Cracking the Code: Illuminating New Directions in Scholarly Communications and Publishing Initiatives
Session Type: Working Session
Session Description:
In the last decade, the scholarly communication landscape has shifted. A lot.
And not just because of digital and networked technology or new information
policies or the open access movement, but also because of a rise in publishing
programs based in college and research libraries. As noted in a series of
reports from the
Association of Research Libraries
(2008),
Ithaka S+R
(2007), the
Scholarly Publishing Academic Resources Coalition
(2009) and the
Institute of Museum & Library Services
(2012), libraries “have begun to expand their role in the scholarly publishing
value chain by offering a greater range of pre-publication and editorial
support services” (IMLS, pg. 5). This is a new role for libraries and
librarians when you think of them as purchasers and organizers of content and
collections. However, it’s not too far off when you think of them as builders
and curators of digital libraries. Certain similar skill sets and tools are
required: market analysis and needs assessment, project management, web
design, layout, and proofreading, robust technical infrastructure and metadata
standards, good relationships with authors, creators, and vendors, copyright
and contract expertise, etc. This forum will utilize the experiences at the
Marriott and Quinney Libraries at the University of Utah as a starting point
to discuss these larger topics and build on the
New Modes of Publishing
meeting held at last year’s DLF Fall Forum. Whether you are an established or
experimental publisher, a software developer, a scholarly communications or
digital librarian, or someone generally interested in new library services,
attend this session. Come prepared to participate in the discussion and share
your own experiences.
Topics For Discussion
1. Understanding Our Clients’ Needs:
How do we understand the needs of the academic community for non-traditional
publishing? How do we organize requests and prioritize/initiate projects?
2. Exploring New Publishing Technologies:
What are the pros and cons of the available publishing software? What is the
proper data model? How do we facilitate re-purposing this content into
multipledistribution channels?
3. Connecting With Our Audience:
How do we promote, publicize, market our publications? How do we get our
content in front of our targeted readers?
Univ. of Utah Pilot Projects
We have launched a number of pilot projects to further explore these
topics:
• We are partnering with Oxford University Press to publish a website that
will complement the traditional manuscript that Oxford will publish.
• We are financially supporting open access publishing for our faculty by
funding their author fees for OA journals, then publishing the articles
produced from this funding in our own campus-wide Open Access journal.
• We are publishing several campus journals using our Open Journal System
(OJS) installation.
• We are beginning to investigate potential solutions for crowd-sourcing
metadata.
• We have a print-on-demand device (EBM) and are actively exploring ways to
increase its use with materials published digitally.
• We are repackaging a Libguide, originally developed for an Honors Think Tank
course on social media privacy and transparency into an interactive monograph.
Session Leaders:
Valeri Craigle, S.J. Quinney Law Library, University of Utah
John Herbert, J.W. Marriott Library, University of Utah
Anne Morrow, J.W. Marriott Library, University of Utah
Allyson Mower, J.W. Marriott Library, University of Utah
Session Notes:
View the
community reporting Google doc
for this session!