Étiquette : open access

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EN

Generative AI and Open Access Publishing: A New Economic Paradigm

Authors : Leo S. Lo

The integration of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in scholarly publishing presents both opportunities and challenges for open access. AI can streamline workflows, reduce costs, and enhance the discoverability of research, potentially making open access more financially sustainable.

However, the same AI capabilities also raise concerns about exclusivity and the creation of a tiered system that limits access to knowledge. Publishers face a strategic decision between embracing open access and leveraging AI for proprietary content and services.

Libraries play a crucial role in advocating for open access and ethical AI use, building expertise, and influencing policy development. Balancing the benefits of AI with the principles of equity and inclusivity requires collaboration among stakeholders.

By working together, publishers, librarians, and policymakers can harness the power of AI to democratize access to knowledge while upholding ethical standards, fostering a more inclusive and equitable academic community.

URL : Generative AI and Open Access Publishing: A New Economic Paradigm

DOI : https://dx.doi.org/10.1353/lib.2025.a961190

Catégories
EN

Performance of the Nigerian Open Access Repositories

Authors : Binta Ladan Farouk, Karimatu Isa Maisango, Alkasim Hamisu Abdu

Research is undertaken to make human life better. This underscores the need to communicate the research results globally. The possibilities inherent in digital technologies coupled with the understanding that knowledge should be treated as a public good engender the emergence of the open access movement.

The movement aims at making research literature more freely available. Open access is implemented in two major ways: the gold route and the green route. The gold route entails making research literature freely available on publishers’ servers, whereas the green route entails using Open Access Repositories (OARs) to achieve the open access aims.

To date, a few OARs have been hosted in Nigeria to communicate the research produced in the country with the rest of the world. Therefore, this study used content analysis to assess the functionality and effectiveness of OARs hosted in Nigeria. Data were extracted from the Directory of Open Access Repositories (OpenDOAR), and, additionally, the contents of Nigerian repositories were analyzed.

The finding of the study revealed that there is a steady increase in OARs in Nigeria; however, the country lags when compared with its counterparts. It was also discovered that most Nigerian OARs were inaccessible owing to technical problems. At the same time, the contents of the accessible repositories are not consistent with OpenDOAR repository information sheets.

DSpace repository software continues to be the most popular in Nigeria; however, libraries were found to be lagging in housing OARs for their universities. Therefore, it is recommended that stakeholders in Nigeria double their efforts to develop OARs in the country.

URL : Performance of the Nigerian Open Access Repositories

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.18293

Catégories
EN

An APC Trap? Privilege and the Perception of Reasonableness in Open Access Publishing

Authors : Melissa H. Cantrell, Jennifer A. Mezick, Matthew Estill, Rachel Caldwell &
Lauren B. Collister

Introduction: This article investigates funding sources reported by authors of open access (OA) articles at four R1 (doctoral-granting institutions in the United States with very high research activity) universities, along with these authors’ perceptions of Article Processing Charges (APCs). The study suggests a cognitive dissonance among many respondents, in which there appears to be a desire and willingness to participate in OA publishing, which is at odds with a sense of unreasonableness and an uneven distribution of the ability of researchers to participate.

Literature review: Much of the literature on APCs centers on rising prices, how commercial publishers profit from this model, and the resulting inequities in OA publishing. Some information exists about resources for funding APCs, including grant funding, library programs, and fee waivers.

Methods: We surveyed authors who published an OA article in the calendar year 2022. The survey asked whether there was an APC, the funding source for the fee, and the author’s perception of the reasonableness of APC prices and their relative ability to pay compared with their peers.

Results: From 321 total respondents, grant funding was the largest source of APC funding, and authors reported fees of over $1,500 in U.S. dollars as unreasonable.

Discussion: This study confirms the hypothesis that external grants are the primary support for authors paying APCs, and beyond that, authors use a variety of sources to support their publishing fees. Respondents characterized APCs in general as unreasonable for less well-resourced colleagues.

Conclusion: Though authors were generally able to find funding or have fees waived, they perceive a threshold of reasonableness for APCs.

URL : An APC Trap? Privilege and the Perception of Reasonableness in Open Access Publishing

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.18184

Catégories
EN

Identifying Open Access Practices in Librarianship Journals

Authors : Jennifer Jordan, Blair Solon, Stephanie Beene

Introduction: In this article, we discuss the results of our research over the spring and summer of 2023. During this study, we conducted an environmental scan of 377 journals in the field of librarianship to gather information on open access publishing practices.

Methods: We used a mixed methods framework as a starting point for our research, collecting data on selected journals’ publishing practices. We selected journals based on the following criteria: 1) peer reviewed, 2) written in English or abstracted in English, 3) actively published at the time of analysis, and 4) scoped to librarianship. Data we collected included the journals’ open access policies, peer review processes, and data sharing policies.

Results: With a dataset of 133 of the initial 377 journals meeting our criteria, we observed variations in the journals’ open access practices, peer review processes, and data sharing policies. We noted more journals allowed diamond open access than any other publishing option, and a low number of journals are toll access.

Discussion: Within our study sample, open access policies are varied and in flux. Ascertaining the openness of individual peer-reviewed journals was challenging. Within the 133 journals examined, the state of open publishing practice is clearly evolving quickly, but with varying levels of transparency and consistency.

Conclusion: Even though there are myriad challenges associated with open access publishing, the field of librarianship must continue moving toward an open access model. Academic librarians can advocate for scholars to critically analyze and challenge the scholarly communication system. In addition, journals should provide publishing transparency and guidance for those looking to publish.

URL : Identifying Open Access Practices in Librarianship Journals

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.17778

Catégories
FR

Publication en accès ouvert et coûts d’Article Processing Charges (APC) en Argentine

Auteur.ices : Fernanda Beigel, Osvaldo Gallardo, Soledad Gomez, Flavia Prado

La prolifération des revues en libre accès présente un dilemme difficile pour les chercheurs basés en Argentine, en raison des coûts élevés des APC (Article Processing Charges) qui créent un écart entre ceux qui peuvent payer pour publier et ceux qui ne le peuvent pas. Dans la première partie de ce travail, nous analysons le problème des frais APC dans différents pays d’Amérique latine et les leçons des études réalisées sur le cas de l’Argentine.

Nous décrivons ensuite la population de chercheurs faisant l’objet de l’enquête — les directeurs de projets financés au niveau national — ainsi que la méthode utilisée et ses résultats. Nous proposons une classification des pratiques de publication en libre accès avec APC en quatre groupes comprenant des chercheurs de plusieurs disciplines.

Dans chaque groupe, on observe des tendances différentes vers la publication en accès ouvert ou fermé, l’origine des fonds utilisés pour payer les APC et les disciplines dans lesquelles ce phénomène a plus ou moins d’impact. Enfin, nous analysons la section qualitative de l’enquête qui comprend les questions ouvertes auxquelles ont répondu une bonne partie des chercheurs, offrant un aperçu de leurs stratégies face au problème et les voies envisagées pour en atténuer les effets néfastes.

DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/140p9

Catégories
EN

Podcasting as Open Access: A Review and Discussion of Potential Impact on Scholarly Communication and Promotion

Authors : Allison Symulevich, Matt Torrence, Jason Boczar, Jessica Szempruch

Introduction

Academic Podcasts are an informal way for faculty members to share their research expertise with an expanded and international audience. In this article, we argue that podcasts are a form of informal scholarly communication and that libraries can contribute to the successful dissemination of this informal scholarly communication.

Description of Service

At the University of South Florida, episodes of faculty-created academic podcasts are posted to the institutional repository, allowing the dissemination of these podcasts permanently via open access. The open-access nature of these materials makes them freely available to faculty, students, and other scholars; additionally, it helps to improve metrics capturing while demonstrating international impact.

In comparing the measures afforded to record statistics, as well as other geographic and various platforms used, the authors leaned on internal resources and concepts from the literature to examine existing measures and reporting related to podcasting efforts.

Next Steps

Through the study of both existing services at the University of South Florida and other universities, as well as the literature, what remains is to increasingly document and standardize methods of measuring the impact of academic podcasts and related types of open-access content.

URL : Podcasting as Open Access: A Review and Discussion of Potential Impact on Scholarly Communication and Promotion

DOI : https://doi.org/10.31274/jlsc.18241

Catégories
EN

Making museum research more visible: Open Access in the GLAM sector

Authors : Emily Rees Koerner, Lydia Ackrell

Open Access paradigms have changed how academic scholarship is published and disseminated, creating a new model for how research is shared. But how do these paradigms map onto museum research?

This question is particularly pertinent when larger numbers of funded research projects include, or are led by, museums. This article considers some of the affordances and challenges of using Open Access principles and technologies to make visible the multifaceted modes of research that take place in a museum setting. Using the Science Museum Group as a case study, it focuses on how repositories offer one means to make research conducted in museums more accessible, while also broadening definitions of what a research output is.

With the focus hitherto more on images and collection items, here we expand into the realm of exhibition and gallery outputs – the content which museums produce to narrate their collections’ stories and engage audiences.

Many of these outputs may have been designed to have an ephemeral, physical lifespan, but through platforms such as repositories they can gain a digital afterlife, serving a new purpose as learning resources, research data, or indeed a record of curatorial and museological practice.

The article ultimately argues that Open Access principles can aid museums (and the wider GLAM sector) in their mission to be transparent organisations for wide-ranging audiences.

DOI : https://dx.doi.org/10.15180/252304