New Report From Ithaka S+R: “The Second Digital Transformation of Scholarly Publishing: Strategic Context and Shared Infrastructure”

The Second Digital Transformation of Scholarly Publishing: Strategic Context and Shared Infrastructure was published today (Jan. 29. 2024) by Ithaka S+R.

The report was written by:

• Tracy Bergstrom
• Oya Y. Rieger
• Roger C. Schonfeld

From an Introductory Blog Post:

In a report published today, with funding from STM Solutions and five STM members, we argue that a robust, nimble, and shared infrastructure is imperative to support the vital work of scholarly communication and effectively and efficiently meet the emerging service needs of different stakeholders. In the report, we review several key categories of existing infrastructure, such as identifiers and enterprise publishing systems, and offer recommendations about how they can be improved to address key needs. In addition, we identify several categories where new forms of shared infrastructure should be developed, offering specific recommendations for each, including

• to address the growing atomization of the scholarly article,
• to ensure the trustworthiness of the scholarly record,
• to enable deeper meaning to be drawn from research outputs,
• to address new business models, and
• to provide an alternative system for scholarly communication.

Looking across the gaps that exist today, we observe most are the result of strategic, governance, and business model impediments. In some categories, for example, one group of publishing organizations sees the imperative for shared infrastructure where another group sees the opportunity for competitive differentiation. And there is the ever-present issue of the business model and investment case—who pays, who will pay, and for what—which in turn provides incentives for innovation or inaction. Ultimately, the gaps—and the challenges that cause or exacerbate them—are also opportunities for those prepared to invest in the future of infrastructure to support scholarly communication.

Read the Complete Blog Post

Report Links

Direct to Full Text Report (HTML)

Direct to Full Text Report (47 pages; PDF)

DOI: 10.18665/sr.320210

Filed under: Associations and Organizations, Funding, News, Publishing