December issue of ScieCom info

[Ingegerd Rabow <Ingegerd.Rabow@lub.lu.se>]

Dear Readers,

Welcome to the December issue of ScieCom info. Nordic-Baltic 
Forum for Scientific Communication

We continue to follow the promising Open Access developments in 
Denmark. In our last issue we wrote that the Danish Minister for 
Science, Technology and Innovation was prepared to introduce a 
policy of Open Access to publicly funded research, 
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/announcement/view/16

Read about the latest developments in Lise Mikkelsen's report 
"Recommendations for implementation of Open Access in Denmark - 
extraction of comments from the hearing process"
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4759/4320

Lars Bjornshauge's provocative "Call for action!" applauds 
librarians for all their successful efforts for Green OA and for 
OA mandates. Now is the time to stop paying only lip service to 
Gold OA. Why not try the 1% idea?
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4768/4331

Jan Erik Frantsvag provocatively asks researchers: "What is it 
about the public?" Time and again, researchers mention "the 
public" as - at best - an audience that is uninteresting for the 
scientist or - at worst - should be barred from access.
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4765/4326

One might suspect, that Jan Erik heard some of these arguments 
when his university launched its new OA-policy - a mandate - 
earlier this year: "The University of Tromso adopts an 
institutional Open Access policy."
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4764/4325

The concept of quality is fundamental and closely linked to all 
kinds of research assessments and distribution of funding. Claus 
Vesterager Pedersen presents: "The Danish Bibliometric Research 
Indicator - BFI. Research publications, research assessment, 
university funding."
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4757/4318

In "Open Access availability of articles by Nordic authors", 
Turid Hedlund describes the OA phenomenon from an article based 
perspective. Internet was trawled for OA-copies of peer-reviewed 
articles with at least one author from a Nordic country.
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4760/4321

A group from Helsinki University Library focused on the OA 
availability of publications from the University of Helsinki: 
"The current state of Open Access to research articles from the 
University of Helsinki." Search results from Google or Google 
Scholar were compared with the results from Open DOAR or 
Scientific Commons.
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4761/4322

Aslaug Agnarsdottir presents the "The University of Iceland's 
digital repository, Skemman - open access or closed?"  The 
University of Iceland joined Skemman in 2008, but in spite of 
numerous presentations, there was a marked lack of submissions. 
Then they had a sudden windfall.
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4762/4323

In "PersID: building a persistent identifier infrastructure", 
Adrian Price describes how six European countries have worked 
together to build a persistent identifier infrastructure for the 
scientific community: PersID. A persistent identifier is needed 
to ensure a "shelf mark" for distributed internet resources, both 
for longevity and to establish stable interrelations.
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4756/4317

Mikael Karstensen Elbaek reports from: "Knowledge grows when 
shared - The Launch of OpenAIRE, 2nd December in Ghent", a 
European infrastructure project to facilitate the success of the 
FP7 Open Access Pilot. Neelie Kroes, VP of the European 
Commission, responsible for the Digital Agenda, emphasized that 
"above all, open access to scientific information is important 
because it helps citizens to their right to have access to 
knowledge produced using public funds."
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4758/4319

>From Tromso, Jan Erik Frantsvag sums up "The 5th Annual Munin 
Conference on Scientific Publishing 2010 -"Open Access - The 
Competitive Advantage"
  This year the theme of the conference was wholly related to Open 
Access, and the number of participating scientists was higher 
than ever before.
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4763/4324

The international workshop "Open Archives and their Significance 
in the Communication of Science" was held in Uppsala, November 16 
- 17 2010. Urban Ericsson, Jenny Ericsson, and Linda Astrom 
Wennbom report. Usage statistics and quality were among the 
subjects discussed as well as the need for more IR-content and 
more OA mandates from universities and funders.
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4767/4330

Mikael Graffner and Kristoffer Holmqvist report from "MOA- 
Meeting place Open Access 2010". This Swedish conference held its 
fourth meeting on November 24-25 at Lund University. The 
conference focusing on the development of Open access at Swedish 
higher education institutions. Open Access for research data, 
Open Educational Resources and Open Access Policies were some of 
the topics discussed.
http://www.sciecom.org/ojs/index.php/sciecominfo/article/viewFile/4766/4327


As always, your comments and ideas are very welcome

Happy Holidays!
Ingegerd Rabow
Editor-in-chief