From: "Maziar, Lucy (EDU)" <[log in to unmask]> Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2017 22:21:18 +0000 The more ways to discover it, the more likely people will find it. Probably a lot of the Oxfam publications have already been cataloged without the proper links to the electronic version so even if someone finds it in WorldCat, they won’t know that there is an electronic version freely available. I was looking up the Oxfam America Annual Reports in WorldCat and the only link was to a digitized copy on Google for 2003. It is super easy to add the proper link and make them more accessible. http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/659439159 I also saw that all (or at least many that I Iooked at) of the digitized copies of Oxfam publications on the Hathi Trust were not accessible either – limited search only. If they are open access, then contact Hathi Trust and let the full text of the digitized copy be viewable by anyone. Maybe it’s not that easy since I am not a member of Hathi Trust, but their links show up in Google searches and if someone finds it that way, it would be great if they could go directly to the full text. Librarians want to get information to people. Maybe you can partner with librarians to make sure your publications are properly cataloged. Would I be willing to catalog one publication each year from Oxfam – yes! Especially because I know some of those titles would be very useful to my patrons. Publishers and librarians need to create partnerships to get information to people. Some of that information may require a price tag but some of it can be offered for free and it is certainly no less valuable because it is free. We serve on editorial boards for journals for free – making information accessible is as valuable of a contribution to the scholarly conversation and one in which I would happily participate. Lucy Maziar Library Director US Coast Guard Academy 35 Mohegan Ave New London CT 06320 860.444.8517 <(860)%20444-8517> [log in to unmask] [image: images] <http://fb.com/USCGALibrary> *From:* LibLicense-L Discussion Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] *On Behalf Of *LIBLICENSE *Sent:* Wednesday, July 26, 2017 9:33 PM *To:* [log in to unmask] *Subject:* Re: Oxfam Publications Program and a Big Question From: Eric Elmore <[log in to unmask]> Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2017 15:53:41 +0000 What we really need is a comprehensive grey-lit database along the lines of ERIC and Medline. Librarians and content producers have journal and book content pretty well set up for metadata creation and discovery using a standardized number system(issn & isbn), but all the various types of content NOT a journal or book/e-book fall through the cracks. So along with a repository for that catch-all category of materials we need a standardized number for those materials that discovery systems can hook onto. DOI’s can kinda do that job, but that’s not their primary purpose. Greylit has been a problem forever and we still haven’t really solved the problem, which is a real shame because there is a lot of really interesting content out there free and available, just languishing due to how hard it is to find. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Eric Elmore | Electronic Resources Coordinator | The University of Texas at San Antonio | One UTSA Circle | San Antonio, TX. 78249-0671 | (O)210-458-4916 <(210)%20458-4916>/(F)210-458-4577 <(210)%20458-4577> | [log in to unmask] | ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ *From:* LibLicense-L Discussion Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] *On Behalf Of *LIBLICENSE *Sent:* Tuesday, July 25, 2017 5:25 PM *To:* [log in to unmask] *Subject:* Re: Oxfam Publications Program and a Big Question From: "Bachman, Trisha" <[log in to unmask]> Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2017 14:05:56 +0000 Great discussion. To some extent, we rely on databases like CIAO and Policy File to bring our team and our users to these types of reports (it looks like both contain publications from Chatham House and Oxfam, though there may be a lag in CIAO for the newer works). PAIS Index seems to be even more behind when it comes to Chatham House and Oxfam (I don't know enough about this particular product to hazard a guess as to why that is). We previously had good success linking to these reports via the MERLN website for our military and interagency users, but that effort lacked in things like metadata, tagging, and eventually staffing, so it's also experiencing a lag in updating. This might be something to bring up to ITHAKA in the future? Some of the Chatham House materials are already in JSTOR (mostly the journal articles it looks like), so this may be a good fit? In either event, I'm really interested in the discussion on crowd-funding and the work being done by Ingenta. Thanks for a stimulating conversation! Trish NDU Libraries -----Original Message----- From: <[log in to unmask]> Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2017 19:54:38 +0000 Of course, this is just the tip of an iceberg. A couple of weeks ago I was chatting to the Head of Communications at Chatham House, another UK-based NGO. He was telling me that they publish a fair number of reports a year, but simply post them on their website. He was totally puzzled when I wondered how they would be discovered in academic institutions; he had no idea that reaching students and academics might require doing more than simply relying on Google and posting free PDFs on their website. When I mentioned things like persistent identifiers, long-term archiving, and citation tools, I might as well have been speaking Martian - he had no idea what I was going on about. So, yes, NGO publications do, I think, have limited reach and are an under-discovered and an under-valued resource - amazing when one considers how cheap they are! So, what to do? It costs money to capture content and wrap it with the metadata needed to insert it into both mainstream and specialist discovery channels, to ensure it is available in a persistent and reliable manner. A challenge when NGOs have little or no funds for marketing. A challenge for any aggregator who would struggle to earn a return on their investment since they would be competing against free versions hosted on the parent website - assuming of course, they got permission from the copyright owner to aggregate the content in the first place. But what if, like with arXiv, librarians 'crowd-funded' an effort that would harvest this content from willing NGOs, large and small, do the necessary to enrich it with industry-standard metadata (DOIs and the like), and then feed the relevant discovery and delivery channels. Larger NGOs like Oxfam can hire professionals like Emily to direct their publishing programmes, but I bet smaller ones, like Chatham House, lack in-house publishing expertise. Maybe the 'crowd-funded' effort could also fund best-practice advice and training to improve NGOs' ability to publish in a manner that is in tune with the demands of the industry (like XML). Would anyone be interested in exploring this idea? Toby (And due thanks to Ann Okerson for her advice in preparing this reply). Toby Green Public Affairs and Communications Directorate OECD Winner The Academic and Professional Publisher Award 2017