Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Open sources for higher education.
Scholarly publications,
course material, academic software
thomas.pfeffer@uni-klu.ac.at
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Aim
• Challenge the misconception, that IT-Innovation
necessarily leads to commercialisation
• Demonstrate, that IT can help to preserve old
and create new public domains
• Disentangle sources (representation of
knowledge) from services (interaction)
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Agenda
• A misconception and its consequences:
IT-innovation = commercialisation?
• 3 examples for (new?) public goods
– Scholarly publications
– Course materials
– Academic software
• Consequences and recommendations
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
A misconception and its consequences: IT
= commercialisation ?
• Assumptions of the “new economy”
– IT might be a lever to ‘industrialise’ the craft of h.e.
– Efficiency gains will translate into huge profits
– Only the most profitable will survive (“dim future for
universities”)
• Consequences
– Investments (and losses) in IT-based for-profit h.e.
– Greed and envy (price-tagging and claims for property rights)
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Scholarly publications (1)
basic characteristics
• Not-for-profit: no direct commercial compensation for
authors and reviewers
• Motive: contribute to scientific debate, gain reputation
and attention
• Open exchange of ideas as the basis for scientific
communication and quality control
• Prices: should cover transaction costs only
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Scholarly publications (1)
market situation
• Publicly funded universities/scholars are both
main producers and main consumers
• Oligopoly of publishers with inelastic demand (no
substitute for specialised journals)
• Rocketing prices for publications (journals: 8.5%
per year) endanger access to a basic resource
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Scholarly publications (3)
IT-based solutions
• Online archives ~ online publications
• ITs reduce transaction costs
• Costs: from consumer to producer
Examples
• Open access journals (BioMed Central, EIoP)
• Open access archives (institutional, thematic e.g. ArXiv)
• Open access projects (OAI, Public Library of Sciences)
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Course material
• Necessary investment for modernisation of h.e.
• New form of scholarly publication (quotations,
reviews, sharing, etc.)
Forms of open access archives
• Single institution (MIT OpenCourseWare)
• Discipline driven (The Harvey Project)
• Institutional network (Merlot.org)
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Academic software
• Examples
– CampusSpource (collection of state funded software, NRW)
– SPARC (coalition of research libraries: open archive
technology)
– Sakai (consortium: learning management, student admin,
web-portal, …)
• Rationales
– Cost containment (no royalties, only maintenance)
– Open Source code: open for critique and improvement
– Development of open standards to facilitate cross-institutional
exchange
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Conclusions & recommendations
• Scholarly publications, course ware and academic
software can be regarded as non-rival, public goods
• Efficiency gains and cost reductions are possible
• Raise awareness for academic sources and the
mechanisms of their maintenance
• Defend the public domain against privatisation
(copyright)
• Shift investments from consumption to production
• Support the development of open archives and open
standards
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
Literatur
Edwards, Richard / Shulenburger, David (2003) The High Cost of Scholarly Journals (And
What To Do About It) In: Change Vol. 35, Nr. 6.
Pfeffer, Thomas (2003) Virtualization of Research Universities. Raising the right questions
to adress key functions of the university. Research & Occasional Paper Series:
CSHE.6.03
ttp://ishi.lib.berkeley.edu/cshe/publications/papers/papers/ROP.Pfeffer.6.03.pdf
Pfeffer, Thomas / Sindler, Alexandra / Kopp, Michael / Pellert, Ada (2003)
Organisationsentwicklungshandbuch Neue Medien in der Lehre. Voraussetzungen und
Beispiele für eLearning an Hochschulen. Im Druck.
Nentwich, Michael (2003) cyberscience. Research in the Age of the Internet. Verlag der
Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (Wien).
Noam, Eli (1995) Electronics and the Dim Future of the University. In: Science, Vol. 270,
pp. 247-249.
http://www.asis.org/annual-96/noam.html
world summit on the information society (2003) Open Access: The Facts.
www.wsis-si.org/oa-facts.html
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna
Hochschulforschung | Higher Education Research
Thomas Pfeffer
URLs
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BioMed Central (http://www.biomedcentral.com/)
EIoP – European Integration online Paper (http://eiop.or.at/eiop/)
OAI - Open Archives Initiative (http://www.openarchives.org/)
PLoS – Public Library of Science (http://www.plos.org/)
MIT OpenCourseWare (ocw.mit.edu/)
The Harvey Project (harveyproject.org, harveyproject.science.wayne.edu/)
MERLOT (www.merlot.org/Home.po)
CampusSource (www.campussource.de)
SPARC (www.arl.org/sparc/home/)
The Sakai Project (http://www.sakaiproject.org/)
Open Knowledge Initiative (web.mit.edu/oki/)
Open Sources in Higher Education
WS Public Higher Education under Pressure, 8.+ 9. July 2004, Vienna