ECS is once again participating in International Open Access Week. It begins on Monday, October 23 and for the week you’ll be able to read and download anything in the ECS Digital Library at no charge. That’s over 132,000 articles and abstracts.

ECS proud to participate in Open Access Week as part of its commitment to Free the Science, an initiative to move toward a future that embraces open science to further advance research in our fields. This is a long-term vision for transformative change in the traditional models of communicating scholarly research. Being open means better collaboration, more impact, and faster progress.

Let your friends and colleagues know what ECS is doing so they too can take advantage of our free research! Discover information in fields like energy technology, communications, transportation, human health and welfare, and the general sustainability of our planet.

PS: If you like what ECS is doing to promote more openness in research communications, please consider supporting Free the Science. Your gift, no matter the size, will help ECS build an example for the world. Donate now!

Five German scientists have stepped down from their editorial positions with Elsevier journals in an effort to push for nationwide open access. This is the latest move in the battle between German open access advocates and the for-profit publisher.

Earlier this year, German libraries, universities, and academic leaders came to the table to support an initiative called Projekt DEAL, aimed at changing the landscape of scholarly publishing by foregoing the subscription-based academic publishing model in lieu of a “publish and read” agreement. Essentially, Projekt DEAL pushes for an agreement where German institutions pay a lump sum that covers publication costs for all papers whose first authors are associated with German institutions, those papers are then published as open access, and in return the institutions receive access to all Elsevier-published journals.

Publishing giant Elsevier has been resistant to the deal, stating that they will continue to publish open access papers if authors or instructions pay the processing charge, but that the institutions should not expect that amount to give them full access to all Elsevier journals.

As Elsevier continues to resist, more German institutions are choosing to not renew subscriptions.

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This Sunday at 2:00 pm ET is ECS OpenCon. We are webcasting it live from the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center in National Harbor, MD.

Go to the ECS YouTube channel on Sunday to watch.

e are bringing together some of the top advocates in open access and open science to explore what next generation research will look like.

ECS OpenCon is a satellite event of the main OpenCon, an international event hosted by the Right to Research Coalition, a student sponsored organization of SPARC, the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition.

ECS is the first scholarly society to host a satellite event.

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Over the summer, librarians and academic leaders in Germany came together to lead a push in taking down the paywalls that block access to so many scientific research articles. The initiative, named Projekt DEAL, represents a bold push toward open access that could change the landscape of academic publishing.

The latest developments in Projekt DEAL pick up on a battle now over two years in the making, where libraries and universities in Germany have united in pushing large publishers to adopt a new business model. The institutions are looking to forego the typical subscription-based academic publishing business model in lieu of paying an annual lump sum that covers publications costs of all papers whose first authors are associated with German institutions.

The concept behind Projekt DEAL is relatively straight forward: multiply the number of papers with first authors associated with German institutions by a reasonable fee per paper. The institutions would pay that amount and those papers would then be published open access, available to everyone around the world, in exchange for free access to all of the publisher’s online content for the German institutions. This would not only mark a huge step in the open access movement, but would alleviate some of the financial burden facing libraries paying for high-cost journal subscriptions.

But this push isn’t the first of its kind. According to reports from Science, institutions from the Netherlands, Finland, Austria, and United Kingdom have all worked for similar agreements. The results, however, have been less than the libraries and universities had hoped for.

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Image: CC0 Public Domain

Founder of the highly controversial Sci-Hub, Alexandra Elbakyan, has recently pulled access to the research pirate site in Russia. After criticism from Russian scientists, Elbakayan finally pulled the plug on Russia’s access to Sci-Hub after researchers named a new parasitic insect after her.

The so-called “Pirate Bay of science” made its mark in 2011 when Kazakhstan hacked into hundreds of scholarly journals, leaking million documents and illegally allowing the public to freely access scientific papers.

Previously, Elbakyan referred to the internet as a “global brain,” stating that paywalls should not exist in order to provide a free flow of content that can help build society. Now, she has described recent attacks on her as an “extreme injustice,” saying: “If you analyze the situation with scientific publications, the real parasites are scientific publishers, and Sci-Hub, on the contrary, fights for equal access to scientific information.”

This is not the first to Sci-Hub has come under attack. In June 2017, publishing giant Elsevier won a legal judgement against sites like Sci-Hub, awarding the publisher $15 million in damages for copyright infringement. The site is also facing legal action from the American Chemical Society.

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On October 4, during the Society’s 232nd meeting, ECS will be hosting its first ever ECS Data Sciences Hack Day. This event will be ECS’s first foray into building an electrochemical data sciences and open source community from the ground up.

On this episode of the ECS Podcast, we discuss the upcoming ECS Data Sciences Hack Day, the importance of dataset sharing, how open source software can transform the field, and the future of open science.

This episode’s guests include Daniel Schwartz, Boeing-Sutter Professor of Chemical Engineering and Director of the Clean Energy Institute at the University of Washington; David Beck, Director of Research with the eSciences Institute at the University of Washington; and Matthew Murbach, president of the University of Washington ECS Student Chapter.

Schwartz, Beck, and Murbach will be at the 232nd ECS Meeting this fall in National Harbor, Maryland participating in OpenCon and running the ECS Hack Day. There’s still time to register for both of these events.

Listen to the podcast and download this episode and others for free on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, Podbean, or our RSS Feed. You can also find us on Stitcher and Acast.

Q&A series with ECS OpenCon 2017 speakers

Dan Schwartz, Boeing-Sutter Professor and director of the Clean Energy Institute at the University of Washington

ECS will be hosting its first ever OpenCon event on October 1 in National Harbor, MD. OpenCon will be ECS’s first, large community event aimed at creating a culture of change in how research is designed, shared, discussed, and disseminated, with the ultimate goal of making scientific progress faster.

During ECS’s Open Con, Dan Schwartz, director of the Clean Energy Institute at the University of Washington, will give a talk on the open science movement and academia. In addition to speaking at OpenCon, Schwartz will also co-organize the ECS Data Sciences Hack Day.

The following conversation is part of a series with speakers from the upcoming ECS OpenCon. Read the rest of the series.

ECS: When we say “data sciences,” what does this encompass?

Dan Schwartz: “Data science” is shorthand for the scientific and engineering principles that underpin efficient creation, visualization, analysis, and sharing of data. I have a conjecture—unevaluated but euphemistically called “Schwartz’s law” around here—that every PhD I graduate produce more data than the sum of all prior PhDs. Basically, each year cameras and detectors have deeper bit depth, equipment and software get more automated, more of the software tools allow data and simulation to be animated, etc. In short, both experimentalists and simulation people are seeing huge growth in data they need to analyze, visualize, and share with collaborators.

ECS: Specifically, what areas of electrochemistry and/or solid state science can most benefit from the various components of data sciences, such as open data, open source software and cloud-based computing tools, etc.?

DS: I believe we can accelerate progress and improve reproducibility of all ECS science and technology through open data, open software, and access to shared computational resources. A critical part of this is building the ECS community that establishes standards for data repositories, creates, peer evaluates, and improves software tools.

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In May 2017, we sat down with ECS journal editors Robert Savinell and Dennis Hess at the 231st ECS Meeting to discuss the future of scholarly publishing, open access, and the Society’s Free the Science initiative. The conversation was led by Rob Gerth, director of marketing and communications at ECS.

In 1978, Savinell became an active member of ECS, serving as an associate editor for the Journal of The Electrochemical Society (JES) in 1984. He was appointed editor of JES in 2013, where he began focusing on continuing the tradition of rigorous review, enhancing timeliness of decision and publication, while transitioning JES to full open access. Savinell has recently been reappointed as editor JES for a three-year period, from May 18, 2017 through May 17, 2020.

Hess became a member of ECS in 1974. He has been active in both the ECS Dielectric Science and Technology and Division and ECS Electronics Division, serving as a divisional editor from 1978 through 1990. Currently, Hess is the editor of the ECS Journal of Solid State Science and Technology.

Listen to the podcast and download this episode and others for free through the iTunes Store, SoundCloud, or our RSS Feed. You can also find us on Stitcher.

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By: Kevin Smith, In the Open

Recently there has been a spate of comment expressing frustration about the allegedly slow progress of open access, and especially Green open access. It is hard to disagree with some of this sentiment, but it is important that frustration not lead us into trying to solve a problem with a worse solution. The key, I believe, to making real advances in open access is to walk away from the commercial publishers who have dominated the market for scholarship. Only if we do that can libraries free up money from our collection budgets to do truly new things. A new business model with the same old players, even if it were possible, would be a mistake.

The most articulate call for an open access future for scholarship – the Budapest Open Access Initiative — was issued fifteen years ago, in February 2002. There is no one better qualified to speak about the meaning of that declaration today than Professor Jean-Claude Guédon, who signed the original Budapest statement and last month published a brilliant and compelling article about where we are and where we need to go next in the movement toward open access scholarship.

Guédon covers a lot of ground in his article “Open Access: Toward the Internet of the Mind.” I want to focus on two points, one I think of as a warning and the other a signpost.

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By: Elizabeth Gilbert, The Medical University of South Carolina and Katie Corker, Grand Valley State University

What is “open science”?

Open science is a set of practices designed to make scientific processes and results more transparent and accessible to people outside the research team. It includes making complete research materials, data and lab procedures freely available online to anyone. Many scientists are also proponents of open access, a parallel movement involving making research articles available to read without a subscription or access fee.

Why are researchers interested in open science? What problems does it aim to address?

Recent research finds that many published scientific findings might not be reliable. For example, researchers have reported being able to replicate only 40 percent or less of cancer biology results, and a large-scale attempt to replicate 100 recent psychology studies successfully reproduced fewer than half of the original results.

This has come to be called a “reproducibility crisis.” It’s pushed many scientists to look for ways to improve their research practices and increase study reliability. Practicing open science is one way to do so. When scientists share their underlying materials and data, other scientists can more easily evaluate and attempt to replicate them.

Also, open science can help speed scientific discovery. When scientists share their materials and data, others can use and analyze them in new ways, potentially leading to new discoveries. Some journals are specifically dedicated to publishing data sets for reuse (Scientific Data; Journal of Open Psychology Data). A paper in the latter has already been cited 17 times in under three years – nearly all these citations represent new discoveries, sometimes on topics unrelated to the original research.

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