Italian Universities for Open Access: Towards Open Access for Scholarly Literature: Report of the Messina Workshop
| Pages | 16-17 |
| Published date | 01 January 2005 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/07419050510588232 |
| Date | 01 January 2005 |
| Author | Valentina Comba |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science |
Italian Universities for Open Access:
Towards Open Access for Scholarly Literature:
Report of the Messina Workshop
Valentina Comba
16 LIBRARY HITECH NEWS Number 1 2005, pp. 16-17, #Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 0741-9058, DOI 10.1108/07419050510588232
This workshop is the result of a
long-term and successful effort by a
group of Italian librarians[1] and
institutions who are pursuing the goal
of innovation in the Italian e-
publishing environment. Since the 3rd
OAI Workshop in Geneva, February
2004, we have been aware that the
many Italian initiatives in universities
and consortia towards Open Access
would be very weak without a
National framework; our model is the
Sherpa project in UK (www.sherpa.
ac.uk) and the DARE project in The
Netherlands (www.surf.nl/en/themas/
index2.php?oid=7).
These are the reasons why we
decided to present a ``Manifesto''
supporting Open Access and the Berlin
Declaration to the Chair of the
Conference of Rectors Commission for
Libraries, Professor Milanesi, Rector of
Padua University. During the
Commission's meeting on 9 July 2004
the invitation of the University of
Messina to hold a Workshop in
Messina[2] to promote Open Access
and the Berlin Declaration was accepted
and just four months later it took place.
At the Workshop Rectors and
delegates from 31 Universities[3] and
the Instituto Italiano di Medicina
Sociale signed the Messina
Declaration[3], declaring:
...to agree to the ``Berlin Declaration on
Open Access to knowledge in the
Sciences and Humanities'' and wishing
that this act will represent just the first
and significant contribution from Italian
Universities to a broader and faster
dissemination of scientific knowledge.
The signature ceremony was
preceded by Professor Milanesi's
speech about academic publishing and
the problems that Italian Universities
are facing: lack of research funding and
diminished impact of Italian research in
the world. Open Access services and
journals may help lead e-publishing
through a changing environment and
give more impact to research papers
authored by scholars at Italian
institutions.
On that same opening day, David
Prosser (SPARC Europe), Frederic
Friend (University of London and
frequent spokesperson for JISC) and
Jean Claude GueÂdon (University of
Montreal) gave their contribution to
the workshop. Frederic Friend made
special reference to the JISC role in
supporting Open Access, and
particularly the development of
institutional repositories in the UK.
Universities through the FAIR
programme are such an example and
he also pointed out the conclusions of
the House of Commons Science and
Technology Select Committee, where
a support policy for institutional
repositories is proposed. David
Prosser gave a general overview of
changes by commercial publishers
regarding self-archiving and stressed
some important initiatives by Funding
Agencies towards a wider use of open
archives (i.e. the US NIH Open
Access Plan). Jean Claude GueÂdon
suggested some innovative views for
the Academic communities in the use
of national (and transational)
collaborative perspectives for
managing open access peer reviewed
journals. He also discussed he
collaboration by experts to create
autonomous editorial boards for
overlay journals as virtual and high
quality journals freely accessible,
where the selection and management
costs are shared by the universities.
The second day of the workshop
offered participants four sessions and
a panel discussion. The sessions were
devoted to technical issues related to
institutional repositories development,
service providers and the CILEA-
CASPUR initiative, and the advocacy
role of libraries at local, national and
international levels. Special mention
should be made to Antonella De
Robbio's paper about copyright's
issues, which is still among the
hottest topics discussed by the
authors.
One of the last panels, was a good
discussion about economic models that
gave the participants some practical
insights and data about costs and
pitfalls of some open access projects.
The main costs for institutional
repositories development were defined
and it was pointed out the need for
accurate project management in these
times of poor funding for Italian
Universities.
As workshop organizers we are
conscious that the Messina Declaration
is just the start of what we like to call
``Messina process'': There is a growing
awareness about e-publishing changes
and the new economic models which
may hopefully provide more impact for
research papers, providing a viable (and
less expensive) solution for the
information provision to authors and
readers.
NOTES
1. The same are in the Messina Organizing
Committe: Benedetta Alosi and Nunzio
Femmino' (Messina), Paolo Bellini (Trento),
Valentina Comba (Bologna), Patrizia
Cotoneschi (Firenze), Antonella De Rob-
bio (Padova), Paola Gargiulo (CASPUR),
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