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>Partner News
>Industry Roundup
>Resources for Authors
>Resources for Publishers
>Upcoming Events
>Articles of Interest

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1. SPARC News

• SAVE THE DATE: SPARC-ACRL Forum at ALA - Working with the Facebook Generation: Engaging Student Views on Access to Scholarship. Saturday, January 12, 2008, 4:00 - 6:00PM
• SPARC Europe Announces Call-for-Nominations - Nominations are open for the Third Award for Outstanding Achievements in Scholarly Communications Award to Honor Leaders in Field of Scholarly Communications.
• SPARC and ACRL release materials on the progress of open access journal publishing - New interviews and analysis explore in depth the views of three major open access publishers on the challenges of sustainability.
• Senate Approves Appropriations Bill Including NIH Public Access Requirement - Please remember to thank your Senators and Representatives for their support

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2. Partner News

Please see the SPARC web site for a complete list of news from SPARC partners.

• PLoS has launched the new journal PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases.
• BioMed Central has announced its Biology Image Library, an online resource that provides access to over 11,000 carefully selected biology-related images. In other news, BioMed Central has also launched a YouTube channel.
• The University of Michigan Library's Scholarly Publishing Office makes public its new featured series.
• BioOne has joined the SERU pilot program and announced new titles.
• PhysMath Central takes off.
• Opulus Press launches "First Online."
• Open Society Institute awards a grant to support the production and distribution of the Open Access Documentary Project, a collection of online videos celebrating the benefits of open access to scientific and medical research.

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In SPARC Webcasts:

Taking action on the NIH Public Access Policy - in Congress and on Campus, a SPARC/ATA Web cast recorded October 4, 2007 (Recorded October 4, 2007)

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3. Industry Roundup

Please see the SPARC web site for a complete listing of relevant industry news and details on these highlights.

• NIH public access status - The U.S. House of Representatives failed to override the President's veto of the FY08 LHHS Appropriations Bill, which contained the NIH's Public Access policy language.
• Sage and Hindawi Publishing Corporation will partner to produce a suite of fully open-access journals.
• Council of the European Union supports open access.
• Harvard Faculty of Arts & Sciences considering open access.
• NIH has launched an open access dataset of genetic and clinical data.
• OpenDOAR now includes 1000 repositories.
• Max Planck Society announces cancellation of Springer online publications.

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4. SPARC Resources for Authors

The Create Change web site now features nine interviews with scholars and researchers from diverse fields, including experts from chemistry, computer science, economics, engineering, history, humanities, mathematics, medicine, and microbiology.

More SPARC Resources for Authors.

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5. SPARC Resources for Publishers

Society publishers with open access journals. From the SPARC Open Access Newsletter.

Also available: Sponsorships for Nonprofit Society & Scientific Journals: A Guide to Defining and Negotiating Successful Sponsorships, August 2005.

More SPARC Resources for Publishers.

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6. Upcoming Events

SPARC:

2008 SPARC Institutional Repositories Meeting
November 17 and 18, 2008, Baltimore, MD
http://www.arl.org/sparc/meetings/ir08.html

SPARC-ACRL Forum on Emerging Issues in Scholarly Communication
Saturday, January 12, 2008, 4:00 - 6:00PM.

These and other important events can be found on the SPARC Activities Calendar.

Community events:

February 2008

February 20-22, 2008
LCDP Institute on Scholarly Communication and Information Policy
Knoxville, TN

March 2008

Thursday, March 13, 2008
San Jose State University presentation
11:30am-1:00pm

May 2008

May 21-24, 2008
LIBRARIES & PUBLISHING 3.0: - connecting authors to readers in the digital age
Canadian Library Association Annual Conference & Trade Show

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7. Articles of Interest

Albanese, Andrew. "After Years of Effort, Mandatory NIH Public Access Policy Passes Congress." October 25, 2007.

Baker, Gavin. "Student activism: How students use the scholarly communication system." C&RL News, November 2007

Healy, Bernadine. "Making Science Free to All." U.S. News and World Report, November 12, 2007.

Leonard, Andrew. "How the World Works: Why James Inhofe tried to sabotage open access." Salon.com, October 26, 2007.

Vigens, Jens. "Particle physicists push for publishing changes." Research Information, October/November 2007.

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You can help open access to research.

SPARC membership is open to North American and international academic and research institutions that share an interest in creating a more open and diverse marketplace for scholarly communication. Visit the SPARC Web site to learn how.