PEER : Annual Report – Year 2

PEER (Publishing and the Ecology of European Research), supported by the EC eContentplus programme, is investigating the potential effects of the large-scale, systematic depositing of authors’ final peer-reviewed manuscripts (so called Green Open Access or stage-two research output) on reader access, author visibility, and journal viability, as well as on the broader ecology of European research.

The project has recently been granted a nine month extension and will now run until May 2012.

URL : http://www.peerproject.eu/fileadmin/media/reports/D9_8_annual_public_report_20100930.pdf

Library Advocacy in India in the Light of Education for Sustainable Development – Perspectives of an Emerging Economy

India is considered as a world leader amongst the developing countries in terms of economic sustainability and growth. India also has a growing number of literate population due to rapid expansion of secondary and post-secondary education landscape. However, when it comes to education for sustainable development (ESD), India stands more elitist to serve only privileged sections of population.

Indian public library system still remains inadequate to fulfil the huge demands from neo functional literates or lifelong learners who mostly belong to under-privileged sections. ESD is incomplete without having adequate equity-based access to public library system which is an essential component of the ESD concept. Here comes the emergence of strong library advocates in the country. In post-independent India, Indian library associations were engaged in public library legislation in few states of India.

The public library legislations in different states were resulted from public library movement in the country. When new generation of library professionals took charge of library associations in the country, a dilution of public library movement and library advocacy across the country is observed. Where leadership of library associations was no more seriously engaged in library advocacy in the country, there was also rare existence of Indian civil societies engaged in library advocacy as well as policy advocacy in the relevant fields.

Fortunately, Indian National Knowledge Commission (NKC) was established in 2005 by the Central government which eventually formed a Working Group on Libraries. This Working Group on Libraries along with other related working groups of NKC re-established dialogs with national and state actors and other stakeholders through public consultations. Some civil society organizations also have started focusing on library advocacy, as a part of their engagement in ESD.

This paper discusses trajectories of various actors and stakeholders in India who are catching up ‘library advocacy’ to bridge the knowledge gaps in the country. This paper also analyses impact of Indian government’s policy frameworks towards building inclusive knowledge societies and their implications in future library advocacy in India.

URL : http://eprints.rclis.org/14916/

Coming of age in the academy? The status of our emerging field

Science communication is certainly growing as an academic field, as well as a professional specialization. This calls to mind predictions made decades ago about the ways in which the explosion of scientific knowledge was envisioned as the likely source of new difficulties in the relationship between science and society.

It is largely this challenge that has inspired the creation of the field of science communication. Has science communication become its own academic subdiscipline in the process? What exactly does this entail?

URL : http://jcom.sissa.it/archive/09/03/Jcom0903%282010%29C01/Jcom0903%282010%29C06/Jcom0903%282010%29C06.pdf

From analogue to digital scholarship: implications for science communication researchers

Digital media have transformed the social practices of science communication. They have extended the number of channels that scientists, media professionals, other stakeholders and citizens use to communicate scientific information.

Social media provide opportunities to communicate in more immediate and informal ways, while digital technologies have the potential to make the various processes of research more visible in the public sphere.

Some digital media also offer, on occasion, opportunities for interaction and engagement. Similarly, ideas about public engagement are shifting and extending social practices, partially influencing governance strategies, and science communication policies and practices.

In this paper I explore this developing context via a personal journey from an analogue to a digital scholar. In so doing, I discuss some of the demands that a globalised digital landscape introduces for science communication researchers and document some of the skills and competencies required to be a digital scholar of science communication.

URL : http://jcom.sissa.it/archive/09/03/Jcom0903%282010%29C01/Jcom0903%282010%29C05/Jcom0903%282010%29C05.pdf

Science communication, an emerging discipline

Several publications have sought to define the field of science communication and review current issues and recent research. But the status of science communication is uncertain in disciplinary terms.

This commentary considers two dimensions of the status of discipline as they apply to science communication – the clarity with which the field is defined and the level of development of theories to guide formal studies.

It argues that further theoretical development is needed to support science communication’s full emergence as a discipline.

URL : http://jcom.sissa.it/archive/09/03/Jcom0903%282010%29C01/Jcom0903%282010%29C03/Jcom0903%282010%29C03.pdf

Designing and Implementing Second Generation Digital Preservation Services: A Scalable Model for the Stanford Digital Repository

This paper describes the Stanford Digital Repository (SDR), a large scale, digital preservation system for scholarly materials. It examines the lessons-learned through over five years of development and operational experience.

Building on the knowledge gained, the paper goes on to outline a new repository design and service framework, SDR 2.0, that will address some of the challenges that have emerged. Changes in the environment such as staffing levels and collaborative opportunities are also described.

Finally, the paper includes observations on the general state of the preservation and repository communities, and the emergence of a new generation of systems and strategies in this space.

URL : http://www.dlib.org/dlib/september10/cramer/09cramer.html