Action 4.3.1 Conduct a feasibility study and pilot with a view to establishing a publicly-owned, centralised national platform for Diamond OA publication of journal and books. This action will be aimed at supporting OA models for Irish-based academic journals and publishers.

Publish OA Ireland commenced in November 2022 and will run until November 2024. Its overall aim is to conduct a feasibility study on creating a Diamond open access (OA) publishing platform for Ireland.

The project’s objectives are to:

• research and map the landscape of scholarly publishing across all disciplines on the island;
• benchmark Irish scholarly publishing against international good practice in Diamond OA standards, process and infrastructures;
• conduct the feasibility study for a publicly owned, centralised all-island platform for Diamond OA publication of journals and books;
• design, build, test and implement a pilot publishing platform based upon project recommendations, in collaboration with stakeholders;
• publish a set of recommendations for a publicly-owned, centralised platform for Diamond OA publication of journals and books in Ireland.

Further details on project outputs can be found in the Outputs section on the project’s website.

Mid-term Report Summary: 

Context:

Publish OA Ireland is co-led by the Royal Irish Academy and Trinity College Dublin and is funded by the National Open Research Forum (NORF) under the 2022 Open Research Fund. The project commenced in November 2022 and will run until November 2024. Its overall aim is to conduct a feasibility study on creating a national Diamond open access (OA) publishing platform for Ireland.

The project’s objectives are to:

• Research and map the landscape of scholarly publishing across all disciplines on the island; 
• Benchmark Irish scholarly publishing against international good practice in Diamond OA standards, process and infrastructures; 
• Conduct a feasibility study for a publicly owned, centralised all-island platform for Diamond OA publication of journals and books, comprising delivery of: 
  • a set of technical and non-technical requirements; 
  • infrastructure options;
  • costings (including research funding models) for a national platform designed for Irish scholarly publishers and the national stakeholders; 
• Design, build, test and implement a pilot publishing platform based upon these recommendations, in collaboration with partner publishers and scholarly authors with journal and monograph demonstrators; 
• Publish a set of recommendations for a publicly owned, centralised platform for Diamond OA publication of journals and books in Ireland.

So far, the project team have employed the following methods:

• Desk research – preparing the first draft of the Directory of Irish Publishers, review of funding models, assessment of platforms, etc.;
• Survey – refining the Directory and beginning to engage publishers and elucidating their needs;
• Interviews – engaging with publishers to refine community requirements;
• Workshops – engaging with scholarly authors to refine guidelines on OA for such authors.

Expected results, impact and use

By the end of the project lifecycle, the project team expect to have completed a pilot and compiled recommendations for establishing a publishing platform and on how to extend the use of such a platform first to project partners and then to any publishers in Ireland who wish to use it. To do that, staffing, software and stability of funding would be required. Such a platform would support bibliodiversity in Ireland and provide a valuable resource for Ireland’s publishers, which are small sized, in the main, and operate on extremely limited budgets.