Open Access News

News from the open access movement


Friday, November 02, 2007

Digitization and OA at Harvard

Joshua Kearney, From Widener to the World Wide Web, Harvard Crimson, November 2, 2007.  Excerpt:

...The Open Collections Program is an example of Harvard’s foray into the digital realm. The project was started in 2002 and...has...launched two open collections. The two topics covered are “Women Working 1800-1930” and “Immigration to the United States 1789-1930.” ...

The other important player in the digitization of Harvard’s libraries has been the Google Library Project....

Robert C. Darnton ’60, the current director of the Harvard University Library, says Google has its shortcomings.

“I don’t think Google is the big rock candy mountain; Google isn’t going to solve all the problems,” Darnton says. “But I do think that open access is something that really matters.” David D. Weinberger, a fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, also acknowledges the virtues of Google, saying, “If the fastest way to [provide open access] is to involve a commercial company, then it makes sense to me.” ...

“It’s not just open collections or open access as it goes according to the current formulas, but openness in general so that Harvard, which has these great intellectual riches, can share the wealth with the rest of the world,” says Darnton. But Darnton—new this year as director of the University Library—also sees much room for improvement with the current information systems.

“Why can’t all dissertations be made fully accessible online? Why can’t we have lecture notes, and reserved reading, and course packs, and all kinds of what’s called ‘gray literature’...why can’t we make everything, this whole world of scholarly communication available free?” asks Darnton. “It seems to me that the new information society of the 21st century should be open, accessible to everyone, and that Harvard should take the lead in making that happen.” ...

Digital publications still cluster in areas of science, technology, and medicine, and the high prices of these materials are subject to the whims of publishers. While the faculty of Harvard is fighting to obtain the rights to their own published works so that they can be used free of charge, the library system has to continue to pay indefinitely....

Both Verba and Darnton share an opinion that digitization may not impair book readership and sales, but could actually boost them instead....