Ulrich Herb hat einen lesenswerten Sammelband zum Themenfeld Offenheit in Wissenschaft, Verwaltung und Bildung veröffentlicht. Zwölf Autorinnen und Autoren beleuchten Initiativen deren Ziel es ist, durch Nutzung des Webs, den Zugang zu Information und Wissen zu verbessern.
Yesterday, David Willetts, the UK government’s Minister for Universities and Science, gave a speech at the annual general meeting of the Publisher’s Association. The full text of the speech is online and very well worth reading, though it’s long.
These are worrying days for barrier-based publishers. In the few days since I posted part 2 of this series, we have yet another major development in the Open Access world: UK Science Minister David Willetts’ announcement that “we will make publicly funded research accessible free of charge to readers”.
Last month, the wettest April in the UK since records began, there was also a deluge of articles in the popular press about open access. This is a round-up of some of the articles (and perhaps notable by their absence are any articles that are behind a paywall!). Harvard backs open access in face of ‘prohibitive’ journal costs Times Higher Education 28 April 2012
Given the huge amount we’ve written about open access on this blog, it may come as a surprise to realise that the blog itself has not been open access until today. It’s been free to read, of course, but in the absence of an explicit licence statement, the default “all rights reserved” has applied, which has meant that technically you’re not supposed to do things like, for example, using SV-POW! material in course notes.
It seems the world is conveniently arranging itself for the benefit of this occasional series. Every time I am about to post an installment, something apposite happens out there. Just as I was preparing part 0, Bernstein Research’s investment report Is Elsevier Heading for a Political Train-Wreck? came out; just before part 1, Elsevier decided that the solution to their problems was to hire a PR guy;
Harvard University is probably the single richest school on the planet. Its endowment in 2011 was the biggest in the USA, at $31.728 billion — over 60% more than the next highest (Yale, at $19.374 billion). It’s also in with a good shout as the best university in the world — the current Times Higher Education ranking has it equal second, behind only Cal Tech, level with Stanford, and ahead of Oxford, Princeton and Cambridge.
Die Enquete-Kommission „Internet und digitale Gesellschaft“ hat heute auf ihrer 16. Sitzung den Zwischenbericht der Projektgruppe „Bildung und Forschung“ diskutiert. Dieser Bericht (PDF) behandelt u.a. das Themenfeld Open Access zu Textpublikationen und Forschungsdaten sehr umfassend. Neben einer Einführung in das Thema wird die Entwicklung von Open Access beleuchtet. Darüber hinaus werden die Herausforderungen behandelt.
Last time we looked at the state Elsevier has got itself into, and how it needs to make significant changes to regain the trust of researchers (and librarians for that matter). By coincidence, literally as I was writing that, Elsevier’s Liz Smith tweeted: I clicked through and looked at the advert: This is worth doing — as Richard Poynder pointed out back in January, Elsevier needs to get out more, and hiring someone whose job is just that
Background Today has seen the release of a Bernstein Research investment report by Claudio Aspesi, entitled Reed Elsevier: Is Elsevier Heading for a Political Train-Wreck? It contains some stark warnings to potential investors: And: And most importantly, this conclusion: I’m not here to gloat.