OLH now supported by over 200 institutions thanks to the libraries of the seven Irish universities

We are extremely pleased to announce that the Libraries of the seven Irish universities have joined the Open Library of Humanities’ Library Partnership Subsidy system. The seven Irish universities consist of Dublin City University, Maynooth University, National University Ireland, Galway, Trinity College, Dublin, University College Cork, University College Dublin, and University of Limerick. With the addition of these institutions to the OLH LPS model, the Open Library of Humanities is now supported by over 200 institutions.

The Open Library of Humanities is an academic-led, gold open-access publisher with no author-facing charges. With initial funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the platform covers its costs by payments from an international library consortium, rather than any kind of author fee.

Professor Martin Paul Eve, a founder and academic project director of the OLH, welcomed the Irish Universities Association Librarians’ Group: “We are delighted that the Irish Universities Association Librarians’ Group has chosen to support the OLH. Every library is pushed for budgets at the moment and we recognize that open access must also come as part of an initiative to convert subscription journals to an open model, thereby offsetting costs. That more than 200 institutions are now supporting the OLH means that we have successfully reached a major milestone in our sustainability plan.”

Gobnait O’Riordan, Chair of the Irish Universities Association Librarians’ Group and Director of Library and Information Services at the University of Limerick: “We are very excited to join the OLH project, which offers an excellent publishing platform and a fair, sustainable approach to Gold open access publishing. This is fantastic news for our humanities’ scholars across the universities and we look forward to contributing through our membership to the future of open access in this field.”

Dr Caroline Edwards, co-founder and Editorial Director of the OLH said of the news: “It’s a fantastic milestone to reach 200 library partners in our international network within only 12 months of launching the platform. We’re thrilled at the levels of enthusiasm with which the OLH is being received at leading research libraries around the world. Our innovative library governance structure demonstrates that libraries and academics can have a powerful impact on shaping the kind of fair scholarly publishing system we desperately need in academia today.”

Libraries outside the US, UK, EU or Canada interested in joining the OLH Library Partnership Subsidy model should contact Professor Martin Paul Eve: martin.eve@openlibhums.org. UK-based libraries can join through Jisc Collections at http://www.jisc-collections.ac.uk/Catalogue/Overview/Index/2120. US-based libraries can join through LYRASIS at https://lyrasis.openlibhums.org. European libraries can sign up at http://lps.openlibhums.org.