The Institute of Computer Science and Masaryk University Press have joined, along with 23 other institutions from fourteen European countries, a three-year project entitled “Creating a Robust Accessible Federated Technology for Open Access” (CRAFT–OA). The support of institutional publishing with open access (diamond open access) means that neither the author nor readers pay any fees.
The project was launched in January via a two-day online meeting and the participants are scheduled to meet in person for the first time in Göttingen, Germany in March. The final output of the CRAFT–OA project shall consist in particular services and tools for various stages of the publishing process. It will also enable individual publishing platforms and institutions to improve the quality level of their publishing process, as well as professionalization and streamlined cooperation.
“There are countless journals with open access which want to allow their authors and readers diamond open access. Thanks to our project they will take advantage of coordination and shared services and especially the sharing of knowledge in the area of professional institutional publishing and links to other experts, allowing them to develop their individual publishing projects,” said Margo Bargheer, CRAFT-OA coordinator from the Göttingen University.
The institutions participating in the CRAFT-OA consortium are joining the project with long-term experience with institutional publishing and established infrastructure. At the same time, they are committed to continuing development of their capacities in this area. CRAFT-OA will offer new tools, training, educational material, information and services. It will support the expansion of cooperation and development of professional communities for the sake of long-term sustainability of the outputs of the project.
The CRAFT-OA project fits the context of the support of diamond open access by the EU. It complements the earlier DIAMAS project (“Developing Institutional Open Access Publishing Models to Advance Scholarly Communication”) which runs outside of the technical aspect, the goal being the building of a capacity centre and development of the community. Another project titled PALOMERA (“Policy Alignment of Open Access Monographs in the European Research Area”) also focuses on institutional scientific communication, especially books and publishing policies.