Piloting Business Models for OA Scholarly Monographs in Humanities and Social Sciences
The project will commence by consulting with a range of stakeholders to get a full understanding of the current monograph publishing environment. Once the consultation stage is completed, the requirements and knowledge gathered will be used to create an invitation to tender.
The invitation to tender will invite monograph publishers in the HSS to become partners in the project and to submit a selection of titles to be published in OA on the OAPEN platform and on other platforms. Publishers that are selected will receive funding from the publication fund that will be managed as part of this project. The invitation will define the criteria for selection, the rules of engagement and ongoing requirements in terms of promotion and data evaluation.
The proposals received will be marked and the recommendations agreed by the Steering Group. It is anticipated that around 30 monographs are made available.
Once the successful publishers have been informed, they will be required to follow the rules of engagement and make monographs available on the OAPEN platform and other platforms agreed. They may make use of the tools for publishing on the OAPEN platform or they may prefer to use alternative tools such as those offered via the Open Monograph Press[1]. If they use the OAPEN platform they will be required to meet its standards and specifications. The publisher will provide required data to JISC Collections. This data will be used to evaluate the impacts on the publishers business. In addition, data from the platforms upon which the e-books will be made available will be collected to measure the reach and dissemination of the monographs and the resulting impact on research in the UK.
Throughout the project, JISC Collections will share information and knowledge at an international level through the Knowledge Exchange partners and through the OAPEN stakeholder groups. Meetings with stakeholders will also continue throughout the pilot period.
At the end of the pilot period, JISC Collections will analyse all the data and present the findings, recommendations and guidelines.