Johan Steenbakkers, Director of e-Strategy and Property Management of the KB [Koninklijke Bibliotheek], the National Library of the Netherlands, has been appointed Knight of the Order of Oranje Nassau on account of his achievements in developing the e-Depot, the digital repository of the KB. The ceremony took place during the international digital preservation conference Tools & Trends, which was organized by the KB on the occasion of Steenbakkers’ retirement.
Steenbakkers played a vital role in developing a storage system for digital publications. The first ideas for such a system were developed in the early 1990s, when electronic publishing was first introduced and the KB decided that e-publications should be included in the national deposit collection. Dr. Steenbakkers not only developed an innovative vision on the future of electronic publications and the KB’s role, but he also came to be the moving force behind a joint IBM/KB project to develop a repository system which met the demands of long-term storage and access. Thus the e-Depot came to be, a world first in the storage of electronic documents, journals and websites. Ten million articles in the e-Depot.
Dr. Steenbakkers’ knowledge, drive and enthusiasm allowed the KB to gain an international reputation in the area of digital preservation. Considerable interest was roused worldwide and twelve major publishers, including Springer, Elsevier, Blackwell and BioMed [Central] concluded archiving agreements with the KB. Just before Steenbakkers’ retirement, the 10 millionth journal article was ingested....
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.
