Digital Library Center Blog | UF

International Publishers and Librarians Agree to Enhance The Debate on Open Access

Geneva/The Hague 20 May 2009 - For immediate release

A joint statement released today by the International Publishers Association, the International Association of Scientific Technical and Medical (STM) Publishers, and the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) calls for a more rational, evidence based debate on open access. It encourages experimentation and piloting of new concepts and ideas, whilst acknowledging that the differences in the different academic disciplines and publishing traditions may lead to differentiated approaches and business models in support of authors.

The joint statement is intended to move the oftentimes heated and polarised debate about open access as a model for scholarly communication towards a more measured and nuanced discourse.

Says IPA President Herman P. Spruijt “The debate about open access is important and publishers welcome it. Publishing is never at a standstill and we should not fear change. Now that more experience has been gained with open access publishing and now that data is available on its success, the open access debate should be able to move away from emotional accusations and oversimplification. Our discussions with IFLA on this topic are always spirited, but have become more insightful and less polarised as we moved towards facts, evidence and differentiated arguments. There is a lesson here to be learned for the public debate on this issue.”

Says IFLA Working Group co-chairman Ingrid Parent: “IFLA is pleased to announce the joint declaration on open access with IPA. This statement shows that both our associations share the important objective of providing the broadest possible access to information. IFLA and IPA believe publishers and librarians have a lot to gain by supporting innovation, experimentation and pilot projects in developing open access to scholarly publications.”

Notes for Editors:
The full text of the statement is available here.

More about IPA:
The International Publishers Association (IPA) is an international industry federation representing all aspects of book and journal publishing. Established in 1896, IPA’s mission is to promote and protect publishing and to raise awareness for publishing as a force for economic, cultural and political development. Around the world IPA actively fights against censorship and promotes copyright, literacy and freedom to publish.

More about IFLA:
The International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) is the leading international body representing the interests of library and information services and their users. It is the global voice of the library and information profession. IFLA promotes the principles of freedom of access to information, ideas and works of imagination and freedom of expression. The delivery of high quality and equitable library and information services helps guarantee that access and improve the social, educational, cultural, democratic and economic well-being of those communities and organizations libraries serve. IFLA has 1600 Members in approximately 150 countries around the world.

I’ve been hoping to see something like this built from Stanford’s copyright database and all of the copyright records and research so many of us have done and it’s great to see it in beta!

http://www.worldcat.org/copyrightevidence

While it isn’t as much as I want for the first full release, it’s in beta so it’s nice that they’ve opened it early for us to contribute. In the first full release, I’d like to see it auto-ingest records from Stanford’s copyright database along with any other databases it can (Gutenberg, BMI, the copyright office, anyone) and to then list those records, including what they pull from, with the full record information including status. Then, I’d like to see an easier interface with a “based on all available information” next to a “best current guess” copyright status indicator (and one that could be like the Creative Commons icons), with a link to the available information and the copyright rules that are being applied. This way, people could see how  the rules are used, what rules apply to each text, and what information is and isn’t available. Adding all of this is a ton more work, but it would make the copyright evidence immediately useful for evaluating copyright and for teaching people how to evaluate copyright. Then, I’d also like an official sign on process (and one that uses OpenID) to allow “copyright experts” who are vetted to enter in the definitive information. Google’s Knol is focusing on the value of authoritative, attributed information and every database can benefit from the same.

The service was only announced last month so it’s clearly in the early stages and this isn’t a critique–it’s just that the need is so great that anything that can be automated and established to be interoperable with other data sources and/or with people contributing more effectively is always better.  Eventually, most copyright checks should be easy. To get to that point will take a great deal of work given the issues (different rules for material type, publication status/place, non-standard copyright record formatting), but this should get us another step closer!