UKSG 2014 - ROAD Directory of Open Access Scholarly Resources

ROAD, the Directory of Open Access scholarly Resources UKSG 2014

A number for making sure that we talk
about the same things…
ROAD, the Directory of Open Access scholarly Resources - UKSG 2014
Could you please renew
my subscription to
Nature ?
My paper will be
published in the next
issue of Nature !
The Impact Factor
of Nature is
38.597
What indexing
services cover
Nature ?

Nature = ISSN 1639-1241
Nature = ISSN 1281-606X
Nature = ISSN 1281-606X
•subscription agents
•librarians
•bodies in charge of the
evaluation of the research
•indexing and abstracting
services
•programs for digital
preservation
• researchers
•….
… and which benefits to a wide range of
users

The ISSN system
• An ISO identifier for continuing resources - ISO standard 3297 (2007)
• An international network comprised of one International Centre created by
UNESCO and the French Government in the 70’s and 88 National Centres
• National Centres are hosted by National Libraries, Book Chambers, National
Centres for scientific information
• An international database, the ISSN Register: 1,77 million of bibliographic
records. Available on subscription.
• 60 000 to 65 000 new resources identified each year by the ISSN Network
ROAD, the Directory of Open Access scholarly Resources
UKSG 2014

A few things about the ISSN as an identifier
• The ISSN identifies serials (journals, monographic series, conference
proceedings….)
but other types of continuing resources fall under the scope of the ISSN as well:
integrating resources such as databases, websites, loose-leafs
• When a resource is available on different media (print, online, CD-ROM etc)
each medium version is identified by a separate ISSN
• The ISSN is an identifier, not a « quality label »
like the other ISO identifiers, the « purpose of the ISSN » is to identify resources
in a unambiguous way, not to evaluate their quality or their validity

Context of the ROAD project: significant
growth of (OA) scholarly resources
• Citizens and researchers ask for a free access to the research ouputs
(Budapest OA initiative in 2002, Berlin Declaration on Open Access to
Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities in 2003…), in particular when
publicly funded
• National and international policies/initiatives in favor of OA (European
Commission, REF Post 2014…) as a tool for developping the economy
• Development of ready-to-use systems for producing journals or repositories
(Dspace)
• Development of national « infrastructures » (HALE in France – Hyper Articles
en Ligne)

Context of the ROAD project: significant
growth of (OA) scholarly resources (2)
• Dramatic growth of the number of researchers past 15 years
worldwide
• Over 3 600 academic repositories registered in ROAR (Registry of
Open Access Repositories) to date
• 12 000 OA journals ? (probably more)
• 9700 listed in DOAJ but this number is currently decreasing because of
a more selective policy

Context of the ROAD project: questions about
the quality or prominence of OA journals
Recurring questions about the quality of OA journals within the scholarly
community
ISSN viewed as a quality label, a certification, in particular by young researchers
OA journals are of lower
quality ?
Could you please help me
in selecting the journal in
which I can publish my
articles ?
This journal has an ISSN:
that means it is a high
quality journal ?

Context of the ROAD project : questions about
the quality or prominence of OA journals
We are sorry: the evaluation of journals is
made by peers or by devoted bodies or
companies, not by the ISSN catalogers
That said, the ISSN is a convenient tool for
aggregating information about journals….

Context of the ROAD project:
confusion of roles and questionable initiatives
 e.g: ISSN role (see previous slide)
 e.g: confusion about indexing/abstracting services and
library catalogues (« my journal is indexed by the
British Library catalogue, it is thus a good quality
journal»….)
 e.g: questionable scholarly metrics are emerging (lack
of transparency etc, cf Jeffrey Beal blog)

Context of the ROAD project: UNESCO need
for a global view of OA production worlwide
• UNESCO promotes and supports the Open Access to knowledge via
various programmes and actions
• GOAP: snapshot of the status of Open Access (OA) to scientific
information around the world (policies, initiatives, per country and
geographic area)
• Need for complementing GOAP by statistics about the OA production
worlwide (journals, repositories etc)
• http://www.unesco.org/new/en/communication-and-
information/portals-and-platforms/goap/

A short-term project
• Beta version of ROAD has been developped in 6 months
• End of April 2013: the project is validated by the Governing Board of ISSN
International Centre
• June-July 2013: selection of the contractors (technical developments, data
checking and update)
• September: beginning of the data checking, technical developments,
partnerships with indexing/abstracting services, journals indicators…
• December 2013: launch of the beta version

Target audience of ROAD
• students and researchers,
• public bodies in charge of the funding and evaluation of the research,
• journalists,
• librarians and information scientists,
• well informed amateurs.

Use cases
•“ How many OA journals are indexed or ranked in my country ? »
•“ What law-related OA scholarly resources in Spanish are available whether
they be journals, conference proceedings or monographic series “
•“ What institutions have established an academic repository in South-Africa ?”
•“What mathematical OA journals are currently published in Brazil ?”
•“ I have to give a paper during an international conference: are its proceedings
indexed and where ?”

ROAD records
• ROAD is a subset of the ISSN Register
• ISSN records which describe OA resources are marked with a devoted code
so that to be published in ROAD
• ISSN records are enriched by data taken from external sources (journal
indicators, indexing-abstracting services, registries…)
• The matching ISSN records / coverage lists of external sources is processed
thanks to the ISSN number

ROAD records
Additional data from
external sources

Types of resources and criteria
• journals
• conferences proceedings
• monographic series
• institutional repositories
• open access to the whole content of the resource (free registration is
accepted)
• no moving wall
• the resource comprises mainly research papers
• the audience is mostly researchers and scholars
> ROAD codes are added by the ISSN National Centres when creating the
records, or retrospectively by the ISSN International Centre

External sources as of April 2014
• DOAJ
• Econlit
• Catalogo (Latindex)
• Psych’INFO
• Linguistic Abstracts
• Scopus
• SJR
• SNIP
• The Keepers
Agreement in principle
• Eigen factor (University of Washington)

Main features

Main features
• Map search and faceted search
• Search by country, subject, indexing-abstracting service,
registries, journal indicators
• Presentation of the external sources ( method/selection
criteria)
• Records downloadable and reusable

Map search

Faceted search

Presentation of external sources

Records downloadable and reusable

Next steps (1)
•Technical improvements (map, responsive design)
•Retrospective identification of OA resources in the ISSN Register
•Identification of academic repositories (semi-automatic assignment method)
•Enrichment of ROAD records: APC (YES/NO), license, type and content of the
repositories, type of peer reviewing…
•Development of the classification (access by subject) so as to make it more
granular

Next steps (2)
•Additional partnerships
•Committee for validating the partnerships ?
•RDF outputs using the PRESSoo model developped by the ISSN IC and the
Bibliothèque nationale de France (currently studied by IFLA groups for formal
international approval)
http://www.issn.org/the-centre-and-the-network/our-partners-and-
projects/pressoo/

Thank you !
françois-xavier.pelegrin@issn.org or road@issn.org

UKSG 2014 - ROAD Directory of Open Access Scholarly Resources

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