Envisioning a World Beyond APCs/BPCs Symposium

The University of Kansas Libraries, Open Access Network (a project of K|N Consultants), Allen Press, and SPARC are co-sponsoring an international symposium, “Envisioning a World Beyond APCs/BPCs,” in Lawrence, Kansas, on Thursday and Friday, November 17-18. The symposium will consider current models available for achieving an expansive, inclusive, and balanced worldwide open publishing ecosystem.

The symposium will provide a public, live-streamed session during which internationally respected scholars, publishers, university librarians, and executives from foundations and organizations will address advanced questions and problems in the open access movement. Additional meetings will explore the future of “openness” in scholarly publishing, responding to and furthering discussions from last December’s Berlin 12 Open Access invitational conference, which focused on “flipping” the current subscription model of scholarly publishing to one that provides free access to readers paid for by article-processing charges from authors or their institutions.

Kevin L. Smith, dean of KU Libraries, will moderate the live-streamed conversation on Thursday, November 17, from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. CST. By streaming part of the symposium, the organizers hope to engage a broad international audience in a lively discussion. During the broadcast, panelists will describe their vision for an open access future. Panelists, local respondents, and the global viewing audience will be able to engage together in thought-provoking dialog to address one of the most fundamental questions in the open access movement currently: To what extent can a global academic community create an open access publishing system that is without costs to readers or authors. Watch the livestream and participate via Twitter using #KUOASymp16. For more details, including list of participants, see the symposium website.