News
Mike Taylor in The Guardian
Posted by Martin Paul Eve on 2013-01-18
For those who missed it, Mike Taylor, a member of our Advocacy Forum, has a piece in The Guardian that's been making waves. In it, Mike provocatively writes: Our job is to make knowledge. If we make it, then brick it up behind a wall, we're wasting our time and our funders' money – which ultimately means we're squandering the world's wealth. Publishing behind paywalls is [...]
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Launching the Project
Posted by Martin Paul Eve on 2013-01-18
Since the initial call to arms, we've had well over 100 responses and the academic committees continue to grow. We're proud to announce that the project has a name! We are called the Open Library of Humanities (OLH) and our domain is openlibhums.org. We have a presence on Twitter as @openlibhums and we also have a Facebook page. The next steps that were taking [...]
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The Future of Publishing
Posted by Martin Paul Eve on 2013-01-14
What does the future of academic publishing look like? What would it look like were we not entrenched in the historically contingent accident that has moulded the current system as it stands? Part of the OLH project is to think critically and imaginatively about what we could have and what we actually need without the constraints of the pre-existing model. Although neither affiliated [...]
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Building a Library for the Future
Posted by Martin Paul Eve on 2013-01-14
Since 1986, subscription costs for academic journals have risen by 300% above inflation. In addition to exponentially increased research output over this period this has triggered what is known as “the serials crisis”; the inability of library budgets to keep pace with the prices set by publishers. Simultaneously, it has been realised that putting research behind paywalls is both unjust [...]
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Unlocking Access to Scholarly Research
Posted by Martin Paul Eve on 2013-01-14
Research that is funded by universities and other public bodies, or those committed to the production of knowledge and the advancement of society, should be available to read. There is currently, however, a massive inequality between groups who have access to this research. We propose that research in the humanities should be open and free to read and re-use, provided that authors are [...]
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