From: Eric Hellman <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wed, 6 Jun 2012 10:44:30 -0400

This is one of those posts where the idea of a title demanded that a
post be written but now I have to figure out how to say it.

As I hope most of you are aware, we launched unglue.it almost 3 weeks
ago, with to goal of making open access for ebooks a crowd-funded
reality. One of our campaigns, "Oral Literature in Africa" is an
academic title that has attracted 41% of the required support with 15
days to go.

This book has had a 42 YEAR "embargo" which the author decided needed
to end, especially since it's mostly unavailable on the continent home
to the literature it chronicles.

So far it has attracted support from 138 individuals and one (1)
institution, the Leddy Library at University of Windsor.

I realize that libraries are not the most agile of institutions, nor
are they the best funded, and they are certainly under strain in many
ways. Many of the individual supporters are librarians who understand
what they have at stake in the transition of books from print to
digital, and we're all in debt to everyone who has taken actions large
and small.

But if open access is to flourish as a movement that moves outside of
academic arcana, then we all need to work together to support and
nurture publishing experiments and to bring along a new generation of
advocates.

Just sayin'.

Eric Hellman

President, Gluejar, Inc.
http://Unglue.it/
[log in to unmask]