[Air-l] Open Access in Germany

[Rubina Vock]

***Apologies for cross-posting***

Please find attached an announcement concerning Open Access activities in Germany.

DFG Project: A Nation-Wide Online Information Portal On Open Access Issues

Since September 2006 the German Science Foundation [Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG] funds the implementation of a nation-wide online information portal on Open Access issues that is operated cooperatively by the Universities of Bielefeld, Goettingen, Constance and the Free University of Berlin, with support from DINI - German Initiative for Networked Information. The platform is intended to inform scientists, their professional societies, university administrations and the interested public comprehensively on objectives and use of Open Access, and support them with practical assistance on its implementation in practice. 

Open Access Publications are conceived as scientific publications that are worldwide freely available on the Internet. The Open Access Movement's objective is the better utilisation of this form of publication in order to maximise the diffusion and usage of scientific knowledge. As recent studies demonstrate [1], the reception of Open Access publications generally is already several times higher than that of traditional publications behind cost barriers. For individual authors as well as their institutions, this translates into a significantly better "visibility" within the international scientific community. The signing of the "Berlin Declaration on open access to scientific knowledge" [2] by numerous national and international science organisations and funding bodies and a growing number of Universities underlines the importance for Open Access for Science Policy in general. 

A DFG survey on author's experiences with Open Access [3] showed that Open Access publication opportunities are still underutilized, but found much willingness to actively further Open Access in Germany. Therefore the DFG, as a cosignatory of the "Berlin Declaration", like many other national funding organisations, strongly encourages all project investigators to publish in refereed Open Access journals or to make available digital copies of their work on Open Access servers. 

Until now Information on Open Access is largely produced in an uncoordinated way and is mostly scattered widely throughout the Internet, much of it is dependent upon the local personal commitment of individuals. This fact is largely responsible for the discrepancy between the growing international significance of Open Access on one hand and the comparatively small publicity and little practice with German scientists on the other hand. 

The new information portal sets out to counter this development in Germany. The offer addresses primarily scientific authors, university administrations and scholarly societies. Current deficits in information and use within the German Higher Education Landscape are sought to be removed by the concise presentation of relevant information on Open Access issues targeted to specific audiences. The information platform will also concentrate on concrete recommendations for action, know how and argumentation aids as well as the sharing of practical experience and all sort of information materials on Open Access. 

The four project partners all belong to the pioneers on the field of Open Access in Germany. After its completion in May 2007, the online platform will be open to all interested users and additional cooperation partners for exchange of information and experiences. DINI - the German Initiative for Networked Information, regards the new information platform as a chance to better promote the relevant open access activities of DINI. Platform development and operation are therefore supported by DINI. 

More information may be found on the website of the project http://www.openaccess-germany.de/ or via the coordinators: 

Dr. Norbert Lossau (Director, State and University Library Goettingen, Project Leader), norbert.lossau at sub.uni-goettingen.de 

Cordula Noetzelmann (Coordination Scientific Publishing, University of Bielefeld), cordula.noetzelmann at uni-bielefeld.de 

Dr. Katja Mruck (Coordination e-Publishing, Open Access, Center for Digital Systems (CeDiS) of the Free University of Berlin), katja.mruck at fu-berlin.de 

Karlheinz Pappenberger (Coordination Scientific Publishing, University of Constance), Karlheinz.Pappenberger at uni-konstanz.de 

[1] http://opcit.eprints.org/oacitation-biblio.html
[2] http://oa.mpg.de/openaccess-berlin/signatories.html)
[3] http://www.dfg.de/en/dfg_profile/facts_and_figures/statistical_reporting/open_access/index.html