OpenLOCKSS: Information for Open Access
Publishers
Why should I participate in LOCKSS (Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe)?
Open access journals are often small operations, dependant on small
editorial teams based in university departments and/or small societies,
and often with limited resources for archiving and preservation
considerations. As such, much valuable open access content is fragile,
and future availability is a growing concern.
LOCKSS, at no charge to you, addresses the
long term archiving and preservation needs of
your journal content to ensure its continued
access for the scholarly community. The
responsibility for preservation, and its
corresponding costs are borne by libraries in
the LOCKSS programme.
What do I have to do?
Participation in the LOCKSS programme requires minimum input by
publishers. To make titles LOCKSS compliant, you must grant permission
to librarians, to collect, preserve, and provide access to your journal
content, and to the LOCKSS software, to crawl, collect and preserve that
content. The OpenLOCKSS team will provide full support and guidance
throughout the initial set-up process which is often as minor
as adding a single, static HTML page.
What is LOCKSS?
LOCKSS (for "Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe") is a tool developed at
the Stanford University Libraries which provides librarians with an easy
and inexpensive way to collect, store, preserve, and provide access to a
local copy of content. Over 80 libraries and 60 publishers from around
the world are using the software. LOCKSS is supported by the UK higher
education funding councils and the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC).
In the UK 30 libraries are participating in the JISC LOCKSS Pilot
Project.
The OpenLOCKSS project, funded by JISC and led by the University of
Glasgow will negotiate with a number of open access publishers, whose
content has been identified as vital for preservation. The project will
seek permission for the inclusion of their titles in LOCKSS.
Further information:
OpenLOCKSS Team
March 2007 | 
