Here you can find a collection of resources on open access books for librarians, gathered by the Open Access Books Network. We created some of these ourselves, and some were created and shared by other organisations for the benefit of all.
‘Open Access Book Programs: Answering Libraries’ Questions’ by Sharla Lair
This post by Sharla Lair, Senior Strategist of Open Access and Scholarly Communication Initiatives at LYRASIS, addresses two key questions that many in the library community are asking: What are the opportunities to direct funds to make scholarly books OA? And how do libraries evaluate these programs to determine whether library funds should be used to support them? Find out more in Sharla’s post.
This video series seeks to dispel a number of key myths around open access (OA) books. In these short videos, common statements are addressed by fellow community members, informally known as ‘the OA Mythbusters’. Read more about the series.
OAPEN Open Access Books Toolkit
The OAPEN Open Access Books Toolkit aims to help book authors to better understand OA book publishing and to increase trust in OA books. This free and public information resource includes a vast number of short articles on OA book publishing following the research lifecycle, which may be helpful for you and your authors interested in OA book publishing. As of September 2024, the Knowledge Base was added to the Toolkit, in partnership with the PALOMERA project, to support policy development for OA books. Access the Toolkit.
The Open Book Collective (OBC)
The Open Book Collective brings together OA publishers, OA publishing service providers, libraries, and other research institutions to create a new, mutually supportive ecosystem for the thriving of OA book publishing. The Collective is a charity that includes librarians in its governance, and a trusted initiative where libraries can find out more about — and support — open access presses. Find out more about the OBC.
This series is a collection of five talks with humanities scholars from different disciplines about their research and (OA) book project. In this series, they share good practices and innovative ways regarding the writing, production, and technicalities of publishing an OA book. These approaches may be of interest to publishers and their future authors. Access the series.
Open Publishing Associations
There are a number of new national associations that gather together institutional presses who are geared toward OA publishing. Some of the ones the OABN has collaborated with include: the Open Institutional Publishing Association (OIPA) in the UK, the Irish Open Access Publishers (IOAP) in Ireland, the New University Presses (NUPs) in The Netherlands, and AG Universitätsverlage in Germany.
IFLA developed the Open Access vocabulary as an easy-to-reference guide for the most widely used terms and definitions, with reference to official statements or other documents where these terms are defined. Download the guide.