06. Publish grey literature data

The supply under open license of bibliographic records describing institutional grey literature.

Description

Activity - The supply under open license of bibliographic records describing institutional grey literature.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Actors - Library, academic authors of grey literature, repository managers elsewhere in institution
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Data involved - Bibliographic records describing institutional grey literature; may also involve full text of documents and associated research data.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Data flow - Data on grey literature collected from across the institution, typically in the context of an institutional repository.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Does this require Open Data - Not necessary, although explicit open licenses for set of metadata, full text and associated research data will make use and re-use easier.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Current Examples - University of Ghent, University of Southampton (ECS)
Part of use case: | Share your experience

Benefits

Institution - (1) Improved learning and research experience; (2) Marketing, through visibility of institutional outputs
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Library Service - (1) Improved service to users; (2) Increased visibility to key stakeholders inside the institution
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Researchers - Potential to increase visibility of institutional holdings and to amplify own research
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Students - Potential to increase visibility of institutional holdings
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Replication - This approach applies to a wide range of teaching, learning and research outputs that may have little or no visibility through current discovery interfaces
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Case for not doing it - Too difficult to be comprehensive, opening up an open-ended commitment
Part of use case: | Share your experience

Motivation

Principles - Raise internal and external visibility of institutional resources not formally published elsewhere.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Costs - Delivers value to the institution by increasing visibility of expensively created institutional resources.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Services - Enhances mission of institutional repositories
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Rationale for not doing it - Diverts the attention from more pressing concerns, in repositories and contributing researcher groups
Part of use case: | Share your experience

Consequences of doing it as Open Data

What will happen? - (1) Institutional researchers will be able to increase visibility of their work; (2) Colleagues and students will have access to material not available by other means.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Potential Risks - (1) Loss of control over institutional data; (2) The originator of elements of the bibliographic records challenges release as open data [see also UC1, UC2, UC3, UC4, UC5, UC7, UC15, UC16, UC17]; (3) Increased visibility of collection leads to demand beyond local resources ability to supply [see also UC3, UC4, UC5, UC7, UC9, UC13, UC16, UC17]; (4) If ‘full–text’ items are included in the data, there is a risk that any publishers of the material may challenge the release as open data.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Potential Opportunities - (1) Development of innovative / compelling third party services based on open data; (2) Increased use of collection by internal and external users through improved discovery services [see also UC3, UC4, UC5, UC7, UC9, UC13, UC16, UC17]
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Consequences of not doing it? - Grey literature is by definition harder to discover through convention discovery routes, and is likely to be under untilised if not adequately exposed to discovery services.
Part of use case: | Share your experience

Rights and Licensing Issues

Rights and licensing issues - Some grey literature comprises eprints and preprints for material published elsewhere; there is the potential for inadvertently contravening licenses and publishing agreements. Some grey literature comprises early results and analysis from research; there is the potential to dilute the impact of later publications, or to release contradictory results.
Part of use case: | Share your experience

Practicalities

Data exchange formatting - Dublin Core, for dissemination via an OAI repository?
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Lifecycle implications - Modest; infrastructure to support an institutional OAI repository.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Hosting requirements - Relatively minor
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Existing systems impact - There is an ongoing requirement to encourage deposition and use.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Skills demands - Configuring an OAI repository is relatively straightforward. Evangelising deposition into the repository is a harder and more of a long term task.
Part of use case: | Share your experience

Costs

Setup - OAI repository software is relatively robust, and there are a number of products from which to choose. Configuration to meet specific requirements may require modest effort that will normally be within the abilities of systems staff.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Ongoing - The infrastructural costs associated with sustaining this capability should be relatively low. The human cost of encouraging deposition and use is more significant.
Part of use case: | Share your experience
Cost of doing nothing - No additional costs will be directly accrued through inaction. However, as more institutions set up systems to promote their activities, those without a strategic approach to dissemination of grey literature may well begin to appear less active.
Part of use case: | Share your experience