GLAM/Newsletter/March 2015/Contents/Open Access report

This Month in GLAM – Volume V, Issue III, March 2015

Open Access report

Wikimania Open Access policy; Wikimania; Wikipedia Science Conference; Punch-card microfluidics

Wikimedia Foundation announced its open access policy

This month, the Wikimedia Foundation announced (blog post) released its open access policy. It applies to research that received support from the Foundation in form of

funds;
letter of endorsement;
equipment, hosting, or office space;
access to non-public data or special API privileges; or
other support under an agreement between researchers and the Wikimedia Foundation.

This complements the multitude of interactions between Wikimedia and Open Access, the most formal expressions so far having been that several Wikimedia entities have signed the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities.

While inspired by existing open-access mandates from research institutions, it deviates from them in that licensing is key throughout, as well as in a number of other ways (cf. Signpost coverage):

It covers not just publications, but associated data, software and multimedia;
It stresses the importance of open licensing, which facilitates and broadens the scope of reuse;
It is itself available under an open license, so it can easily be adapted (e.g. translated);
It avoids embargo periods (which most other policies allow for), and instead allows for limited exceptions;
The exceptions are to be documented in public, which helps to collect data on the necessity for exceptions and can inform later refinements of the policy.

Wikimania

Besides a session dedicated to the new open-access policy, several other sessions related to open access and other research-related topics have been proposed for Wikimania 2015:

Wikipedia Science Conference

In September, the Wikipedia Science Conference is to take place in London, and session proposals are welcome until May 8. The main themes are

Wikipedia and/or Wikimedia as platforms for promoting informed public discussion
Wikipedia and/or Wikimedia as platforms for research (including citizen science)
Wikipedia and/or Wikimedia as models for scientific publishing
Wikipedia and/or Wikimedia as platforms for scientific education
Under-represented groups in STEM subjects

There will also be an unconference part and perhaps a hackathon.

Recent uploads: Singing mute cicadas, punch-card microfluidics, and a cave

The following represents a selection of the files that have been uploaded this month from open-access sources. While traditionally focused on the Open Access Media Importer (whose uploads now total over 19,200), this section now includes files tracked through commons:Commons:Open Access File of the Day/recent uploads by way of OgreBot. If you can think of wiki pages where these files (or other files from the same source articles) could be useful, please put them in there or let us know.