Summer Open Access activities

  • Author By Eric Willey
  • June 29, 2021
Open Access symbol
One area of the publishing industry that has generated considerable discussion is article processing charges (APCs), fees paid by an author or their institution to a publisher to make their article Open Access.

Many faculty use the summer months to conduct research or plan their fall courses. Summer can also be a good time to explore the world of Open Access, especially linked data, and see what others are doing. Virtual conferences with no registration cost and a weekly newsletter all offer ways to investigate linked data and potentially find a new idea for research or classroom instruction.

The 2021 LD4 Conference on Linked Data will be held virtually on July 19-23. Pre-conference workshops and tutorials will be held on July 19, and sessions will be held from July 20-23. There is no cost to attend, although participants must register, and this year’s conference will focus on how linked data can benefit GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museum) institutions and how they can participate. Jessica Meyerson, director of strategy and research at the Educopia Institute, and Lauren Klein, Digital Humanities Lab at Emory University, will give conference keynotes. There are sessions for both expert and new linked data users. You can also check out last year’s conference and view sessions on YouTube to get a better idea of what the conference is like.

The inaugural virtual Wikimania will also take place on August 13-17. The conference theme is the recognition of Wikipedia’s 20th birthday, and celebrating all the passionate volunteers who made that milestone possible. The program has not been finalized at the time of this writing, but there will be no registration costs. The 2020 conference was in Stockholm, and links to recordings of most sessions can be found at the bottom of the program page. Interested readers can also follow the announcements page for more news as the date of the conference approaches.

For readers wishing to learn about future opportunities, the Wikidata Weekly Update is a valuable resource. While the focus is on Wikidata, other linked data events and topics are often included. Newsletters include events, informational items including scholarly articles, a tool of the week, and other noteworthy items. Interested parties can get weekly updates at the link above, or subscribe to the mailing list.

Summer is also a great time to review your past year’s scholarly and creative output and consider including it in our institutional repository, ISU ReD. Anyone wishing to make their own materials more readily available can often place pre-prints or even published articles and materials on ISU ReD. We are happy to answer any questions you might have and discuss what options are available.

If you wish to discuss this further, please contact Milner Library’s Scholarly Communication Team at isured@ilstu.edu.

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