia State Case," Kevin Smith provides an update on Cambridge University Press et al. v. Georgia State University, an important case about copyright and electronic reserves in libraries.

Here's an excerpt:

Earlier this year, the Georgia Regents adopted a new copyright policy after a select committee reviewed and entirely rewrote the older one. The new policy is shorter, more easily comprehended and more pragmatic. . . .

After this new policy was adopted, attorneys for GSU filed a motion for a "protective order" which would state that only information about electronic course content going forward, under the new policy, could be "discovered" by the plaintiffs. GSU argued that since they were a state institution, and therefore entitled to immunity from damages, the plaintiffs could only get prospective relief (an injunction) and therefore should be limited to information about practices related to the policy under which GSU would go forward. After some legal maneuvering, the Judge granted this request last week.

ARL Publishes Author Addenda, SPEC Kit 310

The Association of Research Libraries has published Author Addenda, SPEC Kit 310. The table of contents and executive summary are freely available.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

This survey was distributed to the 123 ARL member libraries in February 2009. Respondents were asked to provide information on the use of author addenda at their institutions, which rights authors were encouraged to retain, and the methods by which libraries were conducting promotion and outreach efforts on the topic of author rights and addenda. Seventy libraries (57%) responded to the survey. Of those respondents, 35 (50%) indicated that authors at their institutions were using author addenda, and 33 libraries (47%) indicated that they “did not know.” Only two libraries indicated that authors at their institutions were not using author addenda.

The majority of respondents (77%) did not formally collect information on the use of author addenda on their campuses at the time of this survey. Evidence was gathered mostly in an informal way, either when an author contacted the library with a question related to copyright or an author addendum, or through anecdotal stories of success or failure in using an addendum. Fifty-two percent (36) of the responding libraries reported that an author addendum had been endorsed by administrators or a governing body at their institution or by their consortia, while 62% (43) responded that there had been no endorsements. There had been more endorsements at the consortial level than at the institutional level. Eight libraries (12%) reported that an institutional endorsement was under consideration at the time of the survey. A larger number of libraries (46 or 68%) reported that their institution or consortium had worked to promote the use of an author addendum by providing links to an author addendum and copyright information on library Web sites or making faculty presentations on author rights (particularly pertaining to the NIH Public Access Policy).

This SPEC Kit includes documentation from respondents in the form of sample addenda, brochures, handouts, and author rights Web sites and slides from presentations to faculty and library staff.

Sun Launches Enterprise-Wide Digital Repository and Archive Solution

Sun has launched its Enterprise-Wide Digital Repository and Archive solution.

Here's an excerpt from Enterprise-Wide Digital Repositories and Archives:

The result is a solution which is more than the sum of its parts. Drupal with Islandora provides an easy, powerful way to create customized Web sites with an organization's own unique content and branding and offers fine control over access to collections and individual data assets. Adding the Fedora Repository provides durability to the content while also enabling seamless sharing of content with other applications. The Sun Open Archive Framework’s Preservation Software layer adds robust storage protection and data handling combined with powerful management tools, while Sun Open Storage delivers the most cost effective and easily deployed storage available. Together these components get customers up and running fast with the assurance they will be able to grow and evolve the system gracefully, protecting investments.

Read more about it at "New Fedora-based Solution Offerings from Sun and its Partners."

“RKBExplorer: Repositories, Linked Data and Research Support”

Hugh Glaser, Ian Millard, and Les Carr have self-archived "RKBExplorer: Repositories, Linked Data and Research Support" in the ECS EPrints Repository.

Here's an excerpt:

RKBExplorer (http://rkbexplorer.com/) is a system for publishing Linked Data to Semantic Web standards, also providing a browser that allows users to explore this interlinked Web of Data, primarily in the domain of scientific endeavour. As part of the activity, we have harvested the metadata from a number of the larger ePrints repositories into http://eprints.rkbexplorer.com, and republished it as Linked Data. This allows the RKBExplorer browser to present a unified view of these repositories and related data from other sources such as dblp and dbpedia (a Semantic Web version of Wikipedia). Users can thus investigate concepts related to the ePrints people and articles, such as related people, projects and institutions.

Library IT Jobs: Systems Librarian at National Library of Medicine

The National Library of Medicine's Reference & Web Services Section is recruiting a Systems Librarian.

Here's an excerpt from the ad:

As a member of our staff, you will have the opportunity to:

  • Develop and support Web 2.0 technologies like blogs and wikis
  • Manage websites, including http://www.nlm.nih.gov
  • Manage and support applications such as Vivisimo, NLM's search engine application and TeamSite, NLM's primary web content management system
  • Collaborate with the MedlinePlus management team to ensure usability and customer satisfaction on http://medlineplus.gov, NLM's consumer health website
  • Serve as technical liaison to NLM's IT department

Digital Library Jobs: Project Manager for the Integrated Workflow for Institutional Repository Enhancement Project

Cardiff University's Information Services Directorate is recruiting a Project Manager for the Integrated Workflow for Institutional Repository Enhancement Project.

Here's an excerpt from the ad:

Cardiff University's Information Services Directorate (INSRV) provides a full range of IS, IT and Library services, supporting staff and students in their academic, research and business functions. MWE is a large IT project involving the deployment of Portal Services, Collaborative Tools and Business Integrations to Cardiff University's users, and will transform the day-to-day working experience of staff and students. The Institutional Repository (ORCA—Online Research @ Cardiff) is a digital repository for the University's research publications, making the full text freely available where possible.

The I-WIRE Project will develop a workflow and toolset, integrated into the MWE research portal, for the submission, indexing, and re-purposing of data and full text for staff publications in ORCA. You will have a significant role in the successful delivery of this externally-funded project.

Digital Preservation: Two-Year Pilot Project Evaluation

The Chesapeake Project has released its Two-Year Pilot Project Evaluation.

Here's an excerpt:

The Chesapeake Project began as a collaborative, two-year pilot program with the goal of preserving born-digital legal information published directly to the Web. It was implemented in early 2007 by the Georgetown Law Library and the State Law Libraries of Maryland and Virginia. Having successfully completed its pilot phase, The Chesapeake Project' legal information archive is now expanding.

The following document comprises the final evaluation and account of The Chesapeake Project's accomplishments during its two-year pilot phase, spanning from February 27, 2007, to February 28, 2009.

During this time, the project's digital archive was populated with more than 4,300 digital items representing nearly 1,900 Web-published titles, the vast majority of which have no print counterpart. Each of these titles were harvested from the Web, stored within a secure digital archive and assigned permanent archive URLs. Today, each archived digital title remains accessible to users, despite whether or not the original digital files have been altered or removed from their original locations on the Web.

A 2008 analysis of the digital archive's content showed that more than eight percent of the titles archived by The Chesapeake Project had disappeared from their original URLs within the project's first year, but remained accessible thanks to the project's efforts. The current evaluation demonstrates that this figure has increased significantly over the past year. In fact, as of March 2009, nearly 14 percent of the project's archived titles—approximately one in seven—have disappeared from their original locations on the Web.

“Citing and Reading Behaviours in High-Energy Physics. How a Community Stopped Worrying about Journals and Learned to Love Repositories”

Anne Gentil-Beccot, Salvatore Mele, and Travis Brooks have self-archived "Citing and Reading Behaviours in High-Energy Physics. How a Community Stopped Worrying about Journals and Learned to Love Repositories" in arXiv.org.

Here's an excerpt:

Contemporary scholarly discourse follows many alternative routes in addition to the three-century old tradition of publication in peer-reviewed journals. The field of High- Energy Physics (HEP) has explored alternative communication strategies for decades, initially via the mass mailing of paper copies of preliminary manuscripts, then via the inception of the first online repositories and digital libraries.

This field is uniquely placed to answer recurrent questions raised by the current trends in scholarly communication: is there an advantage for scientists to make their work available through repositories, often in preliminary form? Is there an advantage to publishing in Open Access journals? Do scientists still read journals or do they use digital repositories?

The analysis of citation data demonstrates that free and immediate online dissemination of preprints creates an immense citation advantage in HEP, whereas publication in Open Access journals presents no discernible advantage. In addition, the analysis of clickstreams in the leading digital library of the field shows that HEP scientists seldom read journals, preferring preprints instead.

Scholarly Societies Optimistic about Global Downturn’s Effect on Their Publishing Operations

A survey presented at a recent Wiley-Blackwell Executive Seminar on "Journals Publishing: Policy and Practice in an Uncertain Market" shows that scholarly societies are surprisingly optimistic about the effect of the global downturn on their publishing operations.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

Sixty percent of professional and scholarly societies believe that the global economic downturn might be a stimulus to introducing efficiencies within their organizations, while 57% think it might provide opportunities for launching new activities or services for their members, according to a new study presented at the Wiley-Blackwell Executive Seminar held at the Royal Society, London, on June 19th 2009.

The study, carried out by Wiley-Blackwell, the leading publisher for professional and scholarly societies, examined the potential impact of the economic downturn on its society publishing partners. Sixty-eight percent characterized the global economic downturn as moderately negative, while 17% stated that it will have minimal negative impact or may even be beneficial.

Asked to rank the expected impact of the economic downturn on each category of their organization’s revenues or assets, more than 75% of society officers believed that there would be a very or slightly negative impact on their membership dues and conference income, with the most concern expressed about endowments and investments. Thirty-two percent did not anticipate any change in income from publishing, forty-seven percent believed it could be slightly affected, while 17% percent felt this area may be very affected.

In terms of strategies to ride out the economic crunch, 41% said that they would consider downsizing while a further 41% said they would consider expanding. More than half (54%) felt that the way to navigate the recession was outsourcing some of their core activities, such as publishing. Two-thirds thought that their publishing needs would not change during the recession, while one-third thought they would. . . .

The survey, carried out by Wiley-Blackwell in Spring 2009, was completed by 47 officers from scholarly and professional societies ranging in size from less than 500 members to more than 25,000, and from a variety of subject disciplines. The majority of respondents were based in Europe and the United States.