This presentation is intended to describe a situation where an open access mandate was developed and implemented at an institutional level, in this case, an Australian University. ...
At Queensland University of Technology a mandate was developed and put in place by early 2004. Although we were not aware of it at the time, it was in fact the first university to develop an institution-wide mandate worldwide. Interesting observations can be made about its effect over a five year period of implementation. ...
[T]he policy was taken through the university research committee, which in turn recommended to the supreme academic decision making body, The University Academic Board, the policy which established the ePrint Repository for research outputs at QUT. ...
[W]hen the Library sought guidance about how much to use the fact that there was a mandate, we chose in the initial stages not to push that too strongly, but to simply move on to the next researcher if there was any particular issue. ...
The second significant feature was the “access statistics” feature which would indicate for any given period the top 50 authors, and the top 50 papers. In this way QUT authors had the ability to understand at least one simple metric about the extent of their impact.
I know this has worked significantly. I know this because one of our top researchers, and a leading figure in the humanities in Australia, and an initial sceptic (but not opponent) of the mandate policy, was observed within two years gleefully announcing to a colleague that he had been in the top position for downloads that week. ...
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
