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August 2025: What’s in this issueWhat’s new in OA & scholarly publishing in Australia & Aotearoa New ZealandWhat’s new in OA & scholarly publishing globallyRecent writing & resources on OAUpcoming events in OA & scholarly publishing
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Contributions to the newsletter or the blog, especially notice of upcoming events, are welcome. Contact us here. If this newsletter was forwarded to you and you’d like to receive it directly, please sign up |
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What’s new in OA & scholarly publishing in Australia & Aotearoa New Zealand |
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| Open Access Australasia supports universities holding the line in publisher talksFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Open Access Australasia (OAA) supports the joint stance taken by the Council of Australian University Librarians (CAUL), Universities Australia, and Universities New Zealand in their negotiations with academic publishers. “Yet we must go further. It is vital that a diverse publishing ecosystem is able to thrive in the region. We would like to see regional support for Indigenous and researcher-led non-commercial (diamond) publishing platforms. We must continue to strive for a more inclusive, equitable research communication ecosystem that works for all.” |
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| | | | Open Access Australasia new online course now runningOA201 Module 1, The bigger picture for Open Access is now running. It introduces 4 themes that will be traced over 4 modules – bibliodiversity, Indigenous Data Sovereignty and Governance, rights retention and the impact of AI, providing definitions, background and context. The launch event held on August 7th is now available to watch Please note that at this time both OA101 and OA201 are available to Open Access Australasia members only. Access for members is free. Interested in joining OAA? See our member benefits and infographic Our Value and get in touch contact@oaaustralasia.org |
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ALIA and Jumbunna Institute launch a new foundational course |
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This foundational course is a collaboration between ALIA and the Jumbunna Institute for Indigenous Education and Research at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS). It provides library workers with practical knowledge, real-world insights, and valuable resources for professional development. It is designed to help library workers build their understanding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures, histories, and connections to Country—and to embed cultural respect and recognition into everyday practice. |
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Empowering sustainable open infrastructure: Welcoming new SCOSS members for 2024/25 |
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Open Access Australasia’s annual webinar to showcase the SCOSS pledges for 2024/2025 is now available to watch. The four new open science infrastructure partners that will join the SCOSS Family – African Journals Online (AJOL), Episciences, Make Data Count and SciPost – are showcased in this recording. SCOSS are also asking for responses to this short anonymous questionnaire to help them better understand the reasons why people choose to pledge or not pledge their support to new initiatives, so they can improve their approach and better serve the open community. https://bit.ly/SCOSSRound6 |
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NHMRC releases Good institutional practice guide.The Good institutional practice guide brings together information on values, concepts and ideas that underpin a high-quality research culture. Although developed to support institutional and research leaders as they implement positive change, the Guide can be used by anyone involved with the conduct, administration and oversight of research. |
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Submit your feedback to the ARC now.The Australian Research Council (ARC) has announced important updates on its approach to research evaluation and the launch of its Persistent Identifier (PID) Action Plan. The ARC welcomes feedback from the research community and stakeholders to help shape and refine these important initiatives. For more details, please see the ARC’s Research Insights Capability draft and the PID Action Plan. |
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Examining options for enhancing repository infrastructure in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand.Location: Kelvin Grove Campus, Queensland University of Technology – Brisbane. Date: 9.00am – 4pm Friday 17 October 2025. The aim of this meeting – a free satellite event of International Data Week– is to review a variety of models including shared infrastructure for institutional repositories; discuss the potential for this type of approach in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand; and examine the various issues that must be navigated/addressed to move forward. Kathleen Shearer of COAR and Martin Borchert of UNSW/CAUL will facilitate this event hosted by Open Access Australasia, COAR, UNSW and QUT, which will feature speakers from Canada, France, Spain, Japan. |
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AuSCCoP The Australian Scholarly Communications Community of Practice (AuSCCoP) last met on August 14th. The group discussed the ARC’s Research Insights Capability initiative and PID Action Plan, events being planned for OA Week and shared resources on responsible use of AI in scholarly communication. For a summary see the notes. The next meeting will be held on Thursday September 11th. More information and how to join AuSCCoP Diamond Open Access Publishing group. At the last meeting on August 21st the group heard from two OA Journal editors on their experiences, common issues and thoughts around sustainability: Janet Catterall, Editor-in-Chief, Journal of Librarianship and Scholarly Communication and Lauren Halcomb-Smith, Founding Editor, Journal of Belonging, Identity, Language, and Diversity. Summaries can be found in the groups notes. More information about the Diamond Publishing group and how to join. AuSCCoP Repositories group Next meeting is scheduled for Thursday 18th September and the theme is, ‘Bring Out Your Dead”. What is occupying you in regards to your IR? Is it the collections management considerations, or even whether or not the IR will survive? Liz and Keely will lead the discussion, with direct questions to attendees for advice on the questions currently keeping them up at night. More information about the Repository group and how to join. Aotearoa Scholarly Communications CoP Information about all six of the Aotearoa groups can now be found on OAA’s website find out more and sign up for meetings The subgroups will be reporting on their activities to the main CoP later in the year. |
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What’s new in OA & scholarly publishing globally |
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Indian court rules to ban Sci-Hub in India after 5 years A 2020 lawsuit filed by publishers at the High Court in Delhi targeted the infamous shadow library, Sci-Hub. The aim was to have the site blocked by ISPs, which triggered a strong response from academics, scientists, teachers and students, who argued that free access to knowledge is vital in India. Close to five years later, the Court has sided with the publishers. Sci-Hub’s founder informed them via email that the results of blocking may be disappointing. |
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Royal Society sets out plan to move journals to full open access in 2026 through Subscribe to OpenUnder plans agreed in July 2025, libraries subscribed to Royal Society journals will now be asked to support Subscribe to Open in 2026 through their subscriptions. If sufficient libraries continue their subscriptions, the journals will be converted to open access for the year. The ambitious plan would make research papers published in its eight world-class subscription journals; including the world’s oldest peer-reviewed journals, Philosophical Transactions A and B, freely available online and remove fees for authors to publish in them. |
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Open-Access Publishing in a Global ContextThe National Science Foundation’s report presents data on the growth and impact of OA scientific publications worldwide from 2003 to 2022. It highlights a significant rise in “gold” OA articles, which now constitute about 30% of all global scientific publications, with increasing adoption especially in low-income countries. The report also discusses disparities in OA publishing across countries and income groups, the varying impact of different OA types, and emphasizes the ongoing shift in scientific publishing toward greater openness. |
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Unlocking the repository: A strategy for increasing the uptake of green open access.Jayshree Mamtora, Wayne Bradshaw and Tove Lemberget This article uses a recent retroactive open access project undertaken by an Australian university library to reframe attitudes and approaches to author self-archiving. In addition to the view that open access is something to be sought for new research outputs – at the time of publication or immediately after an embargo period – the article proposes an ‘archival’ approach to open access, which treats institutional repositories as historical archives of knowledge to be made freely available to the public through periodic author self-archiving campaigns. |
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As the journal Nature moves to publish peer review reports for accepted papers, Bodo Stern argues in the LSE blog that this partial openness falls short of true transparency in scholarly communication. |
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Evaluating the potential risks of employing large language models in peer reviewLingxuan Zhu, Yancheng Lai, Jiarui Xie, Weiming Mou, Lihaoyun Huang, Chang Qi, Tao Yang, Aimin Jiang, Wenyi Gan, Dongqiang Zeng, Bufu Tang, Mingjia Xiao, Guangdi Chu, Zaoqu Liu, Quan Cheng, Anqi Lin, Peng Luo. This study systematically investigates the potential harms of using LLMs during peer review. It explores how reliance on these AI tools could affect the integrity, quality, and fairness of the peer review process in academic publishing. The study highlights concerns and risks to ensure responsible integration of AI in scholarly evaluation. |
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This webinar from OASPA focuses on quality in open access publishing. What do researchers expect from OA journals and what do OA journals offer? Are there any regional differences in the perception of publication quality? |
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Open Science Talk: A researcher’s perspective.Katie Smart served as a research librarian at UiT The Arctic University of Norway from 2022 to 2025. A geologist with research experience from three countries (Canada, Germany, South Africa), Katie’s role at UiT was as a specialist in open science services. In this episode, she discusses different local and national services for open science that she has been involved in and emphasizes that marketing open science to academia must include the perspective of the target audience: the researchers. |
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Upcoming events in OA & scholarly publishing |
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