From: Anthony Watkinson <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Thu, 7 Jun 2018 10:04:25 +0100
What a great plan which all will welcome and it is good to see that the
larger players like Aries and Clarivate are falling in with something
initiated by a smaller one. John Sack has always been concerned with the
researcher interest.
Does anyone else find the PR annoying? There is no secret about the
problems researchers have. They know. Who is this “expert” and where do the
stats come from. I see no reason why the stats should be incorrect but
surely this list at least is owed a reference
Anthony
From: Ashley Dennee <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wed, 6 Jun 2018 14:55:36 +0100
Good afternoon -
I wanted to share some news I thought may be of interest. The National
Information Standards Organization <https://www.niso.org/> (NISO) has
approved MECA - the ‘Manuscript Exchange Common Approach’ - which brings
together the industry’s leading tech providers to create a standard
approach to manuscript systems.
On average, 15 million hours of researcher time is consumed each year, simply
repeating reviews
<https://www.niso.org/press-releases/2018/05/niso-launches-new-project-facilitate-manuscript-exchange-across-systems>
. *John Sack*, Founding Director of digital publishing platform *HighWire
<https://www.highwirepress.com/>*, has led the MECA initiative to improve
access and review times for researchers and publishers.
Please find a full release below, and let me know if you’d like to hear
further about MECA or John Sack.
Thanks in advance,
Ashley
//
*HighWire co-founder leads industry initiative on manuscript exchange*
*LOS GATOS, CA — June 5, 2018 — *Members of the *National Information
Standards Organization <https://www.niso.org/>* (NISO) have approved the
‘Manuscript Exchange Common Approach’ (MECA) - a major new academic
publishing initiative co-led by *HighWire <https://www.highwirepress.com/>*
Founding Director John Sack. The project will see the industry’s leading
technology providers work together on a more standardized approach to the
transfer of manuscripts between and among manuscript systems, such as those
in use at publishers and preprint servers.
The outdated, time-intensive way authors currently submit and re-submit
manuscripts to different publishers is quietly a major productivity killer
for researchers globally. It is estimated that a staggering 15 million
hours of researcher time is consumed each year, simply repeating reviews
<https://www.niso.org/press-releases/2018/05/niso-launches-new-project-facilitate-manuscript-exchange-across-systems>.
But the problem, described by one expert as ‘publishing’s nasty secret
<https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2016/11/30/institutional-conservatism-in-scholarly-communications-thoughts-from-uksgs-one-day-conference/>’,
could be solved if journals and publishers were able to transfer
manuscripts between publications using different submission-tracking
systems.
*Goals and collaboration*
The MECA project will work towards a number of key goals, in order to
address the issue:
· Vocabulary: providing a standard nomenclature
· Packaging: a simple, flexible, standard way to assemble files
· Tagging: being able to pass submission information from system to system
· Peer review: being able to pass review information from system to system
· Transfer: enabling the transfer of information from system to system
· Identity: a unique, consistent identity across systems
· Transmission: a simple, consistent way to send the information across
systems
*John Sack, Founding Director at HighWire*, has co-led the initiative
alongside other leading technology providers. He explains: “*While much of
the recent industry conversation has focused on opening up easier access to
existing knowledge
<https://www.theguardian.com/higher-education-network/2018/may/21/scientists-access-journals-researcher-article>,
we still have work to do on streamlining how that insight is published in
the first place. Too much time is wasted on the manuscript transfer and
submission processes - so it’s great to be working alongside other systems
providers on a solution that will benefit everyone in the industry*.”
*MECA in action*Momentum has gathered pace since the project was first
presented by John at the 2017 SSP Annual Meeting, with the first use case
for the project now live.
In addition to HighWire and eJP, MECA's leading participants are Aries,
Clarivate, and PLOS. The collaboration between HighWire and eJournalPress
enables MECA for a new life sciences journal so that manuscripts and
reviews could flow to - and from - other journals in a standardized way.
The implementation entered into production earlier this year, and is now
completed - meaning that manuscripts and reviews now flow smoothly via
MECA, with the only author intervention being to agree to the transfer.
This first, fully-operational implementation will now serve as the base for
documentation and elaboration through the NISO review and approval process.
You can find out more about HighWire’s manuscript submission and tracking
service, BenchPress, here
<https://www.highwirepress.com/products-services/benchpress>.
Or for more detail on HighWire’s work on the MECA initiative, you can
contact the HighWire leadership team here
<https://www.highwirepress.com/about-us/leadership-team> or visit:
http://www.manuscriptexchange.org
*— ENDS —*
*For media enquiries, please contact:*
Clarity PR for HighWire
[log in to unmask]
+44 (0)20 7100 1333
*About HighWire*HighWire is the technology partner of choice for
world-leading commercial and scholarly publishers. With offices globally,
HighWire provides digital publishing solutions and platform expertise
across all aspects of the publishing life cycle, including content
management and hosting, e-commerce, analytics, access and identity
management, manuscript submission and tracking. HighWire also delivers
strategic consulting services for developing systems and applications and
improving the customer experience.
HighWire is a CODiE award finalist for Vizors in the Best Business
Intelligence Reporting & Analytics Solution
<http://www.siia.net/codie/2018-Finalists> category.
*About NISO*
NISO, based in Baltimore, Maryland, fosters the development and maintenance
of standards that facilitate the creation, persistent management, and
effective interchange of information so that it can be trusted for use in
research and learning. To fulfill this mission, NISO engages libraries,
publishers, information aggregators, and other organizations that support
learning, research, and scholarship through the creation, organization,
management, and curation of knowledge. NISO works with intersecting
communities of interest and across the entire lifecycle of information
standards. NISO is a not-for-profit association accredited by the American
National Standards Institute (ANSI). For more information, visit the NISO
website.
--
*Ashley Dennee*
*Account Executive | Clarity PR *
*T: *+44 (0) 20 3893 5026 *| *M: +44 (0) 7375 022 761
|
