Register now for this FREE 1-hour workshop hosted by the Forum for Open Research in MENA (F.O.R.M.) in collaboration with the Public Knowledge Project (PKP).
Event Abstract
In an Age of Misinformation, the public’s right to be able to turn to trusted and reviewed sources of information that are transparent about the sources of evidence and thorough in their reasoning has never been more vital. It affects how we are governed and how we take care of ourselves and this planet. This right to know, entrenched in the UN Declaration of Human Rights, is now being honored through a global move toward ensuring that there is truly open access, which is to say, public access to research and scholarship.
Open access is being made possible through a number of methods, and this 1-hour webinar will examine the role of open infrastructure in the form of publishing platforms for research journals and books that are made freely available to scholars, libraries, and publishers. In particular, it will describe the work of the Public Knowledge Project (PKP) at Simon Fraser University in Canada that develops (free) open-source software systems (OJS, OMP, OPS).
The webinar will present the extent to which such open infrastructure is being used to post (pre-prints) and publish research in terms of countries, languages, disciplines, and type of open access that is as accessible to authors as it is to readers. It will not only consider the encouraging extent to which this right to know has been realized to date, but will consider the challenges that remain in making this open access to research both sustainable and universal. This leads to a concluding call for reconsidering the legal structures that continue to hamper open access.
What you will learn:
- How valuable open infrastructure is in scholarly communications ecosystems across the world
- The successful spread of open access so far, and the challenges that continue to slow down the spread of open access policies and practices
- What we can do as researchers, librarians, educators and policy makers to help facilitate the spread of open access across the Arab States
NB As the speaker is based in Northern America, we are having our event at an earlier time than usual. If you are unable to attend at this time, please still register and we will send you a recording after the event.
Event Time & Date
July 5th 2023: 9am GST /5am GMT
Target Audience
The event has been developed for university audiences, and all stakeholders of the scholarly publishing system in the Arab world and beyond.