RE: Draft OSI Principles

[Glenn Hampson]

Hi Folks,

 

This is a longer email. Read at your leisure---there’s nothing urgent here. The subject is OSI principles. Last week the scholcomm listserv was abuzz with talk about open principles. I’m glad I was away on vacation or I might have been dragged into that vortex. The best contribution to this conversation, I think, came from Joyce, who shared a link to a book chapter she recently wrote on this topic. I highly recommend at least a skim of her work---it’s a brilliant and balanced reflection of the scholcomm principles landscape and history: http://libres.uncg.edu/ir/asu/listing.aspx?styp=ti&id=19062 (note to self to add this to the OSI website resources page).

 

The reason I’m writing you about this today is that this conversation ties in with the work the OSI summit group has been doing on developing a clear and coherent set of OSI principles to help better define what OSI stands for.  Scott drafted a statement of principles last month, and a number of OSI summit members have said they (and their organizations) are willing to stand behind these. What do you think? Please bear in mind that this is a work in progress and will benefit from more wordsmithing, but do you also agree this is on the right track?

 

OSI Principles

[Draft July 28, 2018]

The participants in the OSI conferences and online discussions hold a wide variety of views on the subject of “Open.”  The Initiative has not sought consensus, but rather to provide a structure that would bring representative voices from across all of the stakeholder groups affected by the scholarly communication process in the belief that through frank and candid discussion of the issues, solutions to what are perceived as problems in the existing systems might be found.

Out of the conference workgroups and the online discussions, certain principles have emerged.  They underpin the ongoing work of the OSI project.

 

·        That the societal benefits of scholarship can be greater in a scholarly ecosystem that is more open and transparent than is presently the case.

·        The devil is in the details.  What do we mean by “open,” by “transparent”?  How do we calculate the costs and benefits of changes to existing systems?  How do we identify and mitigate unintended negative consequences?

·        That maximizing the benefits of more openness requires collaboration across a broadly diverse set of stakeholders -- diverse in geography, in backgrounds, in function, in interests, in expertise, etc.

·        Most of the discussion around open comes from librarians, publishers, some funders and a few active scholars.  But many other stakeholders affect and are affected by changes in the system.  Disciplinary differences make generalizations about “researcher behavior” particularly suspect.  The discussion has almost exclusively focused on activities in North America and Europe.  But scholarly communication in the global south differs in significant ways.

 

·        That no facet of the overall ecosystem can effectively be addressed without taking into consideration how that facet affects, and is affected by, the other facets.

·        The work group discussions at the first two OSI conferences demonstrated that the issues affecting scholarly communication are broad and interconnected.  Changes in the publishing paradigm can’t be addressed without considering the evaluation of research, trends in higher education, incentives that motivate scholars to particular actions, and a host of other intertwined social and economic factors.

 

·        That “Open” can be described as existing along a multitude of dimensions which can be usefully characterized using the DARTS framework.

·        The framework was developed and refined during the first two conferences.  If widely adopted, it can serve as a template to help insure consistency of terminology as people engage with the challenges of developing more open systems of scholarship.

 

OSI brings together leading experts from around the world to engage with the issues surrounding scholarly communication with the intent of producing expert, workable solutions that can be implemented globally and in collaboration with other existing groups.  OSI endeavors to construct partnerships between stakeholders in scholarly communications, conduct research to help improve our understanding of key scholarly communications issues, and develop spin-off products and projects that will help improve the scholarly communications landscape.

 

Specifically, OSI:

·        Hosts conferences that bring experts together to identify specific problems and formulate potential solutions;

·        Develops Issue Briefs that summarize the current state of specific facets of the scholarly communication ecosystem;

·        Maintains the OSI website that functions as a clearinghouse and resource for tracking developments in scholarly communication;

·        Hosts the OSI email discussion list;

·        Participates in scholarly communication conferences.

 

 

If this (or something along these lines) works, then the next step in this process might be to discuss what to do with this statement of common ground. For instance, we might want to:

 

1. Create a DORA-like statement that people and institutions can sign online
2. Create an OSI badge that people can download and display on their websites (and which links to the OSIGlobal website). [Ex: Many organizations already display the OA badge to signify their commitment to OA.]
3. Other? Nothing?

 

Best regards,

 

Glenn

 

 

Glenn Hampson
Executive Director
Science Communication Institute (SCI)
Program Director
Open Scholarship Initiative (OSI)

 

 

[Joyce Ogburn]

Thanks for the call out. Since the chapter more principles have come out. It’s a fascinating development to follow.  For example, the FORCE11 principles of the commons were finished after my chapter was published.  I try to continue tracking them, but the list is getting extremely long.  My tracking document is something 189 pages!!

Joyce 

Sent from my iPad

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