SPARC papers are freely available under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License and may be downloaded in PDF format below. To download Adobe Acrobat reader, visit the Adobe Web site.

(Listed by date of release)

(NEW!) Publishing Cooperatives: An Alternative for Society Publishers - A SPARC Discussion Paper (Released September 2006)
Raym Crow, SPARC Senior Consultant

This SPARC discussion paper proposes a federation of discipline-specific publishing cooperatives as an alternative operating model for society publishers. Publishing cooperatives would be owned, capitalized, and controlled by nonprofit publishers as users, with publishers sharing risks and benefits proportional to their use of the cooperative. Such publishing cooperatives can provide a scaleable publishing model that aligns well with the values of the academy while providing a practical financial framework capable of sustaining society publishing programs and supporting their transition to non-subscription funding models.

Open Access: Unlocking the Value of Scientific Research (2004)
Rick Johnson, Fmr Executive Director, SPARCWe see it all around us: industries are changing and adapting in response to new information and communications technologies. In the music industry, for example, a struggle is underway between companies with a financial interest in defending their pre-Internet business model and the demands of the emerging online marketplace. Similarly, journal publishing’s entrenched print regime is locked in a battle with those who seek to achieve the benefits of a more open exchange of information by utilizing “open access” publishing strategies.

The Future of Scholarly Communication in the Humanities: Adaptation or Transformation? (2004)
Richard K. Johnson, Fmr Executive Director, SPARCAll around us enterprises are weighing the demands of adapting or transforming their business models against the risk of ultimate extinction. Music, motion pictures, retailing, travel, telecommunications – giant changes are underway in these industries and many others. For agile players, evolving consumer demands may present new opportunities. Others will be left behind like buggy whip makers as new entrants emerge. But we’re interested in scholarship, not commerce. Are the rules different here?

The SPARC Initiative: a Catalyst for Change (June 2004)
Bas Savenije, Utrecht University Librarian & LIBER representative to the SPARC Steering Committee, 2004

SPARC was started in 1997 by a number of large research libraries in the US. Its main goal was restore a competitive balance of the STM journals publishing market. A number of programmatic areas were initiated in order to realize this goal: SPARC Alternatives, SPARC Leading Edge, SPARC Scientific Communities, and SPARC Communication and Advocacy. Since two years SPARC puts a special emphasis on Open Access, including institutional repositories. The paper gives an overview of the activities of SPARC and its partners in these areas. The results are evaluated and compared with the measures defined in 1997. Finally, the paper describes the possibilities for libraries to contribute to the realization of SPARC's goals.

The Case for Institutional Repositories: A SPARC Position Paper (August 2002)
Raym Crow, SPARC Senior Consultant

Institutional repositories—digital collections that capture and preserve the intellectual output of university communities—respond to two strategic issues facing academic institutions: 1) they provide a central component in reforming scholarly communication by stimulating innovation in a disaggregated publishing structure; and 2) they serve as tangible indicators of an institution’s quality, thus increasing its visibility, prestige, and public value. This paper examines institutional repositories from these complementary perspectives, describing their potential role and exploring their impact on major stakeholders in the scholarly communication process.
See also: SPARC Institutional Repository Checklist & Resource Guide

Capitalizing on Competition: The Economic Underpinnings of SPARC (2002)
Mary M. Case, Fmr Director, Office of Scholarly Communication, Association of Research Libraries

Over the last 15 years the library community has been faced with high and ever rising prices for scholarly resources. A number of factors have contributed to this situation, most fundamentally, the commercialization of scholarly publishing. While libraries have tried a number of strategies to ameliorate the effects of high prices, the development of SPARC, the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition, finally seems to be having some positive effects. This paper will review the current library environment, outline the elements that contribute to the marketplace for science, technology, and medical publishing, and then briefly discuss the various calls for more competition in the scholarly publishing market. I will then discuss SPARC, a major initiative intended to introduce low-priced, high-value alternatives to compete with high-priced commercial publications for authors and subscribers.

Competition: A Unifying Ideology for Change in Scholarly Communication (2000)
Richard K. Johnson, Fmr Executive Director, SPARCIt's a hot topic at academic conferences, library association meetings, and scientific forums. During the past decade, the debate about how to transform scholarly publishing has animated discussions around the globe. The problem is clear: Scholarly journals cost too much. But though a variety of solutions has been proffered, none has yet been so widely embraced that the underlying structures have shifted appreciably...