Japanese Library Consortia Join CLOCKSS

[Gordon Tibbitts <Gordon.Tibbitts@clockss.org>]

Japanese Library Consortia Join CLOCKSS

October 28, 2010, Stanford, CA - CLOCKSS is very pleased to 
announce that the two major academic library groups in Japan have 
joined the CLOCKSS archive: the Japanese Association of National 
University Libraries (JANUL) and the Private and Public 
University Libraries Consortia (PULC). JANUL consists of 92 
libraries, while roughly 360 libraries are part of PULC. The 
National Institute of Informatics in Japan (NII), which is a 
CLOCKSS founding library and archive node, has been instrumental 
in bringing about this partnership and expanding the support for 
CLOCKSS to all academic libraries in Japan.

Jun Adachi, Professor and Director, Cyber Science Infrastructure 
Development Department of NII, and CLOCKSS Board of Director 
member, says, "We believe it is crucial for libraries located in 
the Asia Pacific region, and particularly Japan, to take an 
active role in preservation and have a voice in policies that 
affect us all. CLOCKSS gives us an opportunity to participate in 
this important international endeavor. Since joining the archive 
node in February 2010, NII has collaborated with CLOCKSS by 
leading an effort to facilitate the participation of Japanese 
libraries. It is encouraging that we have gotten support this 
time from university libraries in Japan as a whole."

Koichi Ojiro of JANUL consortium says, "As scholarly publications 
on the web are becoming increasingly important for research and 
education in academic institutions, it is a real challenge for 
librarians to ensure their long term survival. I am very pleased 
to announce JANUL's commitment to preserving digital scholarly 
assets by participating in CLOCKSS."

Makoto Nakamoto of Waseda University Library shares this 
enthusiasm, saying, "It is a pleasure to join CLOCKSS and join 
our voices with this organization. CLOCKSS reinforces our values 
by providing free access to content that is no longer available 
from any publisher, and making sure that scholarly content will 
always remain in the hands of libraries worldwide."

CLOCKSS Executive Director Gordon Tibbitts is "honored to partner 
with Japan and count JANUL and PULC among the library groups that 
support CLOCKSS. We believe that the best plan for long term 
preservation is diversification, and this partnership will 
greatly benefit CLOCKSS and the entire scholarly community."

About CLOCKSS

CLOCKSS (Controlled LOCKSS) is a not-for-profit joint venture 
between the world's leading scholarly publishers and research 
libraries whose mission is to build a sustainable, geographically 
distributed dark archive with which to ensure the long-term 
survival of web-based scholarly publications for the benefit of 
the greater global research community. http://www.clockss.org.

About National Institute of Informatics in Japan (NII)

Founded in 2000, NII is Japan's only general academic research 
institution with the goal of advancing integrated research and 
development in information fields. Additionally, NII strives to 
facilitate the advancement of cyber science infrastructure. In 
2004 NII became a member of the Research Organization of 
Information and Systems. http://www.nii.ac.jp/en/

About JANUL

Japan Association of National University Libraries (JANUL) is a 
membership organization comprising libraries of national 
universities in Japan, the University of the Air Library, library 
facilities of four inter-university research institutes, totaling 
92 libraries and library facilities. JANUL aims at supporting the 
advancement of library functionality through close coordination 
and cooperation among the members, promoting inter-library use of 
scholarly information resources extensively, and contributing 
development of infrastructures for scholarly information 
distribution in order to help universities achieve their 
missions. http://wwwsoc.nii.ac.jp/anul/index-e.html

About PULC

The Private and Public University Libraries Consortium (PULC) is 
a membership organization of public and private university 
libraries in Japan. Currently, a total of more than 360 private 
and public universities participate in the consortium.

Gordon Tibbitts
Executive Director
Gordon.Tibbitts@clockss.org