Under ett och ett halvt år har representanter från 8 svenska lärosäten samarbetat i projektet ”Forskarmöten om Open Access”, finansierat av programmet OpenAccess.se. Projektet ska vara genomfört senast vid utgången av 2009 och har som uppgift att via halvdussinet seminarier sprida kunskap om Open Access till svenska forskare. Detta görs också på webben via den informationssajt (http://www.searchguide.se/oa/) som utvecklas och administreras inom projektet. Den 5e november avslutas seminarieserien i Göteborg med en större satsning där vi lyfter blicken och försöker bjuda på några internationella utblickar. Föreläsare från CERN och PLoS är inbjudna och vi hoppas att detta seminarium tillsammans med projektets andra aktiviteter bidragit till en ökad medvetenhet bland svenska forskare om möjligheterna att göra sina resultat fritt tillgängliga för alla.
Att syssla med elektronisk publicering inger mig ibland en känsla av att befinna sig i ett land som bara existerar för stunden och sedan ständigt förvandlas till nya topografiska definitioner. Denna lätt ångestskapande, men jag erkänner, också nervkittlande känsla, har för min del blivit allt mer påtaglig under det senaste året. Inom området existerar en i det närmaste total förvirring vad det gäller lagringsformat, standarder, copyright, mjukvara, hårdvara, operativsystem etc för att inte tala om märkliga termer och akronymer som vimlar omkring. Ett antal kartor över territoriet existerar men oberoende av vilken man väljer stämmer de aldrig i praktiken. Det är missförståndens förlovade land. Min fru, som arbetar med undervisning i invandrarsvenska, berättade nyligen en historia som jag tycker på pricken fångar den här känslan. Hon hade haft en introduktionskurs för nyanlända studenter och avslutningsvis bett dem fylla i ett frågeformulär för att skatta deras kunskapsnivå. En av frågorna löd: "Talar du något annat språk än ditt hemspråk? I så fall vilket/vilka?" Vid genomgången av formulären senare på eftermiddagen noterade hon att en av studenterna hade svarat: "engelska och literiska". Literiska – vad är det för språk? Var ligger Literien? Ligurien finns ju och Litauen. Kanske nånstans i närheten där…? Kollegor rådfrågades och huvuden bryddes över atlas och geografiska uppslagsverk. Inget Literien. Frågan fick anstå till nästa dag…då den polska studenten ifråga upplyste sin förvånade lärare att Literien helt enkelt borde ha tolkats som "engelska och lite ri[y]ska"! Jag återger den här historien för den fick mig direkt att associera till den förbistrade begreppsapparat jag försöker hantera i kantlinjen av det virtuella och det verkliga inom elektronisk publicering. Ständiga klumpar i halsen påminner en om att man borde veta bättre om nya varianter av programmeringsspråk/filformat/protokoll etc. Denna osäkerhet är allmän och jag tror inte det finns något sätt att övervinna den förutom att ge sig huvudstupa in i det praktiska arbetet att rita egna kartor över gungflyet eller åtminstone försöka tillföra vettig information till de goda kartor som ändå finns. Det arbetet kräver inte bara mod/dumdristighet utan också en viss orientering om den omgivande terrängen samt en stark övertygelse om att vi måste arbeta med standarder och lösningar som kan återanvändas genom åren. I den övertygelsen hoppas jag att följande redogörelse av ett EP-projekts tillblivelse och vedermödor kan upplysa och upplyfta den som står i begrepp att själv starta ett dylikt projekt eller som på något sätt står på randen till att ta steget in i den snåriga men spännande virtuella publiceringsvärlden.
I snart 20 år har svenska bibliotekarier arbetet för att realisera open access inom vetenskaplig publicering. Men det är först det senaste året man talar om att en vändpunkt nåtts; att över 50 procent av publikationerna finns öppet tillgängliga. Nu hoppas vi på nerförsbacke och kanske en del frihjul framöver men så dyker en ny krök i vägen upp som pockar på uppmärksamhet – öppen data. Plötsligt duger inte kompetensen och verktygslådan längre.
The purpose of the study was to increase self-archiving of scientific articles in Swedish open archives and thus contribute to the dissemination and increased visibility of Swedish research and to a greater impact for the individual researcher. We wanted to find out what obstacles may occur in the self-archiving process and how the database SHERPA/RoMEO functions as support for control of the publishers’ conditions. We engaged 40 researchers at 7 Swedish institutes of higher education to self-archive their peer-reviewed journal articles from the last 5 years. The result was that 140 publications were self-archived in the open archives of these universities and university colleges. After the self-archiving was carried out we followed up on the researchers’ experiences and wiewpoints in the form of oral interviews. We have found several imperfections and problems in the process of self-archiving. These issues are discussed and then we conclude with suggestions for measures to take, which we believe are crucial to making self-archiving generally accepted in the world of research and therefore increasing the dissemination of research results.
This paper discusses processes and experiences gained from creating a national portal (Uppsök) for Swedish undergraduate theses, using a common metadata model and set structure with agreements on semantics on top of OAI-PMH and harvesting from several data providers into a central service provider at the Swedish Royal Library.
The main purpose of this project has been to examine the accessibility of refereed conference articles and the OA- and publishing policies of conferences in order to in this way elucidate different aspects concerning self-archiving in Swedish institutional repositories. For this purpose, the project participants have examined a number of conferences and references to conference articles via their institutional repositories during a specific time period and described these from the perspective of a common scheme. The study has showed that the local institutional repositories fill an important role to make conference publications visible. We have found that ca. 50 % of the conference papers can be published as postprints in our institutional repositories. We have noticed that ca. 15% or the studied conference articles are not available at all. It is, therefore, of great importance to use local institutional repositories as a publishing channel, not only for primary published material such as dissertations and reports, but also as a source for finding these conference articles “without a home”. Between 20-25 % of the examined articles were found in some type of OA archive; ca. half of these were found in one of the project participants’ own institutional repositories. This indicates that the publishing database of respective higher education institution is an important factor for open accessibility. Ca. 10% of the conferences in the study had an explicit OA policy or expressed such a policy by openly making conference articles accessible on their conference sites. A big problem when it comes to self-archiving of conference articles is the lack of information about OA policy. The landscape of conference publishing is complex and the self-archiving of documents from conferences is very time-consuming. Above all, we would wish a policy resource for conferences similar to the SHERPA/RoMEO. At present, however, there is no other alternative than scrutinizing the conferences’ copyright information to the authors and from this attempt to draw conclusions about possible self-archiving.
The main purpose of this project has been to examine the accessibility of refereed conference articles and the OA- and publishing policies of conferences in order to in this way elucidate different aspects concerning self-archiving in Swedish institutional repositories. For this purpose, the project participants have examined a number of conferences and references to conference articles via their institutional repositories during a specific time period and described these from the perspective of a common scheme. The study has showed that the local institutional repositories fill an important role to make conference publications visible. We have found that ca. 50 % of the conference papers can be published as postprints in our institutional repositories. We have noticed that ca. 15% or the studied conference articles are not available at all. It is, therefore, of great importance to use local institutional repositories as a publishing channel, not only for primary published material such as dissertations and reports, but also as a source for finding these conference articles “without a home”. Between 20-25 % of the examined articles were found in some type of OA archive; ca. half of these were found in one of the project participants’ own institutional repositories. This indicates that the publishing database of respective higher education institution is an important factor for open accessibility. Ca. 10% of the conferences in the study had an explicit OA policy or expressed such a policy by openly making conference articles accessible on their conference sites. A big problem when it comes to self-archiving of conference articles is the lack of information about OA policy. The landscape of conference publishing is complex and the self-archiving of documents from conferences is very time-consuming. Above all, we would wish a policy resource for conferences similar to the SHERPA/RoMEO. At present, however, there is no other alternative than scrutinizing the conferences’ copyright information to the authors and from this attempt to draw conclusions about possible self-archiving. To facilitate the future handling and classification of conference articles in Swedish institutional repositories a number of recommendations are suggested.
At Blekinge Institute of Technology (BTH) attempts have been made to with different means motivate researchers to publish in ISI-ranked journals as an adjustment to the resource distribution- and evaluation system of Swedish research policy. This means that we have to stimulate ISI publishing at the same time as we want to meet the research funders’ requirements and make use of the advantages that open access to the research publications of BTH give in the form of increased exposure. The matter is now about finding ways that fulfill both goals. It is unambiguously so that a mere Open Access policy, whether it comes from one’s own higher education institution or from other national research actors, is not sufficient. Particularly not if the policy is in conflict with the established publishing culture among the researchers who not seldom regard the new rules as a counter direction to local and national recommendations to publish in ISI-ranked journals. This is why the Faculty Board at BTH has anchored, supplemented and increased their OA policy document with a descriptive and constructive manual for the individual researcher on how to act to fulfill different conditions and requirements concerning OA generally and research publishing in particular. A policy that does not only provide fundamental support but that also paves the way for administrative systems that give researchers practical support to publish OA and the possibility to choose publishing ways of high quality, favouring both the author and the organization.
Otakt.se startades tidigt 2006. Sajten var en tummelplats för fem griniga gubbar som ville ha möjligheten att fritt tycka om gammal och ny musik.
Tanken var att skriva CD recensioner inom de musikaliska genrer som intresserade oss: pop, rock, soul, blues, visa, jazz, hårdrock, grunge, indie, emo, country, lo-fi, americana, metal och världsmusik.
Förutom recensioner fanns det gott om plats för olika listor (årets bästa... etc.) och texter som (kanske) hade något med musik att göra. Allt gjordes av lust, och bara sådant vi själva ville skriva om dök upp på sajten.
2009 tog lusten slut och vi avvecklade otakt.se men nu drygt tio år senare vill vi ändå göra texterna åtkomliga dels av nostalgiska skäl och för att vi tror att läsare och musikälskare fortfarande kan hitta inspel här som kan leda till spännande musikaliska möten men kanske framför allt för att hedra Björn Mogreen, som var den drivande i projektet och som la ifrån sig pennan och slutade att lyssna på musik våren 2021. Han var en sann otaktsbroder och vi saknar honom mycket.
In this paper we will address the questions of what and where the value of open access to research data might be and how libraries and related stakeholders can contribute to achieve the benefits of freely sharing data. In particular, the emphasis is on how libraries need to acquire the competence for collaboration to train and encourage researchers and library staff to work with open data. The paper is based on the early results of the RECODE project, an EU FP7 project that addresses the drivers and barriers in developing open access to research data in Europe (http://www.recodeproject.eu).
During March 2015, the Blekinge Institute of Technology library carried out an interview survey comprising around 36 senior researchers and postdocs mainly in engineering sciences, with the objective to get a picture of how research data is managed at BTH and to find out what the researcher attitudes are to sharing data. The survey showed that most researchers in the study were positive to sharing research data but lacked any experience of making data management plans and had little or no knowledge of data preservation or of sharing open data. Uncertainties about data ownership are also an issue.
From the autumn of 2008 up to the autumn of 2009 five seminars have been carried out at Swedish universities and university colleges with the purpose of increasing researchers’ knowledge of Open Access. The seminars have been arranged within the project ”Researcher meetings on Open Access” which is funded by the program OpenAcess.se of the National Library of Sweden. Open Access is, today, a relatively well-known concept at universities and university colleges, which presumably is one of the reasons why all the seminars have attracted a great number of researchers and doctoral candidates. The details on how Open Access publishing works are, however, not equally well known, and therefore this type of seminars work in an informative and elucidatory way concerning, for example, parallel publishing, copyright, and increased visibility. It is clear that the libraries now find themselves in a new phase regarding their work with Open Access. Focused information work will be needed for a time to come at our Swedish universities and university colleges on account of the position recently adopted by the Swedish Research Council in regard to Open Access demanding that research funded by the Council must be openly accessible within 6 months after publication. This means that the research libraries will keep playing an important role. In this article we, who have participated in the project, want to convey our experiences from the seminars which have been carried out and discuss the further work of the research libraries to inform and support researchers in matters concerning Open Access.
Open Access Information is a website containing digital learning resources within different aspects of Open Access. The resources consist of text documents, power point presentations and flyers which are free for all to access and download. The purpose is to contribute to growing competence and awareness of Open Access publishing and self-archiving among researchers. More time and effort can be devoted to teaching and marketing by sharing learning resources among university staff. Working in this way we aim to increase the number of records in Swedish OA repositories. Seven Swedish universities have jointly produced these resources with backing from the National Library of Sweden. All resources are published under a Creative Commons licence, which means that users are able to download, reuse and also upload changed and updated material. The Open Access Information will continue to enhance its website and introduce Open Access to researchers by giving six seminars on the subject at Swedish universities during the period autumn 2008 and spring 2009.
In this paper we will address the questions of what and where the value of open access to research data might be and how libraries and related stakeholders can contribute to achieve the benefits of freely sharing data. In particular, the emphasis will be on how libraries need to acquire the competence for collaboration to train and encourage researchers and library staff to work with open data. The paper is based on the early results of the RECODE project, an EU FP7 project that addresses the drivers and barriers in developing open access to research data in Europe (http://www.recodeproject.eu).
In this report we identify and assess different options for bringing together and mobilizing relevant stakeholders in the open access arena. This builds on previous work done in the RECODE project about the open access stakeholder ecosystem, the barriers and the enablers for open access to research data as well as on the RECODE overarching policy recommendations set out in the RECODE work package 5. We have identified a sample of existing networks and organizations to determine whether they are able to meet stakeholder needs and mobilization objectives for open access, data preservation, dissemination and use, and what these organizations can or must do in order to better mobilize stakeholders in order to meet the policy recommendations. We have identified not only examples of good practice but also the barriers not addressed by any currently available structures or organizations. While there are many forces striving to make data sharing common practice, there is still a lack of an overarching, international initiative to implement necessary requirements for making data sharing a truly international community asset. Within the European community the prerequisites and the ambitions are very different among the member states. Even amongst those countries where open access has long been on the agenda, there remain issues and barriers to be addressed. For example, training is needed in most of the stakeholder groups; investment in infrastructure building and funding is required in most institutions dealing with open access to research data; much work remains to be done to convince researchers that sharing data is a good idea. These are just a few of the obstacles that still need attention despite good, on-going efforts by individuals, organizations and states.
ELPUB can look back on a track record of a steadily growing number of conference papers. From a long-term perspective, access to this body of knowledge is of great interest to the community. Beyond this, extended preoccupation with the collected scientific work in the area of digital publishing has to be mentioned. Naturally, the authors are particularly focussed on the individual paper itself and possible connections with related efforts. Typically, conferences amplify and enhance opportunities of “getting- together”. A well-stocked repository may, however, serve in this respect as a fruitful complementary addition. In this contribution, the implementation of persistent identifiers on the existing ELPUB.scix.net-base is elaborated in detail. Furthermore, the authors present the result of efforts related to the harvesting of ELPUB-metadata and to the creation of a citation index. The paper concludes with an outlook on future plans.
Open access to research data provides many benefits to science and society, but as the open access trend grows it becomes increasingly clear that providing unrestricted access to research data is not inherently a “good thing”, and it is certainly not easy to achieve. The RECODE project looks at the grand challenges associated with open access and data preservation and dissemination, including technological and infrastructural, legal and ethical, and institutional and policy issues. In particular, it seeks to understand and use the fragmentation between and within disciplines in order to address these challenges. The aim is to produce policy recommendations for open access to research data, based on existing good practice. In this fourth RECODE deliverable we focus on the challenges faced by institutions, such as archives, libraries, universities, data centres and funding bodies, in making open access to research data possible. Policy makers and the scientific community expect these institutions to play an important role in creating and funding data sharing infrastructures and stimulating and assisting researchers to make their research material public. They look towards these institutions to curate and preserve information, and provide guidance to researchers in managing their data.
The headings:
The library’s support for researchers
Dissertations defended 3rd quarter 2021
Policy for research data at BTH has been approved
VR presenterar Forskningsbarometern 2021 “Hur mår forskningssverige?”
UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science.
RECODE will leverage existing networks, communities and projects to address challenges within the open access and data dissemination and preservation sector, and produce policy recommendations for open access to research data based on existing good practice. The open access to research data sector includes several different networks, initiatives, projects and communities that are fragmented by discipline, geography, stakeholder category (publishers, academics, repositories, etc.) as well as other boundaries. Many of these organisations are already addressing key barriers to open access to research data, such as stakeholder fragmentation, technical and infrastructural issues, ethical and legal issues, and state and institutional policy fragmentation. However, these organisations are often working in isolation or with limited contact with one another. RECODE will provide a space for European stakeholders interested in open access to research data to work together to provide common solutions for these issues. RECODE will culminate in a series of over-arching policy recommendations for a policy framework to support open access to European research data targeted at different stakeholders and policy-makers (http://www.recodeproject.eu). © 2014-IOS Press and the authors.
This report is the deliverable for Work Package 1 (WP1), Stakeholder Values and Ecosystems, of the EU FP7 funded project RECODE (Grant Agreement No: 321463), which focuses on developing Policy Recommendations for Open Access to Research Data in Europe. WP1 focuses on understanding stakeholder values and ecosystems in Open Access, dissemination and preservation in the area of scientific and scholarly data (thus not government data). The objectives of this WP are as follows: • Identify and map the diverse range of stakeholder values in Open Access data and data dissemination and preservation. • Map stakeholder values on to research ecosystems using case studies from different disciplinary perspectives. • Conduct a workshop to evaluate and identify good practice in addressing conflicting value chains and stakeholder fragmentation.
The RECODE project identified two overarching issues that are inhibiting take-up of policies related to open access to research data: a lack of a coherent open data ecosystem; and a lack of attention to the specificity of research practices, processes and forms of data collections. Against this background, the report provides policy recommendations on open access to research data targeted at key stakeholders in promoting open access: research funders; data managers; research institutions; and publishers. These recommendations will assist the above stakeholders in furthering the goals of open access to research data in each of their organizations and networks. Recommendations include both overarching and stakeholder-specific ones as suggestions to address and attend to these two issues by building on or learning from existing experience. In doing so, RECODE recognises that in some situations it is appropriate to build consensus and transfer good practice across disciplines and stakeholder groups, while in others it is appropriate to enable and support specific groups to maintain their particularity in relation to disseminating, preserving and re-using research data. In addition, for each stakeholder group good practice examples are provided that can serve as “models” for providing open access to research data. Finally, the recommendations and good practice examples will reduce “costs” associated with providing open access, as stakeholders do not need to develop their own expertise, but can use this information as a foundation to develop their own policies, support actions and initiatives.
This paper explores key issues in the development of open access to research data. The use of digital means for developing, storing and manipulating data is creating a focus on ‘data-driven science’. One aspect of this focus is the development of ‘open access’ to research data. Open access to research data refers to the way in which various types of data are openly available to public and private stakeholders, user communities and citizens. Open access to research data, however, involves more than simply providing easier and wider access to data for potential user groups. The development of open access requires attention to the ways data are considered in different areas of research. We identify how open access is being unevenly developed across the research environment and the consequences this has in terms of generating data gaps. Data gaps refer to the way data becomes detached from published conclusions. To address these issues, we examine four main areas in developing open access to research data: stakeholder roles and values; technological requirements for managing and sharing data; legal and ethical regulations and procedures; institutional roles and policy frameworks. We conclude that problems of variability and consistency across the open access ecosystem need to be addressed within and between these areas to ensure that risks surrounding a data gap are managed in open access.