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A delivery, management and access model for e-prints |
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Funded by Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) Project Investigators: Dr Fytton Rowland of the Department of Information Science and Dr Alma Swan of Key Perspectives Ltd Duration: April-June 2004 Description This study forecast a delivery, management and access
model for e-prints and open access journal content within Further and
Higher Education). Three main generic models were identified: the centralised
model, where the service gathers open access material (including articles
in open access journals) directly into a national archive, and then makes
the content available for service providers; the distributed model, where
the service points users at original metadata (in institutional or subject-based
repositories, or open access journals) at the time of enquiry; and the
model termed the ‘harvesting’ model, which is a development
of the distributed model and which allows for improvement, standardisation
or enhancement of the metadata at national level to provide a superior
level of service. The advantages and disadvantages of each model are laid
out in the report. The archives that are being created, too, are not being filled with e-prints fast enough. There are political and cultural influences responsible for this, including inertia on the part of authors who are, for the most part, unwilling to voluntarily self-archive their work. Ways in which this inertia may be overcome were discussed, including by mandating the deposition of copies of published articles by authors in institutional archives. This mandatory edict could come from the institutions themselves or from research funders, and we reported current attitudes to this from both these entities. We note that the Parliamentary Select Committee on Science and Technology in its 2004 report recommended (recommendation 44) mandatory depositing. We also described possible options for authors who have no institutional archive in which to deposit their work, if they choose not to publish in an open access journal. There are other issues for consideration with respect to a national e-prints service, too. Legal concerns are one, and the current legal requirements and limitations are laid out in detail. The preservation of e-prints in archives is another: the criteria that should be used to manage this, the policies that might be adopted, lines of responsibility and author/user expectations with respect to longevity of e-prints are discussed. The harvesting model was then returned to and dealt with in more detail. We described how it would operate under current technological conditions and then discussed scenarios for the medium and long term future in the light of how technologies might develop, and the opportunities for improvement to the service that they might offer. A series of targeted recommendations for action by JISC was then provided. These included discussion of how JISC might overcome some of the difficulties envisaged in setting up a national service – institutional and author inertia, for example – and how other stakeholders such as the research funders and the British Library might profitably be involved. Some example costings for creating an e-print archive
were presented, so that institutions wishing to create one have some idea
of what is involved. A cost-benefit analysis to show how a nationally-organised
service would benefit UK research effort and maximise its impact was presented.
Finally, we carried out a brief risk assessment exercise to indicate the
main risks and bottlenecks. Contact: Dr Fytton Rowland
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