American Libraries, the flagship magazine of the American Library Association (ALA), celebrated the first Open Access Day, Oct. 14, by opening up its content on the Web and making its companion weekly e-newsletter, American Libraries Direct, available to anyone for the asking.
“Opening up American Libraries’ searchable PDFs [here] is just the first step toward making all future features and columns available on the site in HTML format in 2009,” said Leonard Kniffel, editor in chief. The current issue of the print magazine will be open to all, as will back issues through 2003; they were all formerly accessible only with a member log-in. The revamped AL website will link content to the AL online forum where readers are encouraged to express their opinions about professional issues, news and controversies.
The decision to open up the magazine and the e-newsletter was made after consulting with key ALA member committees during this year’s ALA Annual Conference in Anaheim. “We’ve known for a long time that this is the direction in which magazine publishing is going,” said Kniffel, “but we have to be careful to counter the perception that member organizations rely on member-only perks to retain members.” The fact is, he said, “making your content difficult or impossible to find on the Web simply means that your members, especially those who are writing for your organization, get left out of all the conversations occurring online.” ...
...This still isn’t a perfect solution; as I mentioned, you do need to download the ebrary reader in order to view the archives. (And there’s a small incompatibility with Firefox 3, so if you use that browser, there’s an extra workaround you’ll have to do.) So I’m also pleased to be able to say that HTML is coming. January is our target date to start posting new issues in an HTML format.
PS: Also see our September post on the ALA announcement that this conversion was in the works. For some of the history on the ALA's move to OA, see Charles Bailey's detailed posts (1, 2, 3, 4).
Posted by
Peter Suber at 10/17/2008 10:20:00 AM.
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.
