Bringing History into the Digital Age: A Case Study of

the Transition of a Journal

Caitlin BakkerWilfrid Laurier Universitycbakker@wlu.ca

Some Background• Part of a much larger project (the

university’s institutional repository—http://scholars.wlu.ca)

• Connections to the V.P. Academic & Provost, the V.P. Research, and the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies

• Since October 1, 2011, 22,500 full-text downloads from 3,083 cities in 150 countries

• Joint initiative of the Library and the University Press

“What distinguishes communication from publication is that publication is created by a whole process of selection, processing, formatting, distribution, institutionalization of forums, recognition and archiving of papers submitted. This is the territory of journals.”

(Boismenu & Beaudry, 2004, p. 9)

Canadian Military History

• A quarterly publication of the Laurier Centre for Military, Strategic and Disarmament Studies

• Editorial board and contributors include some of the foremost scholars in the field

• In print since 1992, no complete electronic edition until this point

• Initial assumptions had been that working with an existing journal would be simpler than launching a new journal (partially true)

• 84% of SSH journals in English are available online

• Approximately 23,700 peer-reviewed journals publishing 1.59 million articles every year

• Enormous public interest in the discipline• But, there is a resistance to electronic

publication based on a perceived lack of quality and recognition

The Central Problem: How do we maintain prestige while broadening

our readership?

SSHRC’s Aid to Scholarly Journals

• Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council program to assist existing journals• Up to $30,000 CAN per journal per annum

• Prerequisites for consideration include:• “Diversity and relevance of the journal’s proposed

strategies for reaching the appropriate readership”• “Nature and extent of the journal’s readership, and the

journal’s efforts to increase or broaden that readership”

• “Impact of the journal’s articles”

Lessons Learned

• Understand the journal’s mandate and motivations• Learn what is not yet in place (by-laws, policies,

agreements)• Leave the “fun stuff” for last• Put it in writing! • By-laws (internal)• Policies (external)

• Expect resistance• Manage expectations

Author Editor Reviewers

Accept

Reject

Aims & scope? Mission statement? Submission

guidelines? Style guide? Conflict of

interest? Simultaneous

submission? CTA? Moral rights?

Selection? Function and responsibility (Recruitment?

Submission? Review?) Managing editor or

editorial teams? Division of duties?

Selection? Recruitment? Guidelines?

Accountability? Conflict of interest?

Timelines?

Revision? Agreement? Page proofs? Timelines?

Complaints? Resubmission?

The Copyright Conundrum

• No author agreements• Economic Rights and

Moral Rights to be considered

• An index for articles from 1992 to 2003, but nothing after

• Little or no contact information for authors

Copyright Transfer Agreements

• A statement of authorship and originality• Indemnification for libelous materials and

assurance that the article contains no violation of any personal or property rights

• Provisions regarding further use, including education use, deposit in IRs or subject repositories, revision and republication

• Author’s rights and responsibilities (page proofs, etc.)

• Moral rights

Key Point: Define your terms!

Gratis

• “Free beer” open access

• Removal of price barriers

• Individuals are free to consume/read as they please

Libre

• “Free speech” open access

• Removal of permissions barriers

• Individuals can consume, but can also revise, reproduce, etc.

Access

• 2-year moving wall• A calculated risk• Risk can be lessened by included copyright

symbols (©) and registering copyright • Considering journal objectives

• Multiple revenue sources considered• Subscription• Advertising• Author pays• Pay-per-view

Creating an e-Readership

• Benefits of working with an established journal• Maintaining prestige rather than building it• Steady stream of submissions

• Extensive scholarly networks of editorial boards

• Large back catalogue• Exposing metadata, even for subscription

materials• Some journals use an incremental

publishing model

The Formula for Success

• A critical mass of high-quality materials• Well-formed metadata and carefully

chosen keywords• A long-term investment of time, energy,

and resources• Sheer luck

Questions? Comments?

Canadian Military History is now electronically available at http://scholars.wlu.ca/cmh

References• Boismenu, G., & Beaudry, G. (2004). Scholarly journals in the

new digital world. Calgary: University of Calgary Press. • Gould, T.H.P. (2011). Protocols and challenges to the creation of

a cross-disciplinary journal. Journal of Scholarly Publishing, 42 (2), 105-141.

• Harris, L.E. (2001). Canadian copyright law. (3rd ed.). Toronto: McGraw-Hill.

• Phillips, A. (2009). Business models in journal publishing. The Future of the Academic Journal. Eds. B. Cope & A. Phillips. Oxford: Chandos. 87-104.

• Solomon, D. (2008). Developing open access journals: A practical guide. Oxford: Chandos.

• Xia, J. (2009). Library publishing as a new model of scholarly communication. Journal of Scholarly Publishing, 40 (4), 370-383.