http://scoap3.org Latest news from Scoap3 en-us Five more U.S. partners have joined SCOAP3: three laboratories, the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, SLAC, the Thomas Jefferson Laboratory, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and two universities, the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign and the Northwestern University SCOAP3 now counts 29 institutions in the U.S., which have pledged to redirect their current subscriptions to High-Energy Physics journals to the initiative. More U.S. partners are expected to join in the near future. SCOAP3 is also supported by partners from 15 European countries, Australia and one international organisation. In total, SCOAP3 has received pledges for about 4 million euros, over 6 million dollars, corresponding to 40% of its budget envelope. http://scoap3.org/news/news43.html http://scoap3.org/news/news43.html Mon, 23 Jun 2008 11:00:00 GMT The Association of College and Research Libraries, ACRL, has issued a letter of support for the SCOAP3 initiative, where it "welcomes this experiment in new funding models and recognizes its potential to inform scholarly publishing more globally" and states that it "believes that SCOAP3 is a valuable addition to the heterogeneous mix of strategies being undertaken by scholars, publishers, libraries and others to ensure the future of high-quality journals." Additionally, the association "encourages its members to consider joining the SCOAP3 effort through an institutional or consortial expression of intrest". More details are in a podcast interview with John Ober and Kim Douglas, current and incoming co-chairs of ACRL’ s Scholarly Communications Committee. http://scoap3.org/news/news42.html http://scoap3.org/news/news42.html Thu, 19 Jun 2008 07:00:00 GMT UKB, the Dutch consortium of the thirteen university libraries and the National Library of the Netherlands, and , the National Institute for Subatomic Physics in the Netherlands, have joined SCOAP3. M.A.M. Heijne, the president of UKB, commented: "I sincerely hope that this project will be an opportunity to show the world that the challenges in Open Access can be met." The Netherlands becomes the 15th country to join SCOAP3, which has also received financial pledges from an international organization and a growing number of U.S. universities, laboratories and library consortia. To date, over 38% of the SCOAP3 budget has been pledged and more partners are poised to join in the near future. http://scoap3.org/news/news41.html http://scoap3.org/news/news41.html Fri, 13 Jun 2008 18:00:00 GMT JISC has joined SCOAP3 on behalf of UK Higher Education Institutions who have pledged to re-direct their current expenditures on High-Energy Physics journals to this Open Access initiative. Dr. Malcolm Read, JISC Executive Secretary, commented: "JISC strongly supports moves towards making scholarly resources openly available, in a sustainable manner that brings value for money to education and research. We're delighted therefore to be supporting an initiative that promotes an innovative business model while making vital resources available to all." With JISC, SCOAP3 now counts partners from 14 countries in Europe and Oceania, as well as an international organisation and a number of institutes in the United States. In total, these partners have pledged 37.4% of the SCOAP3 budget envelope, corresponding to 3.7 million Euros (5.8 million $). http://scoap3.org/news/news40.html http://scoap3.org/news/news40.html Mon, 09 Jun 2008 13:00:00 GMT Australia has joined SCOAP3, through a partnership of six Universities: Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide, Western Australia, New South Wales and the Australian National University The University of Melbourne declared: Australian universities have a long history of collaboration to provide the advanced scholarly information infrastructure required to support research and innovation. Now, more than perhaps ever before, collaboration across national boundaries will be essential to advance knowledge creation and dissemination. SCOAP3 provides an excellent opportunity to test how this may be done. With the accession of Australia, SCOAP3 has received pledges for exactly a third of its budget, and expanded its consensus basis beyond Europe, where is supported by 12 countries and an international organisation and the United States. http://scoap3.org/news/news39.html http://scoap3.org/news/news39.html Tue, 20 May 2008 08:00:00 GMT Five more U.S. institutions have expressed their interest in redirecting their subscriptions to High-Energy Physics journals to SCOAP3: Emory University Lewis and Clark College University of Hawai'i University of Kansas University of Wisconsin at Madison With these accessions SCOAP3 now counts 24 partners in the United States in addition to partners representing 12 European Countries and an international laboratory. http://scoap3.org/news/news38.html http://scoap3.org/news/news38.html Fri, 25 Apr 2008 10:00:00 GMT The Institut Interuniversitaire des Sciences Nucleaires of the Belgian National Foundation for Scientific Research, Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique - FNRS has joined SCOAP3 on behalf of Belgium. The SCOAP3 membership now consists of 12 European countries and a growing number of U.S. library and library consortia which have collectively pledged about 3 Million Euros, or 5 Million U.S. dollars, towards the operation of the consortium. http://scoap3.org/news/news37.html http://scoap3.org/news/news37.html Wed, 23 Apr 2008 15:00:00 GMT The Deans and Directors of the Greater Western Library Alliance (GWLA), a consortium of 31 research libraries in the mid-western and western United States, endorsed the SCOAP3 project. They expressed interest in redirecting their subscription expenditures in High-Energy Physics journals toward the SCOAP3 project. http://scoap3.org/news/news36.html http://scoap3.org/news/news36.html Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:00:00 GMT ARL, the Association of Research Libraries, has published in its Bimonthly Report, no. 257 (April 2008) an essay by Ivy Anderson encouraging libraries to support SCOAP3. The essay remarks the "Audacity of SCOAP3" as being "non-disruptive to authors-and to a substantial degree, to publishers and societies" and having "the potential to fundamentally alter the role of libraries in the publishing process". In the same issue of Bimonthly Report , ARL encourages library and consortia to review the Report of the SCOAP3 Working Party, calculate the amount of their pledge to SCOAP3 by estimating their current expenditures on seven HEP core journals and sign the expression of interest to join SCOAP3. http://scoap3.org/news/news35.html http://scoap3.org/news/news35.html Wed, 09 Apr 2008 18:00:00 GMT Maine InfoNet has joined SCOAP3. Maine InfoNet is a service of the University of Maine System and the Maine State Library, which draws on a partnership of public, academic, school, and special libraries to establish a statewide Maine Digital Library. It joins other 19 U.S. institutions which have pledged to re-direct their subscriptions to High-Energy Physics journals to SCOAP3. The progress of the SCOAP3 fund-raising can be monitored here http://scoap3.org/news/news34.html http://scoap3.org/news/news34.html Wed, 09 Apr 2008 18:00:00 GMT ASERL, the Association of Souteastern Research Libraries, groups 38 U.S. Universities. The Board of ASERL, has voted a resolution in support of SCOAP3. http://scoap3.org/news/news33.html http://scoap3.org/news/news33.html Tue, 08 Apr 2008 10:00:00 GMT The University of Oregon has joined SCOAP3. With the University of Oregon, SCOAP3 counts already 18 U.S. institutions which have pledged to re-direct their subscriptions to High-Energy Physics journals to the initiative. About 15% of the U.S. contribution to SCOAP3 has already been collected, a number which is poised to increase in the coming weeks. http://scoap3.org/news/news32.html Mon, 07 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT OhioLINK a consortium of the libraries of 86 Ohio colleges and universities, and the State Library of Ohio, has joined SCOAP3 . Tom Sanville, Executive director of OhioLINK said: "SCOAP3, if successful, offers what we would like to all see with Open Access journals - at least a zero sum game or better. It is not a dual investment with traditional subscriptions but a replacement at not worse than the value of our current investment and hopefully better. For that reason alone the OhioLINK community thinks it worthwhile to support CERN's steps to see if this can be put into practice for important journal content". OhioLINK joins a fast-growing number of U.S institutions which have pledged to re-direct their subscriptions to High-Energy Physics journals to SCOAP3. http://scoap3.org/news/news31.html Wed, 26 Mar 2008 09:00:00 GMT The videos of the SCOAP3 U.S. Focal meeting held on February 29, 2008 at the University of California at Berkeley are now available on YouTube. You can also download the webcast or a podcast. http://scoap3.org/news/news30.html Mon, 17 Mar 2008 17:00:00 GMT The Johns Hopkins University has indicated its interest in participating in SCOAP3 and becomes the first institute on the U.S. East Coast to do so, stretching the SCOAP3 U.S. membership from the Atlantic to the Midwest, from the Mountains to the Pacific. In 10 days, 16 U.S. institutes have signed an Expression of Interest in joining SCOAP3, pledging a total of more than 10% of the U.S. contribution to SCOAP3. "SCOAP3 is an exciting approach to scientific publishing being led by CERN, the particle physics laboratory that developed the World Wide Web. I am delighted that the Johns Hopkins Sheridan Libraries are collaborating with CERN to support this global project," said Jonathan Bagger, Professor of Physics and Astronomy in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and Vice Provost for Graduate Programs. "With increasingly rapid changes in the forms of scholarly communication and access, it is critical for libraries at research intensive institutions like Johns Hopkins to be open to all sorts of publishing models that benefit authors and advance scientific knowledge," said Winston Tabb, Sheridan Dean of University Libraries at Johns Hopkins. http://scoap3.org/news/news29.html Mon, 17 Mar 2008 17:00:00 GMT On February 29, 2008 the University of California at Berkeley hosted the US SCOAP3 focal meeting, aimed at fostering broad consensus and involvement from the leading US libraries and library consortia to make SCOAP3 happen. Consult the slides presented at the meeting and the list of participants and the Participating institutions. » Read more http://scoap3.org/news/news28.html Fri, 29 Feb 2008 18:00:00 GMT Four U.S. National Laboratories joined SCOAP3 today. The libraries of Argonne National Laboratory, Fermilab, Los Alamos National Laboratory and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory signed an Expression of Interest to re-direct their current subscriptions to High-Energy Physics journals to the SCOAP3 consortium. To date, fifteen libraries across the U.S. are part of SCOAP3 and more are expected to join in the very near future. In seven months, 30% of the SCOAP3 budget has been pledged by libraries in 13 countries. http://scoap3.org/news/news27.html Thu, 28 Feb 2008 16:00:00 GMT IEEE announced today its interest in participating in the SCOAP3 initiative, mentioning that "SCOAP3 endorses principles such as the value of peer review to validate scientific research, and the need for self-sustaining business models. The IEEE is keenly interested in exploring approaches that benefit the creators and consumers of technical literature." IEEE publishes a "broadband" journal, IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science, which, among other engineering disciplines, carries articles about technical aspects of High-Energy Physics experiments. SCOAP3 aims to convert the High-Energy Physics content of such "broadband" journals to Open Access. IEEE agrees that "Under the SCOAP3 plan, paid subscribers to a broadband journal would receive a price reduction to account for the subset of the journal's articles that are supported by SCOAP3" http://scoap3.org/news/news26.html Thu, 28 Feb 2008 16:00:00 GMT The California Institute of Technology has signed an expression of interest to join SCOAP3. Caltech stated "that the High Energy Physics scientists are, indeed, taking a fresh look at the publishing cycle. Through SCOAP3, they have devised a model to put the scientific HEP community in greater control of its work. This is a refreshing and encouraging approach, and one that should serve research well." Caltech joins fast-growing list of U.S. libraries who have joined SCOAP3 in the recent days. http://scoap3.org/news/news25.html Thu, 28 Feb 2008 14:00:00 GMT The California Digital Library has joined SCOAP3 on behalf of the ten Campuses of UC Berkeley , UC Davis , UC Irvine , UC Los Angeles , UC Merced , UC Riverside , UC San Diego , UC San Francisco , UC Santa Barbara , UC Santa Cruz. These institutes become the first to join SCOAP3 in the United States. The University of California stated: "We find the consortial funding model of SCOAP3 both intriguing and innovative and are impressed with the level of support that SCOAP3 has been able to garner in Europe to date. Any proposal that holds out promise for placing scholarly publishing on a more sustainable and open footing is a welcome development." The SCOAP3 fund-raising is complete in 12 European countries, with more European countries expected to join soon. Today, the fund-raising in the United States has started, and will be boosted by the SCOAP3 US Focal Meeting. http://scoap3.org/news/news24.html Tue, 26 Feb 2008 15:00:00 GMT Eastern Europe counts more and more countries in SCOAP3. On 18th of February, Prof. Zalán Horváth, Chairman of Section of Physical Sciences in the Hungarian Academy of Sciences signed the Expression of Interest to join SCOAP3, on behalf on Hungary. Hungary becomes the 12th country to join the consortium and brings the total funds pledged to SCOAP3 to 2.7 millions Euro or 4 million U.S. dollars: only seven months after the start of the fund-raising. http://scoap3.org/news/news23.html Fri, 22 Feb 2008 17:00:00 GMT The Slovak Republic signs the Expression of Interest to join the SCOAP3 consortium. The Slovak-CERN Committee will be responsible for the Slovak contribution to SCOAP3. With the accession of the Slovak Republic, the SCOAP3 consortium now counts 11 countries all over Europe; we expect other countries to join very soon. http://scoap3.org/news/news22.html Mon, 18 Feb 2008 18:00:00 GMT Nicolae Victor Zamfir, director general of the Horia Hulubei National Institute of Physics and Nuclear Engineering signs the Expression of Interest to join the SCOAP3 consortium, on behalf of Romania. He finds "SCOAP3 a very good initiative to disseminate high-quality results in particle physics [...] supporting Open Access". Romania joins a rapidly-increasing list of members of the SCOAP3 consortium. http://scoap3.org/news/news21.html Fri, 15 Feb 2008 18:00:00 GMT The SCOAP3 initiative is rapidly gaining momentum: in a few months, many European countries have expressed their interest in joining the consortium and many more are expected to follow suit in the coming months, with more and more awareness rising in the rest of the world and with widespread support from the scientific community. However, without broad consensus and involvement from the leading US libraries and library consortia, SCOAP3 cannot happen. Join representatives from over 40 U.S. libraries and U.S. library consortia and come to the US SCOAP3 focal meeting at the University of California at Berkeley on February 29! This is an opportunity for individual libraries and library consortia to learn more about this unique initiative, and how each of us can make a difference and make Open Access happen. The goal of this event is to explain the SCOAP3 objectives and implementation and to bring together our insight and experience to understand how a re-direction of subscriptions to High Energy Physics journals toward SCOAP3 might be achieved in the U.S. http://scoap3.org/news/news20.html Fri, 08 Feb 2008 21:00:00 GMT The High Energy Physics Advisory Panel (HEPAP) advises the U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. National Science Foundation on High Energy Physics (HEP) research. After discussing Open Access at a recent meeting the panel expressed its strong support for SCOAP3, contingent upon its sustainability. SCOAP3 is concerned about sustainability, as it answers a call from the HEP community for Open Access that maintains the high standards of peer-review of its high-quality journals. SCOAP3 aims to achieve Open Access by re-directing subscription funds which are already in use, today, to provide content to library users, rather than requiring new sources of funding and is thus sustainable by construction. http://scoap3.org/news/news19.html Thu, 31 Jan 2008 16:00:00 GMT Prof. Rolf-Dieter Heuer, Research director of DESY and Director-General Elect of CERN spoke of "Innovation in Scholarly Communication: Vision and Projects from High Energy Physics" at APE2008, "Academic Publishing in Europe, Quality and Publishing". He discussed the strong support of the scientific community in High Energy Physics (HEP) to Open Access (OA) and the strength of the SCOAP3 model, which was worked out in a consensus among scientists, librarians and publishers worldwide; he outlined the future for Discipline Repositories in HEP with the onset of a new e-infrastructure for scholarly communication answering the evolving needs of users; and shared his vision on preservation, re-use, and OA to primary data, recounting his personal experience. http://scoap3.org/news/news18.html Fri, 25 Jan 2008 14:00:00 GMT The Strategic Helmholtz Alliance 'Physics at the Terascale' fully supports the goal of SCOAP3 of free and unrestricted electronic access to peer-reviewed journal literature in particle physics and is convinced that the proposed fair-share business model will promote a healthy and dynamic market and will benefit scientists, authors, funding agencies and publishers alike. Unrestricted access to published scientific results is essential for wide dissemination and efficient usage of scientific knowledge, says the Management Board of the Alliance, which invites all partners to actively support the SCOAP3 initiative, facilitate the large-scale transition to open-access in particle physics by raising awareness on open-access publishing in their communities and encourage their authors to publish in open-access journals. The Alliance is a German network comprising 17 universities, 2 Helmholtz institutes and 1 Max Planck institute. It represents experimental physicists and theoretical physicists addressing the fundamental questions of particle physics, distributed computing, novel detector development and accelerator science. http://scoap3.org/news/news17.html Tue, 22 Jan 2008 10:00:00 GMT The Institute of High Energy Physics of the Austrian Academy of Sciences signs the Expression of Interest to join the SCOAP3 consortium. The participation to the consortium will involve all Austrian High Energy Physics institutes and their Libraries. http://scoap3.org/news/news16.html Tue, 15 Jan 2008 09:00:00 GMT The Norwegian association of higher education institutions (UHR) signs the Expression of Interest to join SCOAP3 on behalf of the Kingdom. The participation is strongly supported by both the national Research Council and the Physics Council. http://scoap3.org/news/news15.html Thu, 10 Jan 2008 10:00:00 GMT The Danish Library Agency signs an Expression of Interest to join SCOAP3, pledging the Danish contribution to the consortium. The Danish Library Agency represents the Denmark Electronic Research Library (DEFF). DEFF an organisational and technological partnership between research libraries co-financed by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Education. Read more: http://scoap3.org/aboutus/aboutus7.html http://scoap3.org/news/news14.html Thu, 20 Dec 2007 18:00:00 GMT SCOAP3 is rapidly gaining momentum: in a few months, many European countries have expressed their interest in joining the consortium and many more are expected to follow suit in the coming months, with more and more awareness rising in the rest of the world. Over a third of the required budget envelope has already been pledged or will be pledged shortly. But without broad consensus and involvement from the leading US libraries and library consortia, SCOAP3 cannot happen. Therefore, we would like to invite representative of US libraries and US library consortia to a US SCOAP3 focal meeting at the University of California at Berkeley on February 29, 2008. This is an opportunity for individual libraries and library consortia to learn more about this unique initiative. The goal of this event is to explain the SCOAP3 model objectives and implementation and to bring together our insight and experience to understand how a re- direction of subscriptions toward SCOAP3 might be achieved. Read more and register online and free of charges at http://scoap3.org/focalmeeting.html http://scoap3.org/news/news13.html Mon, 17 Dec 2007 12:00:00 GMT CERN Council today appointed Professor Rolf-Dieter Heuer as next CERN Director General. Professor Heuer will serve a five-year term, taking office on 1 January 2009. His mandate will cover the early years of operation and first scientific results from the Laboratory's new flagship research facility, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), scheduled to begin operation in summer 2008. The present CERN Director General, Dr. Robert Aymar, is an Open Access advocate and inspired the SCOAP3 initiative. Prof. Heuer, now Research Director at DESY, the German High Energy Physics laboratory, is also an Open Access supporter. He was among the signatories of the first Expression of Interest to reach SCOAP3, pledging German financial support to the consortium, and he is a member of the Editorial Board of PhysMathCentral Physics A, which he calls "another important step in removing access barriers to knowledge about high- energy physics experiments and theories. Increased choice and diversity is a benefit to all, leading to a healthy and dynamic market in academic publishing in particle physics, in line with the spirit of SCOAP3." http://scoap3.org/news/news12.html Fri, 14 Dec 2007 16:00:00 GMT The Council of the European Union adopts Conclusions on scientific information in which it "recognises the strategic importance for Europe’s scientific development of current initiatives to develop sustainable models for open access [...]" and "underlines the importance of effective collaboration between different actors, including funding agencies, researchers, research institutions and scientific publishers, in relation to access [... to], scientific publications". These principles are precisely the pillars of the SCOAP3 model. Finally, it "invites Member States to enhance the co-ordination between [...] large research institutions and funding bodies on access [...] policies and practices". http://scoap3.org/news/news11.html Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:00:00 GMT The Swedish National Library on behalf of the BIBSAM consortium for Swedish research libraries signs the Expression of Interest to join the SCOAP3 consortium. http://scoap3.org/news/news10.html Fri, 16 Nov 2007 13:00:00 GMT Springer makes a further step towards Open Access: The European Physical Journal C, which is among the potential initial partners of SCOAP3, is willing to negotiate with funding agencies interested in Open Access to become fully Open Access. In anticipation of such successful negotiations, all experimental papers accepted by The European Physical Journal C will be published Open Access without any fees. http://scoap3.org/news/news9.html Fri, 16 Nov 2007 12:00:00 GMT The rectors and council chairmen of Greek Universities confirm the participation of the Greek academic community to SCOAP3. The financial support will be covered by the Greek Library Association's budget, completed by the participating universities. http://scoap3.org/news/news8.html Tue, 06 Nov 2007 11:00:00 GMT The Portuguese Minister of Science, Professor Mariano Gago, during the closing address of the Berlin 5 Open Access conference held in Padua, strongly supports the SCOAP3 initiative. http://scoap3.org/news/news7.html Wed, 10 Oct 2007 08:00:00 GMT The INFN (Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare, Italy) expresses its interest to join the SCOAP3 consortium. http://scoap3.org/news/news6.html Tue, 18 Sep 2007 18:00:00 GMT Robert Aymar, CERN Director General, signs the Expression of Interest to join the SCOAP3 consortium. http://scoap3.org/news/news5.html Tue, 18 Sep 2007 18:00:00 GMT On behalf of the Assembly of Greek universities, the University of Patras signs the Expression of Interest to join the SCOAP3 consortium. http://scoap3.org/news/news4.html Fri, 14 Sep 2007 18:00:00 GMT The director of CNRS/IN2P3 signs the Expression of Interest to join the SCOAP3 consortium. http://scoap3.org/news/news3.html Tue, 4 Sep 2007 18:00:00 GMT ICFA, the international committee for future accelerators, a major forum for the future directions in High Energy Physics, encourages all concerned parties from all world regions to actively get involved in the SCOAP3 initiative to assure its success. http://scoap3.org/news/news2.html Thu, 16 Aug 2007 18:00:00 GMT The representatives of Helmholtz consortium (DESY, HMI, FZK, GSI), Max Planck Society (MPG), and Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB) sign the Expression of Interest to join the SCOAP3 consortium. http://scoap3.org/news/news1.html Thu, 9 Aug 2007 18:00:00 GMT