Category: Open Access

"Open Science, Closed Doors: The Perils and Potential of Open Science for Research in Practice"


This paper advocates for the value of open science in many areas of research. However, after briefly reviewing the fundamental principles underlying open science practices and their use and justification, the paper identifies four incompatibilities between those principles and scientific progress through applied research. The incompatibilities concern barriers to sharing and disclosure, limitations and deficiencies of overidentifying with hypothetico-deductive methods of inference, the paradox of replication efforts resulting in less robust findings, and changes to the professional research and publication culture such that it will narrow in favor of a specific style of research. Seven recommendations are presented to maximize the value of open science while minimizing its adverse effects on the advancement of science in practice.

https://doi.org/10.1017/iop.2022.61

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Core’s Library Resources & Technical Services Journal Goes Fully Open Access"


Previously, the most recent six issues of LRTS were embargoed behind a login for subscribers and Core members, which has been removed. This change makes the complete contents of the journal from 1996 to the present freely available on the LRTS site.

bit.ly/3DqHwSK

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"cOAlition S Confirms the End of Its Financial Support for Open Access Publishing under Transformative Arrangements after 2024"


Plan S was launched in 2018. At that time, cOAlition S recognised that transformative arrangements would provide a useful means to repurpose funds for journal subscriptions to publication fees, thus supporting legacy publishers in transforming paywalled to Open Access publication models. It was, however, also clear that the transformation would have to be completed at a definite point in time, by the end of 2024 at the latest. We maintain this timeline. We believe that the strategy of providing financial support for these arrangements—endorsed by many cOAlition S members—beyond 2024 would significantly increase the risk that these arrangements will become permanent and perpetuate hybrid Open Access, which cOAlition S has always firmly opposed.

bit.ly/3Y2l8He

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Community Consensus on Core Open Science Practices to Monitor in Biomedicine"


The state of open science needs to be monitored to track changes over time and identify areas to create interventions to drive improvements. In order to monitor open science practices, they first need to be well defined and operationalized. To reach consensus on what open science practices to monitor at biomedical research institutions, we conducted a modified 3-round Delphi study. Participants were research administrators, researchers, specialists in dedicated open science roles, and librarians. In rounds 1 and 2, participants completed an online survey evaluating a set of potential open science practices, and for round 3, we hosted two half-day virtual meetings to discuss and vote on items that had not reached consensus. Ultimately, participants reached consensus on 19 open science practices. This core set of open science practices will form the foundation for institutional dashboards and may also be of value for the development of policy, education, and interventions.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3001949

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

New Tools Validate Compliance with OA Funder’s Rules : "Confused by Open-Access Policies? These Tools Can Help"


Funding-agency policies mandating that scientific papers and data are made publicly available have helped to drive the adoption of preprints, open-access publishing and data repositories. But agencies often struggle to measure how closely grant recipients comply with the funding policies. Awardees, and the institutes that employ them, can struggle to ensure they are following the rules. Now, digital tools are cropping up to help both sides of the funding equation stick to the regulations.

https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-023-00175-1

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Faculty Perceptions of Open Access Publishing: Investigating Faculty Publishing Habits to Evaluate Library Collection Alignment"


Introduction: This investigation, originally conceived as a method for informing Albertsons Library on creative solutions to the collections budget shortfall, sought to determine an institution’s faculty perceptions of publishing and/or using open access (OA) materials, as well as to identify future mechanisms that would shift perceptions of OA publishing to a more favorable light, thereby fostering adoption of OA materials in faculty research and teaching. Methods: The study used an anonymous electronic survey of 468 faculty members, with a response rate of nearly 34%. Results and Discussion: Respondents indicated a mixed set of adoption, with equal distribution in willingness to engage with OA journals and publications. Quality of OA publications, combined with concerns for tenure and promotion, holds faculty back from utilizing OA journals and publications in their own research and in the classroom. Conclusion: The data collected through the course of this perceptions survey provide important insight into the perceptions of faculty at this point in time, laying the groundwork for future surveys to evaluate growth in engagement with OA publishing. Though the data provided do not immediately alleviate collections budget constraints at Albertsons Library, the survey contributed to a more holistic understanding of faculty publishing behavior in OA journals.

https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.13216

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Model(s) of the Future? Overlay Journals as an Overlooked and Emerging Trend in Scholarly Communication"


Overlay journals, a potentially overlooked model of scholarly communication, have seen a resurgence due to the increasing number of preprint repositories and preprints on coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) related topics. Overlay journals at various stages of maturity were examined for unique characteristics, including whether the authors submitted their article to the journal, whether the peer reviews of the article were published by the overlay journal, and whether the overlay journals took advantage of opportunities for increased discovery. As librarians and researchers seek new, futuristic models for publishing, overlay journals are emerging as an important contribution to scholarly communication.

https://doi.org/10.5206/cjils-rcsib.v45i2.14730

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"European Commission Grants Substantial Funding to Improve Institutional Publishing for Science"


The project "Creating a Robust Accessible Federated Technology for Open Access (CRAFT-OA), carried out by 23 experienced partners from 14 European countries, coordinated by the University of Gättingen, Germany will start in January 2023 and run for 36 months. . . . The project focuses on four strands of action to improve the Diamond OA model: (1) Provide technical improvements for journal platforms and journal software (2) Build communities of practice to foster overall infrastructure improvement (3) Increase visibility, discoverability and recognition for Diamond OA publishing (4) Integrate Diamond OA publishing with the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) and other large-scale data aggregators.

https://operas.hypotheses.org/6016

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Challenges of Qualitative Data Sharing in Social Sciences"


Open science offers hope for new accountability and transparency in social sciences. Nevertheless, it still fails to fully consider the complexities of qualitative research, as exemplified by a reflection on sensitive qualitative data sharing. As a result, the developing patterns of rewards and sanctions promoting open science raise concern that quantitative research, whose "replication crisis" brought the open science movement to life, will benefit from "good science" re-evaluations at the expense of other research epistemologies, despite the necessity to define accountability and transparency in social sciences more widely and not to conflate those with either reproducibility or data sharing.

bit.ly/3j6NTTV

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Recalibrating the Scope of Scholarly Publishing: A Modest Step in a Vast Decolonization Process"


By analyzing 25,671 journals largely absent from common journal counts, as well as Web of Science and Scopus, this study demonstrates that scholarly communication is more of a global endeavor than is commonly credited. These journals, employing the open source publishing platform Open Journal Systems (OJS), have published 5.8 million items; they are in 136 countries, with 79.9% in the Global South and 84.2% following the OA diamond model (charging neither reader nor author). A substantial proportion of journals operate in more than one language (48.3%), with research published in a total of 60 languages (led by English, Indonesian, Spanish, and Portuguese). The journals are distributed across the social sciences (45.9%), STEM (40.3%), and the humanities (13.8%). For all their geographic, linguistic, and disciplinary diversity, 1.2% are indexed in the Web of Science and 5.7% in Scopus. On the other hand, 1.0% are found in Cabells Predatory Reports, while 1.4% show up in Beall’s questionable list. This paper seeks to both contribute and historically situate expanded scale and diversity of scholarly publishing in the hope that this recognition may assist humankind in taking full advantage of what is increasingly a global research enterprise.

https://doi.org/10.1162/qss_a_00228

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Phase 1 of the NIH Preprint Pilot: Testing the Viability of Making Preprints Discoverable in PubMed Central and PubMed"


Introduction: The National Library of Medicine (NLM) launched a pilot in June 2020 to 1) explore the feasibility and utility of adding preprints to PubMed Central (PMC) and making them discoverable in PubMed and 2) to support accelerated discoverability of NIH-supported research without compromising user trust in NLM’s widely used literature services. Methods: The first phase of the Pilot focused on archiving preprints reporting NIH-supported SARS-CoV-2 virus and COVID-19 research. To launch Phase 1, NLM identified eligible preprint servers and developed processes for identifying NIH-supported preprints within scope in these servers. Processes were also developed for the ingest and conversion of preprints in PMC and to send corresponding records to PubMed. User interfaces were modified for display of preprint records. NLM collected data on the preprints ingested and discovery of preprint records in PMC and PubMed and engaged users through focus groups and a survey to obtain direct feedback on the Pilot and perceptions of preprints. Results: Between June 2020 and June 2022, NLM added more than 3,300 preprint records to PMC and PubMed, which were viewed 4 million times and 3 million times, respectively. Nearly a quarter of preprints in the Pilot were not associated with a peer-reviewed published journal article. User feedback revealed that the inclusion of preprints did not have a notable impact on trust in PMC or PubMed. Discussion: NIH-supported preprints can be identified and added to PMC and PubMed without disrupting existing operations processes. Additionally, inclusion of preprints in PMC and PubMed accelerates discovery of NIH research without reducing trust in NLM literature services. Phase 1 of the Pilot provided a useful testbed for studying NIH investigator preprint posting practices, as well as knowledge gaps among user groups, during the COVID-19 public health emergency, an unusual time with heightened interest in immediate access to research results.

https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.12.12.520156

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Guest Post — How Do We Measure Success for Open Science?"


If the success of an innovation relates to the practice of Open Science — which at PLOS is about much more than reputation; it’s central to our mission — then what does success look like? And how do you measure it at the publisher scale? Indeed, to make progress towards any goal, good data are needed, including a view of your current and desired future states. Unfortunately, as recently as last year, there were no tools or services that could tell us everything we wanted to know, at PLOS, about Open Science practices. . . . This is, in part, why we developed and have recently shared the initial results of our "Open Science Indicators" initiative.

bit.ly/3PlXWAR

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Non-Fungible Token (NFT) in the Academic and Open Access Publishing Environment: Considerations towards Science-Friendly Scenarios"


The article describes the use and possible value creation of Non-Fungible Tokens (NFT) in the academic and open access publishing environment. It defines NFTs, describes disadvantages and possible solutions, especially in the intended scientific environment. An overview of existing NFT service providers from the publishing environment illustrates that there is not yet a suitable one for researchers. Accordingly, three possible scenarios are shown where NFT services could be located in a science-friendly way. One would be with library- or scholarly-led university presses, repositories, and other publication infrastructures (such as OJS or OMP). Another would be to use centralizing and channelling article submission platforms with which universities have contracts, such asChronosHub. The third and broadest approach would be through Digital ObjectIdentifier (DOI) registration agencies such as ChronosHub and DataCite, although complexities come into play here due to the triangular relationship with publishers registering DOIs (some of them having exclusive usage rights transferred to themselves). This complexity could be reduced by registeringNFTs only for open access publications with a Creative Commons Attribution license. A summary and outlook provide an overview of open questions and initial starting points to get started.

https://doi.org/10.3998/jep.2574

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"An Open Social Scholarship Path for the Humanities"


Open digital scholarship is significant for facilitating public access to and engagement with research, and as a foundation for growing digital scholarly infrastructure around the world today and in the future. But the path to adopting open, digital scholarship on a national—never mind international—scale is challenged by several real, pragmatic issues. In this article, we consider these issues as well as proactive strategies for the realization of robust, inclusive, publicly engaged, open scholarship in digital form. We draw on the INKE Partnership’s central goal of fostering open social scholarship (academic practice that enables the creation, dissemination, and engagement of open research by specialists and non-specialists in accessible and significant ways). In doing so, we look to pursue more open, and more social, scholarly activities through knowledge mobilization, community training, public engagement, and policy recommendations in order to understand and address challenges facing digital scholarly communication. We then provide tangible details, outlining how the INKE Partnership puts open social scholarship theory into practice, with an eye to a more open and engaged future.

https://doi.org/10.3998/jep.1973

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Ten Recommended Practices for Managing Preprints in Generalist and Institutional Repositories"


Currently, there are numerous gaps in geographic and domain coverage and some authors will choose to deposit their research outputs into another type of repository, such as an institutional or generalist repository. . . . To address these gaps, a COAR-ASAPbio Working Group on Preprint in Repositories identified ten recommended practices for managing preprints across three areas: linking, discovery, and editorial processes. While we acknowledge that many of these practices are not currently in use by institutional and generalist repositories, we hope that these recommendations will encourage repositories around the world that collect preprints to begin to apply them locally.

https://cutt.ly/R0gursT

Full report

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Comparison of Clinical Study Results Reported in medRxiv Preprints vs Peer-reviewed Journal Articles"


Most clinical studies posted as preprints on medRxiv and subsequently published in peer-reviewed journals had concordant study characteristics, results, and final interpretations. With more than three-fourths of preprints published in journals within 24 months, these results may suggest that many preprints report findings that are consistent with the final peer-reviewed publications.

https://cutt.ly/k0gyQOv

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Adding Equity to Transformative Agreements and Journal Subscriptions — The Read & Let Read Model"


Not only should libraries pay for access to that number of articles in the next year, they should multiply it by two. This will mean that likely about half the prepaid article uses will go unclaimed by a libraries’ community during the coverage year. To justify the "double" payment, these unclaimed uses shall be made available for any online reader during the following year. . . . I call this plan Read & Let Read (R&LR).

bit.ly/3iGSgoz

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Evaluation of Publication of COVID-19–Related Articles Initially Presented as Preprints"


In this study, we identified 3343 COVID-19–related preprints posted on medRxiv in 2020. Our March 2022 search indicated that 1712 of those preprints (51.2%) were subsequently published in the peer-reviewed literature; this number increased to 1742 (52.1%) when we repeated the search in October 2022. Not considering January 2020, in which only 1 article on COVID-19 was posted, the rate of subsequent publication in a scientific journal ranged from 43.5% (94 of 216 preprints; observed in March 2020) to 60.6% (177 of 292 preprints posted in August 2020). The Table shows the top 25 of 579 peer-reviewed journals in which these preprints were published; 827 preprints (47.5%) were subsequently published in quartile 1 journals (Figure).

bit.ly/3HprhIq

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Open Access Journals Lack Image Accessibility Considerations in Author Guidelines"


Using image accessibility and alt text as a lens, our objective was to evaluate how open access journals incorporate disability accessibility as part of open access publishing. Using a random sample of 300 English language open access journals, we assessed author guidelines to understand image requirements for submissions and open access statements to understand how journals conceive of openness and accessibility. We found that most open access journals do not include disability accessibility elements in their guidelines to authors when submitting images as part of their scholarship. While over half the journals had required parameters for image submission, none of them required alt text. And while the majority of journals included the word 'access' or 'accessibility' in their open access statements, almost none included disability or inclusion related terms.

https://doi.org/10.31222/osf.io/zsjqw

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

Wolters Kluwer: The Path to Open Medicine: Driving Global Health Equity through Medical Research


The paper is divided into three parts. Part 1 traces the historical events that led to the modern system of scientific research, funding, knowledge dissemination, and recognition, which largely confines health and medical knowledge production to those in HICs [high income countries]. By understanding our shared past and the rise of structural barriers to global health equity, we can better inform our shared path to dismantle them. Part 2 takes a clear-eyed look at where the scientific community is now. Are the ideals of Open Medicine playing out as envisioned? Are the benefits of Open Medicine shared amongst all of humanity, or with only a select few? Lastly, Part 3 offers ideas and recommendations for all stakeholders to chart a path to bring Open Medicine into alignment with its goals and aspirations.

https://cutt.ly/E15vETj

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

John Willinsky: Copyright’s Broken Promise: How to Restore the Law’s Ability to Promote the Progress of Science


In Copyright’s Broken Promise, John Willinsky presents the case for reforming copyright law so that it supports, rather than impedes, public access to research and scholarship. He draws on the legal strategy of statutory licensing to set out the terms and structures by which the Copyright Act could ensure that publishers are fairly compensated for providing immediate open access.

https://cutt.ly/E15zPXH

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Why We Need Open-Source Science Innovation — Not Patents and Paywalls"


The results of a survey study of university professors in Canada found 81.1 percent of Canadian faculty would trade all IP for an open-source endowed chair and 34.4 percent of these faculty would require no additional compensation. Surprisingly, even more American faculty (86.7 percent) are willing to accept an open-source endowed professorship.

https://cutt.ly/x190Hso

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Institute of Physics Publishing Strikes Unlimited Publishing Deal with Big Ten Academic Alliance"


Strengthening the commitment to opening research, IOP Publishing (IOPP) has agreed to a three-year unlimited open publishing agreement with the Big Ten Academic Alliance (BTAA) consortium in the United States (US). Beginning January 2023, the agreement enables affiliated researchers to publish unlimited Open Access (OA) papers at no cost to them. . . . During the agreement, authors affiliated with Big Ten Academic Alliance institutions will be able to make their research openly accessible to the global community immediately after publication while retaining their copyright.

https://cutt.ly/u19NN2u

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Are We Undervaluing Open Access by Not Correctly Factoring in the Potentially Huge Impacts of Machine Learning? — An Academic Librarian’s View (I)"


Synopsis: I have recently adjusted my view to the position that the benefits of Machine learning techniques are more likely to be real and large. This is based on the recent incredible results of LLM (Large Language models) and about a year’s experimenting with some of the newly emerging tools based on such technologies.

If I am right about this, are we academic librarians systematically undervaluing Open Access by not taking this into account sufficiently when negotiating with publishers? Given that we control the purse strings, we are one of the most impactful parties (next to publishers and researchers) that will help decide how fast if at all the transition to an Open Access World occurs.

https://cutt.ly/U19MZzK

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Access to Research Data and EU Copyright"


The article seeks to contribute to this aim by exploring the legal framework in which research data can be accessed and used in EU copyright law. First, it delineates the authors’ understanding of research data. It then examines the protection research data currently receives under EU and Member State law via copyright and related rights, as well as the ownership of these rights by different stakeholders in the scientific community. After clarifying relevant conflict-of-laws issues that surround research data, it maps ways to legally access and use them, including statutory exceptions, the open science movement and current developments in law and practice.

bit.ly/3VVx7pg

| Research Data Publication and Citation Bibliography | Research Data Sharing and Reuse Bibliography | Research Data Curation and Management Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |