CREATING CHANGE IN EUROPE : SPARC EUROPE AND SCHOLARLY PUBLISHING

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CREATING CHANGE IN EUROPE SPARC EUROPE AND
SCHOLARLY PUBLISHING

• Frederick J. Friend
• Director Scholarly Communication
• University College London
• f.friend_at_ucl.ac.uk
• www.ucl.ac.uk/scholarly-communication
• www.sparceurope.org/

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WHY CHANGE?

• Rise in journal prices restricting access to
  scholarship (N.B. Big Deals only improve access
  to the titles included).
• Access restricted not only for scientific and
  medical users but also for humanities and social
  sciences as journal publishers use higher
  proportion of budgets
• Small publishers threatened by dominance of major
  publishers
• Future access uncertain because dependent upon
  publishers archiving and pricing policies
• Access restricted across the globe a problem
  for rich and poor countries alike
• Restricted access works against world-wide
  growing need for information as the driver for
  economic and social development

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THE EFFECT OF JOURNAL PRICE RISES IN US AND UK
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THE VISION

• An old tradition and a new technology have
  converged to make possible an unprecedented
  public good. The old tradition is the willingness
  of scientists and scholars to publish the fruits
  of their research in scholarly journals without
  payment, for the sake of inquiry and knowledge.
  The new technology is the internet. The public
  good they make possible is the world-wide
  electronic distribution of the peer-reviewed
  journal literature and completely free and
  unrestricted access to it by all scientists,
  scholars, teachers, students, and other curious
  minds. Removing access barriers to this
  literature will accelerate research, enrich
  education, share the learning of the rich with
  the poor and the poor with the rich, make this
  literature as useful as it can be, and lay the
  foundation for uniting humanity in a common
  intellectual conversation and quest for
  knowledge. Budapest Open Access Initiative
  http//www.soros.org/openaccess/

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WHO CAN MAKE THIS VISION A REALITY?

• We can!
• Librarians alone cannot do everything, but
  librarians can form partnerships with academic
  authors, users and publishers.
• Many authors and users are feeling the bad
  effects of the present scholarly publishing
  situation and are looking for better access to
  information.
• Many publishers are worried about the
  sustainability of the present economic model and
  are looking for new economic models which will
  enable them to stay in business.
• Partnership is the key to open up change both
  SPARC and OSI work with publishers
• Publishers can change and survive (so can
  librarians!)

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LOOKING FOR A BETTER WAY...

• Library consortia achieve wider access to big
  packages of journals
• E-print services successful for research
  literature in some subjects
• Open Archives Initiative harvesting metadata in
  order to improve access
• Public Library of Science author power
• Budapest Open Access Initiative funding to
  achieve change through author-archiving or
  alternative journals
• SPARC Scholarly Publishing and Academic
  Resources Initiative www.arl.org/sparc/
  particular contribution to create change is to
  raise awareness and promote alternative journals
  and business models

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SPARC LINKING ADVOCACY AND ACTION
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SPARC ALTERNATIVE JOURNALS CAN SAVE LIBRARIES
MONEY WITHOUT SACRIFICING QUALITY
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SPARC EUROPE www.sparceurope.org

• Supported by LIBER, JISC, CURL, SCONUL, UKB, IWI,
  ANKOS and a number of individual institutions
• Co-operation between SPARC Washington and
  European organizations had grown to a high level
• Meeting in London February 2001 set up SPARC
  Europe
• SPARC Europe is an alliance of European research
  libraries, library organizations and research
  institutions that supports increased competition
  in scientific journal publishing.
• SPARC Europe will collaborate with the
  international SPARC organization based in
  Washington, DC, but will develop Europe-focused
  initiatives under the direction of a European
  managing board and a Europe-based program
  officer.

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SPARC EUROPE INITIATIVES (ACTION PROGRAMME ON
WEB-SITE)

• Raising awareness amongst academic authors and
  users leaflets and workshops to stimulate
  thought and action
• Encouraging institution-based repositories of
  copies of journal articles written by academic
  staff good practice to be identified on SPARC
  Europe web-site
• Providing information about alternative journals
  links from SPARC Europe web-site
• Supporting open access initiatives Open
  Archives Initiative (October Workshop in Geneva)
  and Budapest Open Access Initiative (developing
  new business models).
• Supporting new journals committed to low-cost or
  open access encourage libraries to buy when
  publishers change their policies.

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BEING PREPARED TO COMMIT ..

• The problems in access to academic journals will
  not be solved unless those who are looking for
  change are prepared to take action.
• SPARC began in the US because universities were
  not only prepared to talk about change but to
  commit money to bring about change.
• In other countries, we cannot leave it to the US
  to take action if we want change we have to make
  our own commitment of time or money.
• Thank you for listening - but please take action
  as well as listen! Join SPARC Europe if you are
  not already a member, talk about these issues to
  your colleagues and support open access journals.