Archiv

• [NEWS] Max Planck Society and Brill reach agreement for open access books and chapters

  The Max Planck Society and Brill have established a new collaboration on Open Access for books. Within this new agreement, Brill offers a discount on the book and chapter publication charge for all affiliates of the Max Planck Institutes. Coordinated by the Max Planck Digital Library, 50% of the book or chapter publication charge is funded centrally. The other 50% of the Open Access costs are funded by the applicable Max Planck Institute.

  This extensive agreement covers not only monographs and edited volumes, but also individual chapters from Max Planck-affiliated authors to any Brill volume. All 86 Max Planck Institutes are eligible, and the agreement runs for three years, until October 2025.

  Dr. Ralf Schimmer, Head of Information at the Max Planck Digital Library, comments: “With this agreement we respond to the articulated demands of our researchers and offer a new opportunity to publish their research results in Open Access. We acknowledge the commitment of Brill to finding pathways to more openness in the system and are very pleased to collaborate with this distinguished publisher.” 

  Read the full announcement

  Information for authors

• [NEWS] 5th bloxberg Summit

  The fifth bloxberg summit took place as a hybrid conference in Protaras, Cyprus, from October 26-27. This time the annual Consortium meeting was organized for the fifth time in a row by the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) in collaboration with the University of Nicosia, one of the bloxberg founders. The meeting was hosted at the Sunrise Pearl Hotel by the University of Nicosia. At this bloxberg summit, the decision on founding the bloxberg Association for the Advancement of Science and Blockchain e.V. under German legislation was finalized. The Association has been established with an in-person signing ceremony by 13 founding members with eleven research organizations and two individual members. Please see the press release for more information on the summit.

  

  We are looking forward to the next summit! This time the summit is going to be hosted in Belgrade, Serbia, by the Faculty of Organizational Sciences of the University of Belgrade, a founding member of bloxberg.

  For more info:

  Press Release Fourth bloxberg Summit

  bloxberg

   

• [NEWS] Neues Plakat zu MPDL-Services im Forschungsdatenmanagement

  Wir freuen uns mitteilen zu dürfen, dass es zu den MPDL-Services im Forschungsdatenmanagement ein neues Poster gibt. Es bietet einen Überblick zu den unterschiedlichen Angeboten und Diensten, welche die Max Planck Digital Library den Kollegen und Kolleginnen der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft und ihren Kollaborationspartnern zur Verfügung stellt. Zentral sind dabei acht Services, die auf dem Plakat samt Serviceadressen kurz vorgestellt werden. Das Poster kann in Druckqualität online abgerufen werden. Falls Sie für Ihr Max-Planck-Institut eine gedruckte Version möchten, wenden Sie sich bitte an unseren RDM-Support.

  Weitere Infos:

  RDM Plakat

  RDM Website

  Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!

• [NEWS] New bloxberg Homepage!

  As part and initiator of the bloxberg blockchain – the consortium for the advancement of science and blockchain – we are happy to announce the brand new bloxberg homepage!

  With the consortium growing steadily for four years, the new bloxberg homepage is not only getting a fresh look and update but also many new features. Learn about bloxberg’s mission, check out all Consortium members on an interactive world map, discover the developer’s hut and get to know all scientific bloxberg applications that can help ease researchers' daily work.

  More info:
  bloxberg

  

• [NEWS] Der Servicekatalog wird zum Research Service Catalog!

  Der MPDL Servicekatalog hat ein neues Facelift bekommen. Es ist nun möglich, in drei Kategorien zu filtern: Publishing & Reading, Software & Data Services, und Strategic Services. Neue Servicekacheln und neue Texte geben schnell Auskunft darüber, wie der Service den täglichen Workflow erleichtert und bei der Forschung unterstützt. Die neue Struktur vereinfacht die Navigation durch die zahlreichen Dienste der MPDL. Die Inhalte reichen von wissenschaftlichen Datenbanken sowie einer Fülle von Open-Access-Publikationsdiensten bis hin zu einer Blockchain für die Wissenschaft. Der neue Katalog ist ab sofort verfügbar! Hier geht es zum neuen Research Service Catalog.

  Bei Fragen steht unser MPG-City-Service unter der Hotline +49 (0) 89 909311-243 (Montag bis Freitag 7:00-19:00 Uhr) oder unter der E-Mail Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein! zur Verfügung.

   

  Weitere Infos:

  Research Service Catalog

• [NEWS] Minerva Messenger Upgrade with Brand New Features!

  Our Minerva Messenger aims to provide a great user experience, so the newest server upgrade comes with new functionalities such as voice calling and screen sharing. These share functions make communication in channels more accessible and efficient – with a click of a button, you can join up to three participants in a voice call.
  Another available feature is Insights, offering an overview of the most important activities within your Minerva Messenger workspace. Additionally, a message formatting toolbar has been implemented, allowing you to change text appearance, react with emojis and add hyperlinks. Collapsed reply threads to keep your conversations organized are finally available.
  The upgrade also fixed minor security level bugs and functionality placements.

  More Info:

  Minerva Messenger Upgrade Details

• [NEWS] RDMO-Service: Horizon Europe-DMP-Template verfügbar

  Datenmanagement wird für Drittmittelanträge zunehmend wichtiger. Besonders auf europäischer Ebene steigen hierfür die Anforderungen. Um hierbei zu unterstützen, stellt der MPDL-Service RDMO for MPG einen Fragenkatalog zum Datenmanagement für Horizon Europe zur Verfügung.

  Über diesen Katalog lässt sich das Datenmanagement für Horizon Europe-Projekte und ERC-Grants organisieren. Damit können beispielsweise Datenmanagementpläne (DMP) erstellt werden. Ebenso kann am datenspezifischen Projektmanagement kollaborativ gearbeitet werden.

  Weitere Infos:

  RDMO for MPG

  Für weiteren Fragen oder Onboarding-Services wenden Sie sich bitte an unser Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!.

• New Preview Features for Edmond

  Edmond now offers new preview features for different file formats. All file types, without any restriction, can be published with Edmond, the Open Data Repository for the Max Planck Society. In order to view the content of individual files more quickly, different previews are now available directly on Edmond’s user interface.

  With the brand new ZIP previewer, Edmond now automatically displays the folder structure including files of a ZIP archive. At the same time, individual files can also be downloaded from the ZIP archive, so that it is no longer necessary to download the entire ZIP file. This gives users a quicker insight into the published research data.

  Furthermore, Edmond now also supports the preview of several individual file formats in the browser. This preview applies especially to various text and image formats, pdf files but also audiovisual formats (MP3 & MP4).

  More info:

  Edmond Repository

  For more information, please contact the Edmond support team via Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!

• Minerva Messenger now has an End-to-End Encryption (E2EE) Plugin

  This new plugin enables end-to-end encryption (E2EE) in Minerva Messenger, aiming to authenticate, encrypt, and decrypt messages on the users’ configured devices.

  Have you been looking for a safe way to communicate important matters, data, or research findings with your peers and external collaboration partners, without possibly disclosing information? Then this new plugin may be just the thing you were looking for. End-to-end encryption (E2EE) is a method of secure communication that keeps your data safe while it is being transferred from one end system or device to another.

  The encrypted message can only be read on one platform after setting the current channel in encryption mode. For instance, if you start the E2EE on the Minerva Messenger, desktop client, you will not be able to read old encrypted messages via browser. Therefore, this end-to-end plugin could be sufficient for the needs of the lab work in which several team members may use a shared device. While chatting with the private key on your personal device, other users will not be able to read your old messages from a public laptop. 

  More info:

  Minerva Messenger End-to-End Encryption (E2EE) Plugin

• 4th bloxberg Summit 2022

  The fourth bloxberg Summit took place as a hybrid conference on Mai 3 – 4, 2022, at the LABS workspace at 90 High Holborn building in London. The bloxberg Summit is the annual meeting of the bloxberg Consortium, organized for the fourth time in a row by the MPDL and was hosted by UCL this time.
  The bloxberg Consortium discussed four main proposals, which led to groundbreaking changes for the research network. These significant decisions revolved around its legal entity, governance model, tokenomics, and the architecture of the bloxberg infrastructure. Please see the press release for more information on the Summit.

  

  It has been an exceptional event with fruitful discussions in the center of London with over 25 research organizations from all over the world.
  We are excited for the next Summit, which will be taking place October 26-27, 2022. This time the Summit is going to be hosted in Protaras, Cyprus, by the University of Nicosia, a founding member of bloxberg.

  

  For more info:

  Press Release Fourth bloxberg Summit

  bloxberg

• Max Planck Society signs open access book deal with Springer Nature

  Springer Nature has signed its largest institutional OA book deal with the Max Planck Society through the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL). The agreement covers all Springer Nature book imprints, across a broad range of disciplines, providing OA funding to affiliated authors from over 80 Max Planck Institutes. 

  The initial three-year agreement, live as of 1st January 2022, will enable authors from all 86 Max Planck Institutes to receive a discount on the standard Book Publishing Charge (BPC) to publish their book OA. MPDL will contribute central funding toward the coverage of the discounted BPC, lowering the costs for authors even further. The discount and funding will be available across all of the publisher's book imprints, under a CC BY licence, ensuring their work is freely accessible and discoverable to all communities across science, technology, medicine, the humanities and social sciences. They will be available to readers around the world via Springer Nature's content platform SpringerLink. 

  Ralf Schimmer, Head of Information at the MPDL, commented:

  “In establishing this new agreement with Springer Nature, we further advance one of our core missions - to support our authors in the dissemination of their research beyond the restrictions of paywalls. By covering a significant share of the open access book publication costs, we are enabling more of our authors to publish their work openly, increasing readership and impact, in particular for those disciplines where books play a crucial role in the scholarly communication process.”

  Read the full announcement

  Information for authors

• MPDL unterstützt die Peer Community In (PCI) Initiative

  Auf Initiative mehrerer Max-Planck-Institute unterstützt die MPDL die „Peer Community in Registered Reports“ mit einer Einmalzahlung über 5.000 Euro für die Weiterentwicklung der Plattform.

  Die Peer Community In (PCI) Initiative ist eine nicht kommerzielle Plattform für die kostenlose Veröffentlichung von Preprints für den Peer-Review. Die Plattform wird von Forschenden betrieben, deren Ziel es ist, über den gegenseitigen Review und Empfehlungen jeweils eine fachspezifische Community zu bilden. PCI stellt dafür die Infrastruktur zur Verfügung, die von den einzelnen Communities betrieben werden. Peer Community in Registered Reports (PCI RR) ist eine neue Plattform, auf der Registered Reports aus den Bereichen Medizin, Gesellschafts- und Geisteswissenschaften bearbeitet werden.

  RRs sind eine Form von empirischen Artikeln, bei denen Studienvorschläge von Fachkollegen geprüft und vorab angenommen werden, bevor der Forschungsprozess durchgeführt wird. Da die Entscheidung, welche Artikel veröffentlicht werden, auf der Grundlage der Fragestellung und der vorgeschlagenen Methoden getroffen wird, bieten RRs eine Lösung für eine Reihe von Verzerrungen in der Forschung, einschließlich Publikations- und Berichtsverzerrungen.

  Weitere Infos:

  PCI Initiative

  PCI Registered Reports

  PCI YouTube Channel

   

• MPDL unterstützt PsyArXiv

  Auf Initiative mehrerer Max-Planck-Institute unterstützt die Max Planck Digital Library den Preprint-Server PsyArXiv über einen Zeitraum von zunächst drei Jahren mit einer jährlichen Zahlung von 1.000 USD. PsyArXiv ist ein nicht-kommerzieller Preprint-Server für alle psychologischen Disziplinen und der für eine wachsende Zahl von Forschenden in der MPG ein wichtiges Werkzeug für die Vorabveröffentlichung von Forschungsarbeiten ist und daher vielfach genutzt und geschätzt wird.

  Mehr informationen zu PsyArXiv hier.

• Max Planck Society and IOP Publishing strike a new unlimited open access agreement

  The Max Planck Society and IOP Publishing (IOPP) have established a new, unlimited, transformative open access (OA) agreement. The three-year agreement lifts all limitations for Max Planck authors, enabling them to publish all of their articles accepted for publication in IOPP’s full portfolio of 18 fully OA journals and 56 hybrid OA titles openly, with no author-facing article-processing charges.

  Thanks to this agreement, the new research produced by the Society's scientists, selected and peer reviewed in IOPP journals will be freely and immediately accessible to scholars everywhere.

  The new agreement makes it easier for Max Planck authors to publish open access, as the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) covers OA publishing fees centrally, omitting the need for authors to validate the availability of OA publishing funds. Additionally, the new agreement extends all previous reading rights to IOPP journal content.

  Julian Wilson, Sales and Marketing Director at IOP Publishing says: “Continuing our valued partnership with the Max Plank Society supports our vision of making universal access to physics research a reality. We know that these agreements encourage greater uptake of OA publication. In fact, in 2021, 65% of research from authors affiliated with the Max Planck Society was published OA with us. We now have transformative agreements with 242 institutions in 14 countries and see them as key to accelerating the open access transition. We will continue to proactively secure these agreements in an inclusive and equitable way.”

  Ralf Schimmer, Head of Information and Deputy Director of MPDL says: “IOPP is one of the ten most relevant publishers for Max Planck scientists, in terms of where they choose to publish their articles. Through this new agreement, the Max Planck Society can provide  authors with the opportunity to reach the broadest possible readership for their articles and fully implement its OA2020 strategy, repurposing former subscription fees to support open access publishing, thereby contributing to the broader open access transition in scholarly communication.”

  Read the full announcement 

• Open Access ermöglichen! Praxisleitfaden erschienen

  Bibliotheken habe eine zentrale Rolle in der Open Access-Transformation. Vor allem die Erwerbungsabteilungen der wissenschaftlichen Bibliotheken stehen dabei vor einigen Herausforderungen: Budgets sollen so geplant werden, dass sie die Open Access-Publikationskosten der Einrichtung möglichst umfassend decken. Dabei gilt es abzuschätzen, wie sich das Publikationsaufkommen einer Einrichtung entwickelt und welche Kosten außerhalb der Bibliothek für das wissenschaftliche Publizieren anfallen. Verlage und Konsortien bieten neue Vertragsmodelle an, die bewertet werden müssen und viele der gewohnten Geschäftsgänge verändern sich oder müssen erst neu etabliert werden.

  Im Nachgang zu einem Webinar zum Thema Transformation und Erwerbung, das die MPDL Services gGmbH in 2021 in der Reihe der DEAL Praxis-Webinare organisiert hatte, haben sich sechs interessierte Bibliothekar*innen aus unterschiedlichen Einrichtungen zusammengetan, um das vorhandene Fachwissen zum Thema zusammenzutragen und systematisch aufzuarbeiten. Die MPDL war mit Kai Geschuhn als eine der beiden Hauptautorinnen federführend an der Erarbeitung des 50 Seiten umfassenden Praxisleitfaden „Open Access ermöglichen“ beteiligt, der jetzt – natürlich Open Access unter einer CC-BY-Lizenz – veröffentlicht wurde. Das Autor*innen-Team möchte mit dem Leitfaden einen praxisorientierten Beitrag zur aktuellen Diskussion um die Open Access-Transformation liefern, die eigenen Erfahrungen mit Fachkolleg*innen teilen, und die Bibliotheksgemeinschaft dazu einladen, das gemeinsame Fachwissen kontinuierlich zu erweitern.

  Link zur Veröffentlichung: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6090208

• Minerva Messenger: New Features & New Knowledge Base

  It’s that time again: our messaging service Minerva Messenger has new exciting features you shouldn’t miss!
  Next to upgraded integrations, we are presenting you new features like Boards, which is a project management tool that will help you track and manage your work across teams. In addition, with Playbooks, we are happy to present you with a feature you can use for staying in command with integrated communication, collaboration, and status dashboards to manage your entire workflow lifecycle. Last but not least, we made some cosmetic changes: You can now adjust a new & improved user interface to your personal preference.

  Go here and check out our new Knowledge Base for more detailed information. You can learn more about Minerva Messenger or get in touch with us and submit your request via the new platform! We are looking forward to chatting with you on Minerva Messenger!

  

• Major Edmond update: new interface, new features and many more!

  Edmond – the Open Research Data Repository of the Max Planck Society has received a major update. We have replaced the old software solution of Edmond with the Dataverse software.

  Dataverse is an open-source software, which is driven by a worldwide community and was initiated at Harvard University. Thanks to this new software and functions, Edmond has to offer many new features. Some of them include:

  • A single-sign-on (SSO) for all Max Planck employees – available now
  • There is no storage quota for users anymore
  • The upload of huge single file sizes is possible
  • A new user interface makes working with Edmond even more comfortable
  • With DOI, ORCID, and ROR three different types of identifiers are available
  • Other possibilities like versioning of datasets or private URLs to unpublished datasets help to address the different needs of the Max Planck community

  Virtual Tutorials

  To introduce the new features of Edmond we will offer two virtual tutorials of 30 minutes with a short presentation, a live demonstration, and questions & answers. Join us on:

  March 23, 2022 | 2pm CET | Language: English

  March 24, 2022 | 11am CET | Language: German

  Register now on the RDM Website.

  You can find more info on Edmond here.

  

• Migrate your Slack Channels to Minerva Messenger & keep all your data!

  MPG researchers now can migrate their Slack channels with all the existing data to Minerva Messenger.
  Have you been looking for a safe way to communicate with your peers and external collaboration partners, but you want to keep all the info you already exchanged on Slack? Then become part of the Minerva Messenger community and join the already migrated teams. Minerva Messenger is provided & maintained by the MPDL, which means all your data is safe within our secure MPG infrastructure.

  Migrate your Slack channels now and keep all your existing data! You only need to follow a few steps for a customized migration. Our Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein! will take care of everything else. We are at your side - every step of the way!

  For more info please check out our FAQ or just drop us an Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!. We are looking forward to chatting with you on Minerva Messenger!

• CfP for the Hybrid Workshop: Future Opportunities for Software in Research

  We are very pleased to announce our Hybrid Workshop “Future Opportunities for Software in Research”, taking place on May 12-13, 2022. We are now welcoming workshop contributions on the topic of “Future Opportunities for Software in Research”. Software literacy has become a key competence for scientists across all disciplines. Scientists use software every day, and software development is becoming an increasingly important component of scientific productivity. However, the software needed for certain research projects can get highly complex and take up resources otherwise needed for core research. In the demanded professionalization of software development in research, specialized Research Software Engineers have emerged in recent years. With their help, researchers tackle the challenges in the areas of software and data, such as reproducibility, correctness, user-friendliness, performance, or maintenance.

  Our two-day workshop provides new opportunities to learn about best practices in scientific software development, like:

  • Seeing recent flagship projects in action.
  • Discussing software licensing and intellectual property issues.
  • Discovering new ways to make your software known and recognized.

  Themes and types of contribution

  We are looking for prime examples where software-enabled research (day 1) and working practices in research software engineering (day 2).

  Who should submit?

  We welcome submissions from any people who have an interesting take on research software development, especially:

  • Researchers at any career stage who develop software for research purposes
  • Software developers working in a research context, whatever their job title or field, maybe
  • Those interested in advancing the understanding of how best to use and maintain research software, e.g. concerning openness, reproducibility, sustainability, scalability, or performance
  • Organizations providing tools, platforms, or services that foster research software, such as IT infrastructure providers or computing and data centers.

  The deadline for CfP submissions is February 28, 2022. Talks may have a length of 15-30 mins. + variable time for Q&A and discussion. If your talk is accepted, you will be notified about the talk length by the session chair.

  We would like to cordially invite all interested scientists, research software engineers, IT and computing specialists, and individuals involved in creating, using, or otherwise dealing with research software in the Max Planck Society. We also welcome participants from other research institutions.

  The workshop will be held in hybrid form, so you will be able to connect remotely or come to the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology in Plön.

   

  Organization Team

   

  Holger Dinkel (Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics)

  Conrad Droste (Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology)

  Carsten Fortmann-Grote (Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology)

  Michael Franke (Max Planck Digital Library)

  Maximilian Funk (General Headquarter of the Max Planck Society)

  Yves Vincent Grossmann (Max Planck Digital Library)

  Stephan Janosch (Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics)

  Sven Willner (Max Planck Institute for Meteorology)

   

  You can reach the organizers via Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!.

  You can find info about the event is on the website.

   

  

• Minerva Messenger Plugin Release & Update January 2022

  We are happy to inform you about the newest update of our messaging service – Minerva Messenger. The Minerva Messenger (based on Mattermost) brings all MPG communication together, making it searchable, accessible & easy to use – anywhere. That is why we are constantly keen on providing you with new updates and ensuring all functionalities are working well.

  The Minerva Messenger January 2022 update entails the following integrations and upgrades:

  • GitLab Plugin Release
    Accessing your GWDG GitLab account from inside Minerva Messenger is possible now. With this plugin, you can receive updates on GWDG GitLab repositories and manage the issues directly in Minerva Messenger.
  • BigBlueButton (GWDG Meet integration) upgrade to v4.3.0
    Improved join meeting UX and optimized the UI in dark theme. Added max length limit on the external user name. Fixed a bug where meetings with no recording were polled forever. Now only the creator of the meeting can end the conference.
  • Server upgrade to v5.37.5
    Fixed the issue that OpenID redirect did not work when hosting Mattermost on a subdirectory. Fixed the issue that v5.37 reported an incorrect mmctl version.

  You can find additional details in our Minerva Messenger Knowledge Base.

  If you are not on Minerva Messenger yet, check it out here.

  

• LabCam is now KEEPER Cam!

  With the new KEEPER Cam, you have the same functionalities as LabCam while storing all your taken photos directly on KEEPER, even offline. Do you find something interesting at a conference or exhibition? Do you want to record your experiment in real-time? Or you would like to share precious moments with your colleagues? This is made possible with KEEPER Cam, which is an office application to associate the camera of your mobile devices with your cloud storage space in your KEEPER account. In addition, the OCR function makes it easy to extract and store the full text from photos, which significantly improves your work efficiency. 

  An upgrade and new features will be available soon!

  KEEPER Cam is available in Google Play, Apple App Store, and mPad Store – check it out and make your daily work routine easier!

  

• New ESAC Resources on Transformative Agreements

  Whether assessing a publisher “read and publish” offer for the first time or developing a strategic plan to navigate the open access transition, adapting to the evolution of scholarly publishing is a challenge that librarians everywhere are facing. Some first movers have already worked through the transition locally and are looking at what comes after their transformative agreement phase, while many others are just starting out on their transformation pathway.

  To support the global library and library consortium community in this process, the ESAC Initiative - an initiative coordinated by the Max Planck Digital Library - has introduced three incredibly rich and authoritative resources, fruit of dedicated efforts by members the international ESAC community that have accumulated first-hand experience and deep knowledge of the strategic and operational aspects of negotiating and implementing transformative and central open access publishing agreements.

  Read more here.

   

  ABOUT THE ESAC INITIATIVE

  ESAC is coordinated by the Max Planck Digital Library, in consultation an international advisory group comprised of library and consortium leaders with deep knowledge of the operational aspects of negotiating and implementing transformative and central open access publishing agreements with scholarly publishers. The ESAC community includes library practitioners who collaborate to produce open resources and who exchange experiences and insights via mentorship, dedicated working groups and other activities focusing on open access author and library workflows, data gathering and analytics, agreement terms, and stakeholder engagement.

• New Service Alert: RDMO for MPG!

  We are pleased to announce a new service: RDMO for MPG – a tool to support the planning, implementation, and organization of research data management. The Research Data Management Organizer (RDMO) is a free service of the Max Planck Digital Library for all MPG researchers and staff. The software allows its users to create and write data management plans for various funding organizations.  It also provides the ability to cooperate on plans with a team, providing an overview of your project's work progress. The plans can be updated throughout the various project phases and forwarded to funding bodies. Additionally, RDMO grants an export of your project plans, creating snapshots of your work and assigning roles to project members.

  The web-based software is open source (https://rdmorganiser.github.io).

  For more info, visit the RDMO website.

  If you have more questions check out the FAQ.

• Max Planck Digital Library and Microbiology Society sign transformative agreement

  The Microbiology Society and the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) have announced a three-year transformative agreement starting in 2022. The Publish and Read model will enable researchers of 86 Max Planck Institutes in Germany to publish any article accepted for publication in the journals of the Society open access, without having to pay Article Processing Charges (APCs). Through the agreement, MPDL will cover costs of open access publishing of articles in both fully open access and hybrid journals, allowing scientists to retain copyright and secure the broadest possible readership for their work.

  Read the full press release

• 15th Berlin Open Access Conference: Adapt and Advance

  Nearly 400 participants, representing hundreds of institutions and consortia from around the world, came together for the 15th Berlin Open Access Conference (B15) to discuss the ongoing transition of the scholarly publishing system to open access. Co-hosted by the University of California and the Open Access 2020 Initiative of the Max Planck Digital Library/Max Planck Society, the online conference placed particular emphasis on negotiation processes with publishers.

  In the two and a half years since the community came together at B14, negotiations of transformative agreements have advanced worldwide, demonstrating growing support for leveraging publisher agreements to accelerate the industry’s transition to open access.

  Under the theme “Adapt and Advance”, B15 shed light on the ways negotiating teams around the world are adapting to the changing landscape of scholarly publishing, refining their principles and objectives, and setting new agreement benchmarks, while also acknowledging different local contexts and current financial realities, and the need for greater transparency and sustainability in these transitional frameworks.

  The conference took place from 28 September to 1 October 2021. Further details, recordings and reports of the 15th Berlin Open Access Conference are now available. 

  B15 Conference webpage

  Read the full press release

• Kooperationsjubiläum zwischen Labforward und der Max Planck Digital Library

  Die Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) freut sich sehr über die seit fünf Jahren erfolgreich bestehende Kooperation mit Labforward!

  Im Oktober 2016 gewann die MPDL das damalige Berliner Startup Labfolder, das mittlerweile unter Labforward GmbH bekannt ist, als Lizenzpartner. Das Produkt „Labfolder“ wird als Electronic Laboratory Notebook (ELN) und Laborinformationssystem (LIMS) von mehr als 1.000 der weltweit führenden Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft für die Arbeit im Labor genutzt. Das ELN unterstützt sie dabei, ihre Forschungsarbeiten schnell und strukturiert durchzuführen sowie Ergebnisse im Sinne der guten wissenschaftlichen Praxis zu dokumentieren.

  Labfolder wird seit fünf Jahren von der MPDL allen Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftlern der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft für ihre tägliche Arbeit zur Verfügung gestellt. Das ELN hilft Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler aus unterschiedlichen Sektionen bei ihrer täglichen Forschungsarbeit in einem Großteil der 86 Max-Planck-Institute.

  Wir freuen uns daher, die zentrale Lizenzierung für „Labfolder“ zu verlängern, um den Service auch weiterhin für Forschende der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft zur Verfügung zu stellen. Die MPDL bedankt sich für die bisherige Zusammenarbeit und blickt auf die nächsten Jahre des gemeinsamen Wachstums.

  Weitere Infos:
  Labforward
  Labfolder for Max Planck Researchers

   

   

• bloxberg Summit 2021

  The bloxberg Summit 2021 took place as a  hybrid conference on September 29 – October 1, 2021, at the MPG’s Harnack House in Berlin, as well as online. The bloxberg Summit is the annual meeting of the bloxberg Consortium. It has been organized by the MPDL for the third time in a row to discuss current topics and decide the further proceedings of the bloxberg initiative.

  The third Summit focused on building Consortium Synergies and deepen cooperation between all participating parties from over 40 different universities worldwide. The Summit emphasized discussions and consisted of presentations of the current bloxberg Use Cases, Applications, and bloxberg Tech. It featured talks by Consortium members from Fraunhofer FIT, University College London (UCL), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), and the MPDL. You can find details on the talks here.

  During the Summit, the Iron Throne Voting also took place – a voting deciding who is going to be the primary organizing/administrative entity of the bloxberg Consortium. By a majority of votes, the Max Planck Society has been elected for Iron Throne for a third consecutive year.

  Since it was such an inspiring event, we are already looking forward to the next bloxberg Summit, which will take place in May 2022. The goal of this Summit will be to conclude the individual projects of the working groups and decisions on the future of bloxberg.

  More info:
  bloxberg

   

  

   

• Software Licensing at your fingertips!

  We are delighted to announce that we licensed several software solutions for your everyday need at the lab and office! Also, for a better overview, we created different categories that will help researchers find the right tool they need for their daily work.

  Check out our three new categories & find the right software for you.

  

  

  

  For more info on our Software Licensing Service, visit our Software Licensing Service Website*.

   

  _{*only within MPG IP-range}

• Survey Results on the Usage of Electronic Laboratory Notebooks in the MPG 2021

  The Electronic Laboratory Notebook (ELN) has become a multi-functional data system that can import and export data, notes, and observations from other devices. Therefore, ELNs are also seen in the context of good research practice, and the demands on ELN systems are thus widely distributed. There are many requirements, ranging from simple use in everyday laboratory work to data processing, provision, and long-term archiving. ELNs are intended to make day-to-day research work easier; therefore, it is essential to not solely focus on the technical solutions but to consider the scientists’ needs. Thus, the MPDL conducted a survey on the usage of Electronic Laboratory Notebooks in the Max Planck Society.

  The survey was announced in February 2021 via different MPG internal email lists and was accessible until 31st March 2021. The participation was limited to MPG employees. It consisted of 19 questions, including 15 multiple-choice questions and four free text questions. 

  The results of this ELN Survey are now available online! If you want to know more about the conducted survey and the outcome, check out the following links to access the ELN Survey Summary:

  Key Findings of the ELN Survey here.

  ELN Survey Summary online via MPG.PuRe (limited to MPG IP range). 

  The chart data are available via the Edmond repository. 

  The survey results will also be presented at the workshop about "Living with Electronic Laboratory Notebooks" on 20th and 21st September 2021.

  

• KEEPER Summer Release 

  KEEPER is always keen on keeping your data safe, even during your summer break! While doing that, our KEEPER team prepared something new for you to support you and your research even better. We want to present to you the KEEPER Summer Release 2021. This update entails: 

  Improved file certification via bloxberg, which includes added library certification (up to 1000 files at once), added entries for certified files under “Library Details”, storing the certified file version and the certificates & an added option to add metadata. 

  New interactive metadata form – no more manual editing of the archive-metadata.md file. This new form allows you to create your Cared Data Certificate easily, add metadata to your on demand archive & add metadata to your bloxberg file certification. 

  Reworked and redesigned project catalog, allowing you to explore all libraries with metadata within Keeper, only accessible by MPG users. 

  & many more! For a detailed description of what this release has in store for you, click here.

  

• New Talk Series: Open Science in Practice

  Open Science practices become more and more a part of researchers‘ lives.

  MPDL presents a virtual series of pertinent talks to provide Max Planck colleagues with the latest information on Open Science best practices, tools, platforms, and regulations.

  We invited speakers from diverse fields to present their Open Science related projects, experiences or initiatives.

  Our aim is to provide the audience with a broad range of topics coming from Open Science related fields like

  • Open Access -Public access to research outcome in the form of publications
  • Open Research Data - A free access to research data
  • Linked Open Data - Access to and cross-linking of public data stocks
  • Open Review - The quest for alternative solutions to the traditional review processes provided by journal publishers, in order to improve transparency in this field
  • Open Source - The development and usage of Open Source software for research activity
  • Citizen Science - The involvement of amateur or non-professional scientists in the research process
  • Open Education - The endeavour to a broad access to learning and training – far beyond the existing options provided by the traditional education system
  • Pre-Registration/Registered Reports - Submission and peer review of manuscripts, project plans and hypothesis

  If you are interested in connecting with MPG wide colleagues, inspiring discussions and upskilling talks we invite you to join our 45 minute sessions starting on Wednesday June 30 at 1:00 pm (CEST).

   

  The first talk will be about

  Recent developments in the EC policy on Open Science

  by Alea López de San Román, European Commission´s Directorate for Research and Innovation

   

  Dial-in: https://zoom.us/j/94125328264 (Passcode: osip)

   

  All information surrounding the Talk Series can be found here:

  https://osip.mpdl.mpg.de/

   

  Newsletter containing information on the talks:

  Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!

   

  Reach out to the MPDL Open Science Team

  Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!

• MPG City Week 2021 - we say Thank You!

  We want to thank everyone who joined us on the ride through our first MPG City Week, which took place June 7-10. The whole MPG Family got the chance to network, find tools & ways to improve their work and research or get an overall orientation on our beloved MPG City.
  We had more than 110 City Guides on our tour through 89 slots in which we explored various MPG facilities, networks, and services. The fabulous talks were followed by thoughtful feedback, and we are very grateful for each of you participating in our journey – over 1000 MPG Family members in total!

  We hope you enjoyed the journey!

  

• Kooperation zwischen MPDL und Wolfram®

  Die Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) freut sich über die Kooperation mit Wolfram Blockchain Labs (WBL): Unter der Federführung der MPDL hat Wolfram® eine erste Anwendung mit der Integration von Wolfram Language und IPFS entwickelt. Die Integration zwischen der Distributed-Ledger-Technologie (DLT)-Plattform von WBL und den Open-Source-Protokollen von InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) und Filecoin ist ein Schritt in Richtung dezentrale Speicherung und Analyse-Anwendungen.

  Die Implementierung stellt eine Erweiterung des bloxberg Diensts Certify & Verify durch eine dezentrale Speicheroption dar. Diese bieten vor allem Forschenden, die keinen Zugriff auf dedizierte Speicherlösungen haben, die Möglichkeit die Daten und Metadaten auf IPFS zu speichern, die zu den auf der bloxberg Blockchain hinterlegten Datenhashes gehören.

  Die Erweiterung des Services ist ein weiterer wichtiger Schritt, um die Nutzerfreundlichkeit von Blockchain-basierten Diensten zu erhöhen und damit mehr Nutzern die Möglichkeit zu geben, von den einzigartigen Eigenschaften der Blockchain-Technologie in der Wissenschaft zu profitieren.

  Wolfram nutzt die Integration mit IPFS und Filecoin auch, um Funktionen und Anwendungsfälle zu entwickeln, die in dezentrale Anwendungen von Forscherinnen und Forschern integriert werden können.

  Mehr Details zur Anwendung in Wolfram Language.

  Weitere Infos:
  Wolfram Blockchain Labs
  bloxberg

• New LabCam Release

  The brand new LabCam app with exciting features has arrived! Now, all your photos taken with LabCam are automatically uploaded to KEEPER. Also, the OCR function makes it easy to extract and store the full text from photos, which significantly improves your work efficiency. 

  LabCam is available in Google Play and the Apple App Store – check it out and make your daily work routine easier!

   

  

   

   

• Cooperation between Leibniz University Hannover & MPDL: Colony Counter App

  We are pleased to announce a cooperation between the Institute of Technical Chemistry (TCI) of the Leibniz University Hannover and the MPDL with the shared mission of developing and distributing a service app to make lab work easier and more efficient. The mutual goal is to further develop a Colony Counter App and provide its open-source availability for a wider network of Max Planck Scientists. The Colony Counter App is a tool, which allows taking and scanning pictures of bacterial colonies, by the inbuilt camera of the smartphone or tablet. Thanks to an image-processing algorithm, providing digital picture analysis, the app counts and determines the amount of captured colonies, enabling lab work to be more efficient and precise. The algorithm has been developed by Dr. Daniel Marquard, Dr. Patrick Lindner, M.Sc. Ferdinand Lange, Prof. Sascha Beutel and Prof. Thomas Scheper from the TCI.

  The app will be further developed and improved for usage and distributed by the MPDL Team.

  We are looking forward to this cooperation!

• Neue Website DEAL Operations für Bibliothekar*innen, Publizierende und Wissenschaftsmanager*innen

  Die neue Website DEAL Operations ist ein Angebot der MPDL Services GmbH und bietet Informationsexpert*innen, Forscher*innen und Wissenschaftsmanager*innen Informationen und praktische Unterstützung, um die von Projekt DEAL ausgehandelten transformativen Vereinbarungen erfolgreich umzusetzen und optimal zu nutzen.

  Lesen Sie mehr

• KEEPER & OnlyOffice: a perfect match – an experience report

  The MPDL is always striving to provide services that are top quality in the smallest details. MPDL’s Sync and Share tool KEEPER makes no exception and one focus of it is the collaborative writing tool. After conducting tests for various document-editing systems, KEEPER has just received a new and improved Office service: OnlyOffice!
  This includes better compatibility with Microsoft Office, enhanced collaboration with tracking, review, comments, and more! KEEPER-users have the possibility to work directly on Office files in the browser - independently of your operating system and device. You can also work with your colleagues on the same document at the same time, while also tracking changes, chatting, commenting, and reviewing. There's also the possibility to work with non-KEEPER users, making it the perfect place to collaborate or to work on a file alone, but seamlessly with multiple devices.

  MPDL’s KEEPER team even wrote a whole experience report about it! If you’re interested in the whole procedure, go here & learn more about the challenges, the alternatives, bugs, and the overall happy end!

   

  More info:
  

• New Read & Publish open access agreement between the Max Planck Digital Library and The Company of Biologists

  A three-year Read & Publish open access agreement has been reached between the Max Planck Digital Library and The Company of Biologists.

  This new cost-neutral transformative agreement - which runs from 1 January 2021 to 31 December 2023 - ensures that corresponding authors at Max Planck Society’s 86 Institutes benefit from immediate open access publication of their research articles in The Company of Biologists’ hybrid subscription journals - Development, Journal of Cell Science and Journal of Experimental Biology - with no author-facing publishing charges.

  In addition, this landmark agreement enables corresponding authors at Max Planck Institutes to publish research articles without charge in The Company of Biologists’ fully open access journals - Disease Models & Mechanisms and Biology Open.

  Unlimited access to the full journal archives dating back to 1853 is also available.

  “We are very pleased to implement this new agreement with The Company of Biologists, and salute their willingness to test new economic models that are repurposing previous subscription fees to facilitate a sustainable and cost-neutral transition of their journals to an open access publishing model,” says Ralf Schimmer, Head of Information Provision at the Max Planck Digital Library. "This agreement marks a further, significant step in the Max Planck Society’s strategy to enable open dissemination of research, in line with the principles of the OA2020 Initiative and the Berlin Declaration on Open Access.”

  Read the full press release here.

   

  More info:
  Information for Max Planck authors
  OA2020 Initiative

• New multi-year Read & Publish agreement between Max Planck Digital Library and Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.

  The Max Planck Digital Library and Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers have entered into a three-year Read and Publish agreement. Covering all Mary Ann Leibert, Inc. journals previously subscribed, the transformative agreement covers the cost for open access publishing of all articles by corresponding authors affiliated with the Max Planck Society, eliminating APCs (Article Processing Charges) for authors. In addition, researchers at all Max Planck Institutes will have full access to licensed Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. journal content.

  “We are delighted to partner with Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. on this new agreement that enables the broadest possible readership and impact for the research of the Max Planck Society. By repurposing former subscription funds to support open access publishing in the journals valued by our scientists, the agreement aligns with the principles of the Open Access 2020 Initiative and takes a further step toward the open and innovative scholarly communication system envisioned in the Berlin Declaration on Open Access.” said Ralf Schimmer, Head of Information Provision at the Max Planck Digital Library.

  Read the full press release here

   

  About Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers
  Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers is a leading independent publisher known worldwide for its establishment of authoritative peer-reviewed journals, books, and trade publications in cutting-edge fields such as biotechnology and regenerative medicine, biomedical research, medicine and surgery, public health research and policy, technology and engineering, law and policy, environmental research and policy, and other specialized disciplines. The company publishes over 90 peer-reviewed journals, leading trade magazines, and specialized newsletters, in addition to society membership management and conferences.

  More info
  Information for Max Planck authors
  OA2020 Initiative

• Max Planck Society and Rockefeller University Press enter “Read-and-Publish” transformative agreement

  The Max Planck Digital Library has signed an unlimited “read-and-publish” transformative agreement with Rockefeller University Press (RUP) on behalf of the Max Planck Society. The agreement covers open access publishing of articles in RUP’s three hybrid journals: Journal of Cell Biology (JCB), Journal of Experimental Medicine (JEM) and Journal of General Physiology (JGP).

  Under the agreement, which runs from January 1, 2021 to December 31, 2022, articles by corresponding authors affiliated with Max Planck Institutes will be published immediate open access under a CC-BY license and directly deposited in PubMed Central (PMC). The transformative agreement repurposes former subscription funds to cover all open access publishing fees for authors, and there is no limit to the number of articles that may be published under the terms of the agreement. Max Planck Institutes also receive unlimited access to RUP’s journals.

  “The opportunity to publish their research articles openly in highly selective journals, such as the Journal of Cell Biology, provides a great benefit to our researchers and contributes to the advancement of science. We are very pleased to have reached this new transformative agreement with Rockefeller University Press, marking a further step in the Max Planck Society’s strategy to enable open dissemination of research, in line with the principles of the OA2020 Initiative and the Berlin Declaration on Open Access.” said Ralf Schimmer, Head of Information Provision at the MPDL.

  Read the press release here.

   

  About Rockefeller University Press

  Rockefeller University Press (RUP) is committed to quality and integrity in scientific publishing. We use the latest technologies and carry out rigorous peer review, applying the highest standards of novelty, mechanistic insight, data integrity, and general interest to fulfil our mission of publishing excellent science. RUP publishes Journal of Cell Biology (JCB), Journal of Experimental Medicine (JEM), and Journal of General Physiology (JGP) and co-publishes Life Science Alliance (LSA). RUP’s nonprofit journals were established by the research community, and editorial decisions and policies continue to be driven by scientists who actively contribute to their fields, appreciate the value of peer review, and desire a better publication experience for all. Based in New York City, RUP is a department of The Rockefeller University, a leading biomedical research university dedicated to conducting innovative, high-quality research to improve the understanding of life for the benefit of humanity.

   

  More info:
  Rockefeller University Press Open Access Agreement 2021-2022 - Information for authors
  OA2020 Initiative
  
  

   

• Max Planck Digital Library and Portland Press sign Read & Publish deal enabling unlimited open access in the Biochemical Society’s journals

  The Max Planck Society has signed-up to the Biochemical Society and Portland Press’ pilot Read & Publish transformative deal. This provides Max Planck researchers with unlimited open access (OA) publishing and ‘read’ access across the entire journal portfolio.

  This Read & Publish agreement guarantees all corresponding authors affiliated with the 86 Max Planck Institutes worldwide with OA publishing of their articles in Portland Press journals by default and at no additional author-facing charges.

  The three-year deal, 2021-2023, repurposes former library subscription funds to support open access publishing, instead, ensuring a move away from the traditional subscription model towards a sustainable publishing model based on open dissemination of research.

  Portland Press publishes seven journals covering different areas within molecular biology and the life sciences; two are fully open access (OA) titles and there are five hybrid journals where content is usually published behind a paywall, with authors either choosing to pay an article publishing charge to have their work published OA or benefitting from default, charge-free OA publishing where their institution has signed up to a Read & Publish pilot.

  In the words of Dr Ralf Schimmer, Head of Information Provision at the Max Planck Digital Library, “Through their commitment and thoughtful strategy, the Biochemical Society is paving the way for learned societies toward a sustainable and irreversible transition of scholarly publishing to open access. We are delighted to implement this new agreement in full alignment with the Max Planck Society’s open access transformation strategy and the OA2020 Initiative, for the benefit of our research community and scientists everywhere.”

  Read the full press release here.

  
  More info:
  Portland Press Open Access Agreement 2021-2023 - Information for authors
  Portland Press Open Scholarship Portal
  OA2020 Initiative

• 4. FDM-Workshop 2021: Registierung ist geöffnet und CfP verlängert

  

  

  Die Registrierung für den Workshop „Kompetenz Forschungsdatenmanagement in der MPG“ am 5. und 6. Mai 2021 ist nun geöffnet ist. Sie finden das Registrierungsformular hier: https://fdm-workshop.mpdl.mpg.de/registrierung-2021/.

  Vielleicht haben Sie sogar Interesse, sich an diesem Workshop zu beteiligten? Unseren Call for Participation verlängern wir bis zum 31. Januar 2021. Bei Fragen zögern Sie bitte nicht Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!.

  Der digitale Workshop wird von der Max Planck Digital Library organisiert. Er findet am 5. und 6. Mai 2021 statt und behandelt das Thema Forschungsdatenmanagement und Kompetenzbildung. Die Veranstaltung richtet sich an alle MPG-Kolleg_innen (Wissenschaft, Verwaltung, Bibliothek, IT, Wissenschaftsmanagement et al.). Über zwei halbe Tage finden Diskussionen, Trainings, Best-Practise-Kurzvorträge usw. per Zoom statt, um die verschiedenen Fragen und Interessen in diesem Themenfeld gemeinsam zu diskutieren. Weitere Information sowie das detaillierte Programm folgen unter https://fdm-workshop.mpdl.mpg.de kontinuierlich.

• Max Planck Society and The Royal Society enter new transformative agreement

  The Max Planck Digital Library and The Royal Society have signed a pilot agreement to enable open access publishing across the entire publisher's journal portfolio.

  The Publish and Read agreement builds on the foundations of the central agreement that already covers publishing for Max Planck Society authors in the fully open access journals Open Biology and Royal Society Open Science.

  This new 3-year agreement comes into effect in January 2021 and ensures that articles by Max Planck researchers accepted for publication in any Royal Society journal will be made open access and the relative publishing fees will be covered by the Max Planck Digital Library. Max Planck researchers also gain full access to the complete Royal Society journal portfolio, from its first publications in 1665 to date, significantly increasing their access to scientific papers in all disciplines.

  Read the full press release here.

• New Information Platform on Research Data Management

  We are very happy to announce that our new Information Platform on Research Data Management has now gone live. You can reach it at https://rdm.mpdl.mpg.de. There you will find a lot of useful information on research data management in English, including Data Management Plans, repository selection, and available MPG services.

  The website is structured into the three phases before, during, and after research. Here we map many aspects of RDM and have made them comprehensible for you. We will continuously expand this information page in the near future. If you have any specific requests or suggestions, please let us know.

  And of course, this also applies, if you have specific questions or need general support on the subject of research data management. For this, please contact our RDM support: Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!.

• New bloxberg members: The Ss. Cyril and Methodius University, The Knowledge Media Institute & The Chair for Software Engineering for Business Information Systems

  We are very happy to announce the three newest bloxberg members: The Ss. Cyril and Methodius University, the Knowledge Media Institute at The Open University, and The Chair for Software Engineering for Business Information Systems (sebis) at the Technical University of Munich.

  The Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje is the first state University in the Republic of North Macedonia, founded in 1949, initially with three faculties. The University develops study programs in all scientific fields – natural sciences and mathematics, technical and technological sciences, medical and health sciences, social sciences, humanities, and arts. The Faculty of Computer Science and Engineering (FCSE) is the result of merging the two largest institutions of informatics and computer technologies in North Macedonia: the Institute of Informatics at the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics and the Institute of Computer Technics and Informatics at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technologies. The FCSE fosters international cooperation in terms of teaching, research, and mobility of students within the curriculum mobility program, Erasmus+ and other international cooperation agreements. FCSE realizes intensive scientific cooperation with more than 250 Universities, companies, and institutions from Europe and around the world – more than 100 projects funded by various programs (FP6, FP7, Horizon 2020, NATO, US Naval Research, and bilateral projects with other countries).

  Besides all possible computer science and engineering research fields, blockchain is one of FCSE’s recent research areas with special interest lying in its interconnection with other technologies and systems. Starting from undergraduate level, FSCE provides blockchain courses in their curricula, while on MSc and Ph.D. level they offer specialized studies that provide interdisciplinary research covering Machine Learning, Data Science, IoT, Bioinformatics, etc. “As a part of the bloxberg consortium, we are very happy to support and share bloxberg’s vision on applying decentralized services for scientific and research purposes using a modern blockchain infrastructure. Our colleagues and students strive to develop different applications over the bloxberg infrastructure” says Slobodan Kalajdziski, Professor at FCSE.

  

   

  The Knowledge Media Institute (KMi) is a multidisciplinary R&D lab based in the STEM Faculty of The Open University (OU) in the United Kingdom. OU is the leading university for flexible, innovative teaching and world-leading research in the UK and in 157 countries worldwide. KMi has been at the forefront of innovation for the past 25 years. They lead in a number of areas, including Semantic Technologies, Educational Media, Social Media Analysis, Big Data, Blockchain, Smart Cities, IoT, and others.
  The OU established the Open Blockchain research area in 2015, led by KMi, to investigate how blockchains can be used within higher education and corporate training and also the relationship between semantics, big data, and blockchains. Within the learning area, there are a number of scenarios where radical improvements may occur including: embedding micro certification within blockchains; the development of educational currencies to support the crowdsourced accreditation of ‘soft skills’ such as collaboration, communication, and leadership by peers; and new disruptive models for teaching and learning where intermediary layers are removed resulting in dramatically reduced costs and increased openness. Interoperability between blockchains and the automation of a number of tasks associated with the development of blockchain applications (DApps) through semantic technologies is a second focus.

  KMi’s OpenBlockchain team has accumulated a wealth of knowledge and experience and a testbed architecture to support investigations in the use of blockchain in almost any scenario imaginable and has extensive experience working with the Ethereum blockchain. In May 2020 they unveiled a prototype mobile app that certifies COVID-19 immunity test results using blockchain and stores certificates in a Solid Pod. KMi’s Director, Professor John Domingue, said, “KMi is delighted to join the bloxberg consortium and to share our expertise to realize our joint vision for applied decentralized blockchain services“.

  

   

   

  The Chair for Software Engineering for Business Information Systems (sebis) is one of the 25 chairs of the Informatics Faculty at the Technical University of Munich and is held by Professor Florian Matthes since its establishment in 2002. The chair contributes to the informatics and business informatics education at the Ph.D., master, and bachelor levels.
  Blockchain-Based Systems Engineering is one of sebis' research areas since 2016 with particular interest focusing on institutional use cases, data analytics, and identity management in collaboration with multiple other universities and research institutions. In 2018, it established a Master's course called "Blockchain-based Systems Engineering", which over 600 students regularly attend.

  

   

  More info:

  The Ss. Cyril and Methodius University

  Knowledge Media Institute @ The Open University

  The Chair for Software Engineering for Business Information Systems (sebis) @ Technical University of Munich

  bloxberg

   

   

   

   

   

• Integration of Wolfram Blockchain Labs’ distributed ledger technology platform on the bloxberg blockchain

  We are happy to announce the integration between Wolfram Blockchain Labs’ (WBL) distributed ledger technology [DLT] platform and the bloxberg infrastructure. This means that the bloxberg blockchain is now fully integrated into the Wolfram Language (WL).
  WBL has developed a suite of functions in Wolfram Language that provide straightforward reading and writing capabilities for different blockchains. These functions also provide a powerful environment for users to create custom analytical tools. With this, all Max Planck researches are able to leverage bloxberg to confirm the certification of research data all within the Wolfram Language computational notebook interface, by accessing the new functionality, which is available in e.g. Mathematica.

  Wolfram Mathematica is one of several calculation applications that are provided by the MPDL’s Software Licensing Service (available within MPG IP-range).

  Read the full press release here.

   

  More Info:

  Wolfram Blockchain Labs
  bloxberg

• bloxberg is part of the European Commission's #DLT4Good Scanning & Report

  We are happy to announce that the global blockchain innitiative bloxberg has been included in the latest #DLT4Good report “Scanning the European Ecosystem of Distributed Ledger Technologies for Social and Public Good” of the European Commission. The #DLT4Good report is complementary to the information that can be found in the #DLT4Good Scanning tool. The report’s aim is to explore the current situation of Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLTs), such as blockchains. The scanning and the report are comparing 131 DLT-projects worldwide.

  More Info:

  #DLT4Good Scanning

  #DLT4Good Scanning Tool

  #DLT4Good report

  bloxberg

• Open Access publizieren in Nature – ein weiterer Meilenstein in der Transformation wissenschaftlicher Fachzeitschriften wird 2021 erreicht

  Nachdem die deutsche Wissenschaftsgemeinschaft im Projekt DEAL bereits Open-Access-Rechte für rund ein Drittel ihrer jährlich erscheinenden Fachpublikationen verhandelt hat, können Wissenschaftler*innen in Deutschland ihre Arbeiten ab nächstem Jahr nun auch in den renommierten Zeitschriften der Marke Nature unter einer freien Lizenz veröffentlichen. Dadurch werden perspektivisch nicht nur rund 400 weitere publizierte Forschungsergebnisse aus Deutschland pro Jahr unmittelbar weltweit frei zugänglich; der von der Max Planck Digital Library verhandelte Rahmenvertrag ist auch überhaupt die erste Open-Access-Vereinbarung für Nature-Zeitschriften.

  Eckpunkte der Vereinbarung:

  • Die Vertragskonditionen werden zunächst den bisherigen Bezieher*innen von Nature-Zeitschriften in Deutschland angeboten. Eine abgestufte Preisstruktur berücksichtigt ihre vorherigen Ausgaben für Nature-Subskriptionen sowie ihr durchschnittliches jährliches Aufkommen an Veröffentlichungen in Nature-Zeitschriften.
  • Der wesentliche Anteil der Gesamtkosten aller Einrichtungen, die sich für das neue Modell entscheiden, fließt in die Finanzierung von Open-Access-Publikationsrechten, die ihren affiliierten Wissenschaftler*innen zugutekommen.
  • Gleichzeitig erhalten alle teilnehmenden Einrichtungen dauerhaften Lesezugriff auf das gesamte lizenzierte Portfolio der Nature-Zeitschriften, und die Vertragsbedingungen gelten automatisch auch für Nature-Titel, die während der Vertragslaufzeit neu hinzukommen.

  Zur Pressemitteilung
  
  

  Hinweise für deutsche Wissenschaftseinrichtungen und Bibliotheken

  Der Nature-Rahmenvertrag ist ein als Opt-In-Modell verhandeltes ergänzendes Angebot zum DEAL-Springer Nature-Vertrag. Die als Nature-Bestandskunden geführten Institutionen werden in den nächsten Tagen kontaktiert und erhalten detaillierte Informationen über die Vertragskonditionen.

  Verhandlungsführende Bibliothek ist die Max Planck Digital Library, die Vertragsimplementierung erfolgt jedoch durch Springer Nature. Einrichtungen, die die im Rahmenvertrag vereinbarten Leistungen beziehen möchten, schließen einen Vertrag mit Springer Nature ab.

  Rechnungsstellung und Bereitstellung des Zugangs erfolgen exklusiv durch den Verlag. Die Max Planck Digital Library verwaltet für den Vertragszeitraum lediglich die Open-Access-Publikationsrechte der teilnehmenden Einrichtungen.

  Der Rahmenvertrag zwischen Springer Nature und der MPDL wird in Kürze veröffentlicht.

• New MPDL service: the Minerva Messenger

  10 verschiedene Kommunikationstools zu nutzen ist anstrengend? Finden wir auch und haben eine Lösung: der Minerva Messenger bringt die Kommunikation der MPG zusammen und bietet einfachen Zugang und Nutzung – egal wo man sich befindet!

  Minerva Messenger (basierend auf Mattermost) ermöglicht es eigene Chat-Channels zu eröffnen, um mit Kollegen zu kommunizieren, aktuelle Themen zu diskutieren und Daten zu teilen. Außerdem kann man externe Gäste zur Kollaboration einladen & jederzeit Zoomen. Diese innovative Plattform wird von der MPDL bereitgestellt & gepflegt, das bedeutet alle Daten werden innerhalb der geschützten MPG Infrastruktur gesichert. Beginne jetzt Nachrichten an deine Kollegen zu schicken & werde Teil der einzigartigen Minerva-Community!

   

  Mehr Info:

  Minerva Messenger Clickable Mind Map

  Minerva Messenger Website

   

• University of West Attica becomes a bloxberg Consortium Member

  We are very happy about the newest addition to the bloxberg Consortium: The University of West Attica (UniWA) was founded as the result of merging two Technological Institutes of the country. UniWA currently has 5 Schools and 26 Departments, constituting the third biggest university in Greece in terms of enrolled students.

  CoNSeRT (COmputer Networks & SErvices Research laboraTory) was established in 2018, initially as a research team, part of the Communications & Networks Lab of the Electrical & Electronics Engineering Department of the University of West Attica (UniWA). The achievements and success of the research team have led to its evolution to a research laboratory, established in April 2019. Its main objectives include research and teaching at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels, the establishment of appropriate infrastructures, participation in research programs, provision of services, and interconnecting with social, scientific, and productive organizations on subjects related to the research focus of the Lab.

  Blockchain is one of CoNSeRT’s recent research areas with special interest lying with its interconnection with other technologies and systems, e.g., IoT (e.g., Decentralized Identifiers), Machine and Federated learning, and 5G infrastructures. "At the same time, everyone in CoNSeRT is extremely glad to support and share bloxberg’s vision on applying decentralized services for scientific and research purposes using a modern Blockchain infrastructure", says Dimitris Kogias, a senior researcher at CoNSeRT.

  

   

  Learn more about:

  CoNSeRT

  University of West Attica

  bloxberg

   

• Open Access-Plattform SAIRA® der Fraunhofer Gesellschaft auf der bloxberg Blockchain

  Die neue Open Access-Plattform SAIRA® von Fraunhofer FIT und Fraunhofer hilft dabei, Forschungsergebnisse rund um Covid-19 schnell, unkompliziert und offen zu publizieren. Für die nötige Sicherheit soll künftig die Anbindung an die bloxberg Blockchain sorgen.

  Das bloxberg Konsortiums Mitglied Fraunhofer Gesellschaft hat mit dem Fraunhofer-Institut für Angewandte Informationstechnik FIT in Kooperation mit dem von Fraunhofer geführten Sekretariat der World Association of Industrial and Technological Research Organizations (WAITRO) die Plattform SAIRA^® Open Access Hub geschaffen. Diese hilft nun dabei Forschungsergebnisse zum Thema Covid-19 schnell, unkompliziert und offen zu publizieren.
  Über den Open Access Hub wird jedem die Möglichkeit geboten Technologien und Inhalte einzustellen und diese öffentlich verfügbar zu machen. Die Qualität der eingereichten Beiträge wird durch Reviewer der assoziierten Partner der WAITRO sowie der Fraunhofer Gesellschaft selbst gewährleistet.

  Ferner wird der Open Access Hub zusätzlich an die bloxberg Blockchain angebunden. Somit besteht neben der oben genannten Qualitätsprüfung ebenfalls die Absicherung über die Blockchain Technologie, um Authentizität, Sicherheit und Nachvollziehbarkeit gewehrleisten zu können. Dadurch wird bei den eingereichten Beiträgen sichergestellt, dass sie unverfälscht sind.

   

  Mehr Infos:

  Pressemitteilung Fraunhofer Gesellschaft

  Fraunhofer FIT

  WAITRO

  SAIRA^®

  bloxberg

• Max Planck Society and AIP Publishing sign multi-year Read and Publish agreement

  The Max Planck Society and leading not-for-profit scholarly publisher in the physical sciences AIP Publishing have signed a new Read and Publish agreement.

  As a result of this transformative agreement, articles by Max Planck Society-affiliated corresponding authors accepted for publication in any AIP Publishing-owned journal will be made open access immediately upon publication without any article processing charge (APC) being billed to the author. The cost for open access publishing services will, instead, be covered by the Max Planck Digital Library, as part of the Society’s strategy to redirect subscription investments to deliver open access publishing opportunities to its scientists in the journals most relevant to them, in line with the objectives of the global Open Access 2020 Initiative.

  Prof. Dr. Klaus Blaum, Vice President of the Max Planck Society’s Scientific Council for Chemistry, Physics and Technology remarked, ‘‘By signing a transformative agreement with AIP Publishing, the Max Planck Society is enabling greater visibility, impact, and potential of German research, to serve the greater good of scholarship and society. Our scientists value AIP Publishing’s portfolio of high-quality journals as a channel to openly communicate the results of their research to peers and learners everywhere.”

  In addition, researchers at all Max Planck institute will have access to the content in journals published by AIP Publishing (including those published on behalf of partners) from their first publications through 2020.

  Read the full press release

  Further information for MPS authors about this agreement

• Max Planck Society and American Physical Society sign pilot transformative agreement

  COLLEGE PARK, MD, and MUNICH, GERMANY, JULY 7, 2020 — The American Physical Society (APS) and the Max Planck Gesellschaft (MPG) have finalized the terms of a strategic partnership that allows MPG authors to easily publish open access in all hybrid and gold Physical Review journals at no direct cost to authors. At the center of the collaboration is APS’s first “read and publish” pilot, covering the calendar year 2020, and building upon the long-standing relationship between APS and the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL). 

  “This expansion of our valued partnership with the Max Planck Society is aligned with our mission to advance scientific discovery and research dissemination, and it reflects our organizations’ shared commitment to open science,” said APS Chief Executive Officer, Dr. Kate Kirby.

  The collaboration initiated late last year, as APS and MPDL began working together on the development of new processes and systems required to support the pilot, and the resulting workflows have been fully functional since early 2020. Both organizations are committed to further collaboration on continuously improving this infrastructure to further support sustainable open access publishing. This will also allow APS to offer new open access publishing services more broadly, and thus continue to expand its role in supporting open science and the evolving needs of the broader scientific community. 

  Prof. Klaus Blaum, incoming Vice President of the Max Planck Society’s Scientific Council for Chemistry, Physics and Technology said, “The journals of APS are highly valued by our scientists and our peers globally, and this new agreement will enable the broadest possible readership for a significant portion of our peer-reviewed research, ultimately improving and accelerating the scientific process.”

  “This new transformative agreement with APS marks an important development in our strategy to repurpose our subscription investments in order to deliver open access publishing opportunities to our authors while, at the same time, contributing to the broader transition of today’s scholarly journals to open access in line with objectives Open Access 2020 Initiative,” said Ralf Schimmer, Head of Information at the Max Planck Digital Library.

  Both hybrid and fully open access peer-reviewed journals published by APS -- including highly-selective flagship titles such as Physical Review Letters and Physical Review X -- are covered under the read and publish pilot. 

  “The pilot is designed to deliver tremendous value to researchers by providing the opportunity to conveniently publish open access in the most-read and highest-cited peer-reviewed journals in physics and related disciplines, broadly trusted and valued by researchers around the world for more than 127 years,” said APS Publisher Dr. Matthew Salter.

  To publish open access in these journals and make their articles immediately and freely available to readers without a subscription, authors are generally required to pay a fee. Under the new transformative agreement, the article publication charges (APCs) are covered by the institutional license fee, meaning that authors affiliated with any of 88 Max Planck institutes and research facilities can publish open access in the Physical Review journals without needing to spend time and resources on the invoicing and payment process. Upon publication their papers will be made immediately open access under a CC-BY license allowing broad access and reuse rights.

  “The development of this partnership was motivated by our organizations’ mutual commitment to providing excellent service to our shared customers, the research communities,” said APS Associate Publisher Jeff Lewandowski. “By facilitating hassle-free open access publishing that allows MPG authors to maximize the visibility and impact of their research, and increasing the open access content available to users worldwide, together we are now serving those communities more effectively than ever before.” 

  The 2020 license also continues to provide MPG-affiliated readers access to the entire APS online library, including peer-reviewed research and review articles published from 1893 to the present. APS and MPG have also made significant progress towards developing a longer-term arrangement to extend this open access partnership beyond 2020 in a manner that is sustainable for both organizations and able to adapt to the evolving open science landscape.

  The new partnership is the latest in a long series of innovations by APS in support of its goal to provide sustainable open access options for all researchers across the communities it serves. In the 1990s APS adopted policies supporting green open access through self-archiving, and also launched one of the first fully open access journals in physics. Since then it has continued to invest and innovate in open science through a number of initiatives, including: developing fully open access and hybrid journals to meet a diverse array of author needs; subsidizing open access publishing costs; supporting CHORUS as a founding member; and participating in the SCOAP3 initiative to facilitate convenient open access publishing for high-energy physics researchers. 

   

  About the Max Planck Society

  The Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science is an independent, non-profit research organization. Focusing on research fields that are particularly innovative, the 83 Max Planck Institutes conduct basic research in the service of the general public in the natural sciences, life sciences, social sciences, and the humanities. More than 15,000 studies by its researchers are published each year in internationally renowned scientific journals.

  About the American Physical Society

  The American Physical Society is a nonprofit membership organization working to advance and diffuse the knowledge of physics through its outstanding research journals, scientific meetings, and education, outreach, advocacy, and international activities. APS represents over 55,000 members, including physicists in academia, national laboratories, and industry in the United States and throughout the world. Society offices are located in College Park, Maryland (Headquarters), Ridge, New York, and Washington, DC.

• Open Access Publizieren in der MPG in über 8000 Zeitschriften

  Dank der wachsenden Zahl an Verträgen, welche die Max Planck Digital Library mit großen Verlagen bisher verhandelt hat, können Max Planck Autorinnen und Autoren ihre Artikel sofort und kostenfrei Open Access publizieren und somit nachweislich ihre eigene Sichtbarkeit und Wirkung ihrer Arbeit vergrößern!

  Auf unserer neuen Open Access Publikationssupport Website finden Sie alle Zeitschriften, die von diesen Verträgen abgedeckt werden.

  Beim Publizieren eines Artikels in einer der gelisteten Zeitschriften werden alle Kosten für das Open Access Publizieren durch die von der MPDL für alle Max Planck Autorinnen und Autoren zentral geschlossenen Verträge komplett abgedeckt.

  Lernen Sie hier mehr über die Open Access Publikationsunterstützung für Autorinnen und Autoren der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft.

   

  

• MPDL ist Back in Office

  Die Max Planck Digital Library freut sich mitteilen zu können, dass eine Rückkehr in die Räumlichkeiten der MPDL nun möglich ist. Am 16. Juni 2020 begrüßte die MPDL die ersten Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter, unter besonderer Rücksicht auf die vorgegebenen Sicherheitsmaßnahmen. Wir freuen uns, dass die MPDL trotz mobilem Arbeiten weiterhin die Nutzung aller Services bereitstellen konnte – ein großes Dankeschön an alle Beteiligten.

   

• Virtuelles bloxberg Summit 2020

  Das bloxberg Summit 2020 fand am 28. Mai und 2. Juni online statt. Das Summit ist die alljährige Konferenz des bloxberg Konsortiums, welches dieses Jahr zum zweiten Mal von der MPDL organisiert wurde. Auf der Konferenz werden die neusten Projekte und Themen rund um das Thema Blockchain und Wissenschaft diskutiert.
  Am ersten Tag der diesjährigen Konferenz stellten sich die Third Parties ARTiFACTS®, Decentralized Science, Ethernity HODL UG , sowie Wolfram Blockchain Labs vor und präsentierten ihre Anwendungen die auf der bloxberg Blockchain laufen. Themen wie die Integration von Blockchain und Cloud-Computing Technologies, dezentrale Reputationssysteme für Wissenschaftler und Funktionen, die es ermöglichen mit Blockchain zu interagieren, wurden vorgstellt.

  Zum Teil II des Summits, welches am 2. Juni stattfand, haben Repräsentanten der Universitäten und Institutionen, die Teil des Konsortiums sind, ihre aktuellen Projekte zum Thema Blockchain präsentiert. Darunter die Universität Nicosia, die Universität Genf, die Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften Hamburg, die FH Technikum Wien sowie die MPDL.

  Die Universität Nicosia stellte das Projekt DLT4ALL vor, dessen Ziel es ist, Blockchain und Distributed Ledger Technologien und deren Anwendung verständlicher zu machen. Die MPDL präsentierte ihr neustes Projekt für die Aggregation von Peer Reviews für bloxberg, das als Ziel hat, die Anerkennung von Wissenschaftlern für ihre Peer Reviews zu steigern. Ein Konzept das eine Möglichkeit für die Wiederverwendung von wissenschaftlichen Daten für bloxberg bietet, wurde von der HAW Hamburg besprochen. Auch die mögliche Sicherheit die eine Blockchain bietet, wurde zum Thema zweier Vorträge. Die Universität Genf sprach sich für eine Verifikation von Diplomen, basierend auf einem Smart Contract auf bloxberg, aus. Die FH Technikum Wien hielt eine Präsentation über Electronic Voting, das durch die Blockchain Technologie gesichert wird.

  Wir bedanken uns bei den Vortragenden sowie Teilnehmerinnen und Teilnehmern. Das bloxberg Summit 2020 war ein voller Erfolg und hat zu weiteren Diskussionen zum Thema Blockchain und Wissenschaft inspiriert! Mehr Informationen zu den präsentierten Projekten und Themen sind auf den Internetseiten der jeweiligen Institutionen zu finden. 

   

  Weitere Links:

  bloxberg

  FH Technikum Wien

  HAW Hamburg

  Universität Genf

  Universität Nicosia

   

  Mehr Informationen zu den Third Parties finden Sie hier.

   

• Edmond update - Wachstum und neue Möglichkeiten

  Edmond, das nun hervorragend etablierte Forschungsdatenrepositorium der MPG, wächst weiterhin kontinuierlich: Die Anzahl der Datensammlungen steigt im Schnitt wöchentlich, derzeit fast täglich. Stets mehr Max Planck Institute nutzen Edmond; aktuell sind es 33 MPIs.

  Mitte des Jahres 2019 starteten wir intensiv damit, eine Reihe von Neuerungen an unserem Repositorium vorzunehmen. Dieser Prozess ist nun abgeschlossen.
  Jene Anpassungen betreffen zum Beispiel die Verlinkung von Datensätzen mit anderen Quellen, eine optimierte Datendokumentation (Ergänzung von weiteren Metadaten-Feldern) und verbesserte Suchfunktionen. Außerdem ist es nun auch möglich, für (noch) unveröffentlichte Datensammlungen eine DOI zu reservieren. Der starke Bedarf der Fach-Community nach dieser Möglichkeit begleitete uns nun schon eine ganze Weile. Umso mehr freuen wir uns, die exzellente Arbeit unserer WissenschaftlerInnen damit nun noch etwas mehr erleichtern zu können. Das Datenlimit pro Nutzer haben wir auf 10GB erhöht, mehr ist Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein! jederzeit möglich. 

  Trotz oder gerade aufgrund aller Neuerungen: Edmond bleibt benutzerfreundlich wie gewohnt.

  Mehr zu Entwicklungen im Repositorium hier.

  Mehr zu neuen Metadaten-Feldern hier.

   

• Aktuelle Informationen zum COVID-19 (Coronavirus SARS-COV-2)

  Die Max Planck Digital Library nimmt die rasche Verbreitung des Corona-Virus sehr ernst und hat beschlossen Vorsichtsmaßnahmen anzupassen, um alle Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter sowie Gäste der Einrichtung zu schützen. Bis auf Weiteres abeiten alle Angestellten der MPDL mobil von zu Hause aus. Alle Services der MPDL können wie gewohnt weiterhin genutzt werden.

   

  

• bloxberg @ Aktionspapier des Blockchain Bundesverbands

  Der Blockchain Bundesverband übergab am 11. März sein „Aktionspapier Blockchain“ an die Staatsministerin für Digitalisierung Dorothee Bär. Damit soll die Bundesregierung bei der konkreten Umsetzung von Anwendungen mit der Blockchain-Technologie unterstütz werden.
  Im Bereich Forschung wird bloxberg, eine von der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft initiierte, globale Blockchain-Initiative, als einziges Projekt hervorgehoben. bloxberg wird als Proof-of-Concept für eine Blockchain in der Wissenschaftswelt empfohlen, auf der beispielsweise das BMBF oder die DFG projektgebundene Forschungsmitteltokens verteilen könnten.

  Mit dem Aktionspapier werden vom Präsidenten des Verbands, Florian Glatz, konkrete Forderungen an verschiedene Ministerien weitergeben. Anwesend waren u.a. Vertreter der Ministerien BMWi, BMJV, BMZ, BMWI, BMEL, BMBF, BMI und BMF.

   

  Mehr Infos:

  Pressemitteilung zum Blockchain Aktionspapier des Blockchain Bundesverbands

  Aktionspapier des Blockchain Bundesverband e.V.

  Reuters

  bloxberg

• Third parties @ bloxberg Summit 2020

  We are happy to announce that the bloxberg network is being used for many independent dApps and Apps. Since the bloxberg blockchain is open to everyone to built applications on top of, there has been a lot of so-called third parties running non-authority nodes and connecting them to the bloxberg network. Four of these third parties will be presenting at this year’s bloxberg summit which is taking place at the Harnack House in Berlin on March 2-4, 2020. The bloxberg summit is a conference of bloxberg consortium members, that is held to present and discuss current topics around the use of blockchain in a scientific context. The summit will be held by the MPDL this year.

  The following parties will be presenting at the bloxberg summit 2020:

   

  

  Wolfram Blockchain Labs (WBL) has developed a suite of functions in the Wolfram Language (WL) that provide straightforward reading and writing capabilities for different blockchains. These functions also provide a powerful environment for users to create custom analytical tools. In order for these services to work seamlessly, WBL hosts nodes from Bitcoin, Ethereum, ARK, and bloxberg in their high-performance cluster. This allows direct connections to blockchain nodes and smooth integration with the WL, for use either on the desktop (Mathematica) or cloud (Wolfram Cloud).

   

  

  ARTiFACTS® is a platform designed to accelerate researcher recognition by securing the provenance of in-progress research outputs created by scientists and scholars and making these findings discoverable and citable among peers and colleagues. Transactions are registered on the blockchain; specifically, the bloxberg distributed ledger, using Smart Contracts to establish the proof-of-existence. The citation actions of scientists provide a permanent, valid, and immutable chain of record in real-time. Maintaining the provenance of research contributions and acknowledgments creates stronger incentives for scientists to share their work, enabling them to receive recognition for their contributions and security for their intellectual property. ARTiFACTS and bloxberg interoperability offer researchers control over when their works are shared and with whom, both pre-publication and upon publishing their findings.

  

  Ethernity HODL UG is a young German startup that is experimenting with integrating blockchain and cloud computing technologies, focusing on the information security aspect. This technology is specifically useful in the scientific field. For scientists involved in scientific computing, getting provable and reproducible results for research papers is perhaps one of the biggest challenges. The mission of this project is to make a platform available where they can run their scientific computing tasks and attain "Proof of Execution". Using bloxberg, the "Proof of Execution" certifies the execution specific scientific computing task. Later, the execution can be verified and validated against the blockchain, which aids in the reproducibility of research.

   

  

  Decentralized Science promotes transparency in peer-reviewing using technologies such as blockchain and IPFS. Using their system, reviewers can openly share their review reports and get reputation and rewards. The practice of revealing the reviewers’ reports (either anonymous or signed) is not new and has been promoted for years because it can improve the quality and fairness of peer-reviewing. Decentralized Science offers services such as a tool to find the best and most reliable reviewers for a specific paper, and a reputation system for reviewers to increase the recognition of their invisible work while increasing the fairness, quality, and timelines of their review reports. Their technology is open and decentralized, and will always belong to the academic community. Join the network and help them promote an open and transparent future for peer-reviewing!

   

  More Info: bloxberg

• New KEEPER update

  We are happy to announce our newest KEEPER update. So what’s new?

  In addition to the promise to keep your data safe for at least 10 years, KEEPER has now a new Archiving-On-Demand function. This means, that KEEPER users only have to click a button to store their library on a dedicated and KEEPER independent system. It is possible to use this feature via KEEPER web for any library that is owned by the user. Just click the new "Archive"-button. The "Archive"-button can be found either under "My Libraries" or in the drop-down menu within a library.
  With a correctly filled out archive-metadata.md file an additional archive will be created. KEEPER will take care of the whole archiving process. So go on – give your data a second home!

  

  For more info please visit the KEEPER Knowledge Base.

• Springer Nature und Projekt DEAL unterzeichnen den weltweit größten Open-Access-Transformationsvertrag

  

  Anknüpfend an das im August 2019 unterzeichnete Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) geben Springer Nature und MPDL Services GmbH im Namen von Projekt DEAL heute bekannt, dass der formale Vertrag der bislang weltweit umfangreichsten transformativen Open-Access-Vereinbarung unterzeichnet wurde. Seit dem 1. Januar 2020 werden Publikationen in Springer Nature-Zeitschriften aus den mehr als 700 teilnahmeberechtigten deutschen wissenschaftlichen Einrichtungen Open Access publiziert. Teilnehmenden Institutionen wird ein umfassender Zugang zum Zeitschriftenportfolio von Springer Nature gewährt. Der vollständige Vertragstext wird zusammen mit dem Start des Teilnahmeverfahrens für deutsche Einrichtungen in der zweiten Januarhälfte veröffentlicht. MPDL Services wird in den kommenden Wochen weitere Informationen zur Verfügung stellen und sich mit den teilnahmeberechtigten Institutionen in Verbindung setzen.

  Lesen Sie die Pressemitteilung hier.

  Erfahren Sie hier mehr über die Vereinbarung und den Project DEAL.

   

• 3-month trial with Enago - 40% discount on manuscript editing

  Enago provides scientific and academic editing services to researchers and helps them to get published.

  Max Planck authors now receive 40% discount on Enago’s manuscript editing services. In order to benefit from the pilot agreement and to receive the discount, you need to enter the service through a dedicated landing page for Max Planck affiliated authors:

  https://www.enago.com/inst/mpauthors/

  Please note: There is no central payment for Enago services by MPDL, authors need to cover the remaining 60% themselves. Find out more about Enago's terms and conditions on the service's landing page.

  [Update January 2020: Discount increase from 30% to 40%.]

• ARTiFACTS Smart Contracts Now Processing on the Max Planck Society bloxberg Trusted Research Infrastructure

  Scientists Benefit from ARTiFACTS and bloxberg Interoperability

  Cambridge, Mass. USA and München, Germany –September 3, 2019 –  ARTiFACTS and the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) announced today ARTiFACTS is the first partner organization now registering transactions on the bloxberg distributed ledger. Using Smart Contracts to establish the proof-of-existence and citation actions of scientists provides a permanent, valid, and immutable chain of record in real-time. Maintaining the provenance of research contributions and acknowledgments creates stronger incentives for scientists to share their work, enabling them to receive recognition for their contributions and security for their intellectual property. The interoperability of ARTiFACTS and bloxberg offers researchers control over when their works are shared and with whom, both pre-publication and upon publishing their findings. 

  It is universally recognized that sharing research findings earlier in the research process will accelerate discoveries. Working with the Max Planck Digital Library, a central unit of the Max Planck Society (MPS) that supports thousands of scientists in their publication and research data management efforts, both teams are collaborating to advance the effectiveness of blockchain-based solutions for improving scholarly research and communication.

  “Enabling researchers to receive recognition for all of their scientific contributions in a secure, reliable and efficient way is our primary mission,” said ARTiFACTS President and Co-Founder, Dave Kochalko. “The ARTiFACTS team is proud to be providing innovative research solutions for the Max Planck community on this trusted infrastructure.”

  “The progress from our collaboration with ARTiFACTS is gratifying,” said Sandra Vengadasalam, Head of the Digital Labs Department of the Max Planck Digital Library. “We are continuing to pursue innovation such as this which advances the communication of science and research conducted by our institutes.”

  About ARTiFACTS

  ARTiFACTS, creators of the world’s first blockchain-based collaboration and attribution platform for scholarly research, provides a user-friendly platform, purpose-built for academic and scientific research that leverages blockchain technology. Researchers can record a valid and immutable chain of records in real-time, from the earliest stages of research for all research artifacts, including citing/attribution transactions. ARTiFACTS Smart Contracts with customized bibliographic metadata enable performance of transactions made by researchers on the bloxberg trusted infrastructure.  While today’s digital scholarship creates linkages among a narrowed subset of indexed publications long after discoveries are made, ARTiFACTS focuses on capturing and linking knowledge from its initial ideation throughout the research process to informal and formal dissemination. By using the ARTiFACTS platform, researchers will be able to immutably prove ownership and existence of work, expand access to their research artifacts, provide and receive real-time attribution for novel work and more comprehensively, and rapidly build and demonstrate their body of scholarly contributions.

  To learn more, visit ARTiFACTS and follow them on Twitter @ARTiFACTS_ai!

   

  About the Max Planck Society

  The Max Planck Society conducts basic research in the natural sciences, life science, and humanities. The 84 Max Planck Institutes and 17 Max Planck Centers internationally focus on research fields that are innovative and address forward-looking scientific questions. The Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) is a central unit of the Max Planck Society that supports scientists with a broad portfolio of services in the fields of information provision, publication support and research data management.  With its Digital Labs department, MPDL ensures a constant pipeline of new technologies to provide innovative and sustainable services and tools for all Max Planck researchers.

  To learn more, check out our website and follow us on Twitter @mpdl or Instagram @mpdldigitallabs!

• Blockchain-Strategie der Bundesregierung: bloxberg als Beispiel für anwendungsbezogene Blockchaintechnologie in der Wissenschaft

  In ihrem neuen Strategiepapier zum Thema Blockchain nennt die Bundesregierung die, durch die Max Planck Gesellschaft initiierte, bloxberg Initiative als Beispiel dafür, wie in der Wissenschaft die Blockchaintechnologie anwendungsbezogen eingesetzt werden kann. Unter anderem sollen neue, anwendungsbezogene Kooperationen zum Thema Blockchain durch die Bundesregierung gefördert werden. Mit einer verstärkten Förderung soll die Anzahl neuer, offener Kooperationsformen deutlich steigen.

  Für mehr Informationen:

  Blockchain-Strategie der Bundesregierung

  bloxberg

• MPDL Services GmbH: MoU mit Springer Nature über weltweit umfangreichsten Open Access-Transformationsvertrag unterzeichnet

  

  ^{Photocredit: Bettina Ausserhofer}

   

  Die MPDL Services GmbH , im Auftrag von Projekt DEAL und Springer Nature haben am 22.8.2019 in Berlin ein Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) unterzeichnet, das den Rahmen für die umfassendste Open Access-Vereinbarung weltweit definiert. Die bisherigen deutschen Subskriptionsausgaben für Springer Nature-Zeitschriften werden damit ab 2020 systematisch umgewidmet, um Fachartikel von Autor*innen aus deutschen Wissenschaftseinrichtungen bei Springer Nature frei verfügbar zu machen. Das MoU schafft die Grundlage für eine Transformationsvereinbarung, die eine Open Access-Gold-Komponente und ein „Publish and Read“-Element beinhalten wird. Rund 13.000 Beiträge aus deutschen Einrichtungen werden so pro Jahr in den über 600 Open-Access-Zeitschriften und in den 1.900 Subskriptionszeitschriften von Springer Nature open access publiziert. Darüber hinaus bietet das Modell der akademischen Gemeinschaft an den rund 700 teilnahmeberechtigten deutschen Wissenschaftseinrichtungen umfangreichen Lesezugriff auf die wissenschaftlichen Zeitschriften von Springer, Palgrave, Adis und Macmillan. Die finale Vereinbarung soll noch in diesem Jahr abgeschlossen und veröffentlicht werden.

  Zur HRK-Pressemitteilung

• Neue Edmond-Version: ORCID und Vorschläge für zusätzliche Metadaten

  Edmond, das Open Access Repositorium der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, unterstützt nun ORCID iDs und zusätzliche allgemeine fachliche Metadaten für Datensammlungen. Datensammlungen können nun direkt mit dazu gehörenden wissenschaftlichen Artikeln verlinkt werden, weiterhin gibt es neue Felder für Metadaten (geolocation, biological study object, chemical element/compound, temporal coverage). Diese Felder sind freiwillig, da nicht alles auf alle Sammlungen zutrifft. Sie können auch für bereits bestehende Sammlungen ausgefüllt werden, bereits vorhandene Informationen in der Beschreibung der Sammlung können verschoben werden. Für Details, siehe hier oder Mail an Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!.

• ARTiFACTS and Max Planck Society Partner to Expand Use of Blockchain Platform for Scholarly Communications

  Scientists to Receive Recognition for their Research Contributions on Max Planck Digital Library Blockchain-Based Platform

  Cambridge, Mass. USA/Munich, Germany  - ARTiFACTS and the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) announced today a collaboration to investigate how blockchain technology can advance the way scientific data is handled. By providing the possibility to record a permanent, valid, and immutable chain of research data in real-time, the recognition of scholarly contributions by the MPS research community will be lifted to a new level. Working with the Max Planck Digital Library, a central unit of the Max Planck Society (MPS) that supports thousands of scientists in their publication and research data management efforts, both teams are collaborating to advance the effectiveness of blockchain-based solutions for improving scholarly research and communication.

  It is universally recognized that sharing research findings earlier in the research process will accelerate discoveries. However, today’s scholarly communication process provides no system for sharing, discovering and attributing most scientific outputs. This delays the sharing of results, prevents scientists from receiving recognition in the form of citations to their contributions, impedes funding opportunities and career advancement.

  In collaboration with MPDL, ARTiFACTS will develop blockchain smart contracts and decentralized applications (dAPPs) on the bloxberg Blockchain enabling MPG scientists to receive recognition for all of the research materials they create. “Scientists repeatedly tell us they seek a secure, reliable and efficient method of sharing research materials in ways that both protect their intellectual property and enable them to receive recognition in real-time for their contributions,” said ARTiFACTS President and Co-Founder, Dave Kochalko. “By providing ARTiFACTS services over the distributed ledger platform supported by the Max Planck Digital Library, we are pleased to advance the mission of this world class research organization.”

  “This collaboration is an ideal fit with the forward-looking innovation our Digital Labs seeks to bring to the MPS research community,” said Sandra Vengadasalam, Head of the Digital Labs Department of the Max Planck Digital Library. “Backed by an experienced team delivering creative research information solutions, we look forward to working with ARTiFACTS and accelerating the velocity of MPS research.

  About ARTiFACTS

  ARTiFACTS, creators of the world’s first blockchain-based collaboration and attribution platform for scholarly research, provides a user-friendly platform, purpose built for academic and scientific research that leverages blockchain technology. Researchers can record a valid and immutable chain of records in real-time, from the earliest stages of research for all research artifacts, including citing/attribution transactions. While today’s digital scholarship merely creates linkages among an artificially narrowed subset of indexed publications long after discoveries are made, ARTiFACTS focuses on capturing and linking knowledge from its initial ideation throughout the research process to informal and formal dissemination. By using the ARTiFACTS platform, researchers will be able to immutably prove ownership and existence of novel work, expand access to their research artifacts, provide and receive real-time attribution for novel work and more comprehensively and rapidly build and demonstrate their body of scholarly contributions.

  To learn more, visit us at artifacts.ai and follow us on Twitter @ARTiFACTS_ai.

  
  About the Max Planck Society

  The Max Planck Society conducts basic research in the natural sciences, life science, and humanities. The 84 Max Planck Institutes and 17 Max Planck Centers internationally focus on research fields that are innovative and address forward-looking scientific questions. The Max Planck Digital Library is a central service unit of the Max Planck Society dedicated to the strategic planning, development and operation of digital infrastructures necessary for providing Max Planck Institutes with scientific information, publication support and research data management services. With its Digital Labs department, MPDL ensures a constant pipeline of new technologies to provide innovative and sustainable services for all Max Planck researchers.

  To learn more, visit us at https://www.mpdl.mpg.de/, and follow us on Twitter @mpdl and Instagram @mpdldigitallabs. 

   

• How to deal with no subscription DEAL

  In their joint push to bring the advantages of an open digital environment to scholarly publishing, research organizations around the globe are facing long and sometimes tough negotiations with academic publishers which may lead to a situation in which journal subscriptions have to be cancelled. MPDL in collaboration with Max Planck's PhD net have put together an overview of the most valuable alternative access routes for scholarly articles.

  Download flyer "How to deal with no subscription DEAL"

• New Consortium members for bloxberg

  We are very happy to announce the newest members of the bloxberg Consortium. Welcome KIT, Universidad Nacional de Colombia & University of Zurich!

   

  

  

  

• bloxberg publishes whitepaper

  The MPDL is happy to announce that the bloxberg whitepaper is published.

  Read more @ Newsroom of the Max Planck Society!

   

  

  Get the whitepaper @ bloxberg!

• Open Access Agreement with Cambridge University Press

  Building on the ‘read and publish’ agreement coordinated by the Bavarian State Library (BSB) with financial support from the German Research Foundation (DFG), MPDL on behalf of the Max Planck Society has now entered in a new open access agreement with Cambridge University Press,

  Go to the press release

• Transformative agreement with American Chemical Society (ACS)

  With the beginning of the year 2019, American Chemical Society (ACS) and Max Planck Gesellschaft have entered in a new transformative agreement that provides researchers affiliated with Max Planck institutes the opportunity to disseminate immediately, under an open access license, 100 percent of their research articles upon acceptance and publication by a peer-reviewed ACS journal.

  Read the full press release

• Looking back at the Open Science Days 2019

  On February 5/6 the MPDL had invited to the fourth Open Science Days at Berlin’s Harnack House.

  “Research Software” being this year’s focus topic of choice, a number of interested attendees from all over Europe and even overseas came together in the beautiful Goethe Auditorium.

  
  

   

  And the subject really turned out to be the right decision. It became clear that today, Research Software is and certainly will remain one of the central aspects for the future development of research itself.

  Compared to Open Access and even Open Research Data, a lot of basic questions are still unanswered – and several things are missing for a proper dealing with this topic in everyday research: Platforms, tools, workflows, standards, guidelines, rewarding systems, business models and much more.

  This calls for urgent action by all parties concerned – a message also included in the magnificent keynote by Roberto Di Cosmo. Furthermore, Mr. Di Cosmo reported about the concept and the activities of France’s Software Heritage, which deals with the collection, long term preservation and sharing of software from various sources.

  The conference talks included different concrete examples of Research Software like Picasso for DNA-PAINT, the robotic behavior orchestration software playful or GGIR, which is about processing raw data from movement sensors.

  Besides that, we got to know about platforms like swMath which brings together software and publication data, or the impressive services AiiDA and Materials Cloud for the procession of raw data at Lausannes EPFL.

  Initiatives presented at the conference were the Software Sustainability Institute and de-RSE, the German branch of an international network for Research Software Engineers. These are all about bringing the community together and supporting colleagues in their daily struggle with the reality of Research Software processes.

  The MDPL team really enjoyed these one and a half days at Harnack House and we took a huge mass of new ideas, impressions and information with us.

  Conference slides as well as some pictures are available at the OSD-Homepage.

• bloxberg – The novel Blockchain Consortium for Science

  Munich, February, 2019 – the Max Planck Digital Library is pleased to announce the new research project bloxberg: the first trusted research infrastructure

  Twelve exclusively selected leading research organizations from ten different countries came together to form the global Blockchain Consortium for Science – bloxberg.

  Sandra Vengadasalam and Friederike Kleinfercher from the Max Planck Society envisioned the first trusted research infrastructure by initiating the bloxberg summit to propel blockchain in science. The event took place from February 20th to the 22nd at the magnificent Ringberg Castle in the Bavarian Alps, close to Tegernsee.

  

  The bloxberg infrastructure is a secure global blockchain established by a consortium of leading research organizations – including Carnegie Mellon, UCL, ETH Library at ETH Zürich, Georgia Tech, IT University of Copenhagen, University of Belgrade, University of Johannesburg, University of Kassel, University of Nicosia, University of Sarajevo, and the Max Planck Society – to provide scientists with blockchain based services. The bloxberg infrastructure broadens the scientific landscape of regionally and nationally governed blockchain networks to become the first truly globally maintained decentralized network by scientists for science. By establishing the permissioned, public blockchain bloxberg, the network is safeguarded against the cryptographic power of third entities. The credibility of the research organizations maintaining the network constitutes trust in the system.

  After two days of intensive discussion, the founders signed a memorandum to establish the Novel Consortium for Blockchain in Science – bloxberg. bloxberg will foster services like proving the authenticity of data, protecting intellectual property rights, sharing of precious research results, peer reviewing and publishing, enabling decentralized autonomous research organizations, and much more.

  “With bloxberg a new era has begun” says Dr. Frank Sander, General Manager of the MPDL, “Now the data world has a new dimension: time”.

  The bloxberg founders are certain: “With bloxberg, we will change the way scientific data is managed, scientific results are communicated, and scientists collaborate”.

  Scientific institutions around the world are invited to join and become a part of bloxberg!

   

  To learn more visit: bloxberg

   

  

   

  Pictures: Clemens Fantur

• DEAL Abschluss mit Wiley erzielt

  Das Projekt DEAL zur bundesweiten Lizenzierung von Angeboten großer Wissenschaftsverlage hat heute in Berlin, im Zuge der 14. Konferenz Academic Publishing in Europe (APE), seinen ersten Vertragsabschluss mit dem Verlag John Wiley & Sons verkündet. Der Vertrag ist ein wegweisender Schritt in Richtung der seit Jahren durch die Allianz der Wissenschaftsorganisationen und in der internationalen Initiative Open Access 2020 vorangetriebene Open-Access-Transformation. Er berechtigt alle wissenschaftlichen Autorinnen und Autoren aus rund 700 deutschen Wissenschaftseinrichtungen ihre fast 10.000 jährlich in Wiley-Zeitschriften erscheinenden Fachartikel im Open Access unter einer freien Lizenz zu veröffentlichen.

  

  (Guido Herrmann, Wiley und Frank Sander, MPDL)

  Frank Sander, Leiter der Max Planck Digital Library, unterzeichnete heute für die „MPDL Services GmbH“, eine Tochtergesellschaft der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, den Vertrag.Der Vertragstext wird ab Mitte Februar auf der DEAL-Webseite vollständig veröffentlicht.

  Zur offiziellen Pressemitteilung

• Astronomy & Astrophysics signs transformative Open Access agreement with Max Planck Society

  We are excited about our new transformative agreement with EDP Sciences for Astronomy & Astrophysics, which is the single most important journal for the Max Planck Society, as measured by output. Almost 500 papers from Max Planck authors are published in Astronomy & Astrophysics per year.

  Read the full press release

• Max-Planck-Gesellschaft verzichtet auf Elsevier-Zeitschriften

  Zur Unterstützung der DEAL-Verhandlungen wird der bisherige Vertrag nicht fortgeführt

  Die Wissenschaftlichen Mitglieder und der Präsident der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft (MPG) haben einhellig den Beschluss gefasst, dass die für die Literaturbeschaffung in der MPG zuständige Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) ihr Elsevier-Abonnement Ende 2018 mit Ablauf der derzeit bestehenden Vereinbarung nicht verlängert. Sie bekräftigen damit gleichzeitig ihre Unterstützung für das nationale Lizenzierungsprojekt DEAL und schließen sich den etwa 200 Universitäten und Forschungseinrichtungen in Deutschland an, deren individuelle Vereinbarungen mit Elsevier bereits im Laufe der Jahre 2016 und 2017 nicht erneuert wurden. „DEAL steht ganz im Einklang mit den Zielen der von der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft maßgeblich beförderten OA 2020-Initiative,“ betont MPG-Präsident Martin Stratmann.

  DEAL ist eine gemeinsame Initiative der Allianz der deutschen Wissenschaftsorganisationen unter der Federführung der deutschen Hochschulrektorenkonferenz, die das Ziel verfolgt, bundesweite Verträge mit den drei größten Verlagen nach dem Modell „Publizieren und Lesen“ zu verhandeln. Hierüber soll das derzeit kostenpflichtige Abonnementsystem auf ein Modell umgestellt werden, in dem Forschende und die Allgemeinheit sofort barriere- und kostenfrei auf Forschungsergebnisse zugreifen können. Anstelle der Abonnements werden die Verlage für ihre Publikationsdienstleistungen direkt vergütet, wobei alle Publikationen deutscher Autoren in den Zeitschriften der Verlage unmittelbar frei zugänglich sind. Dieser Verhandlungsansatz ist eine Reaktion auf die unhaltbaren Preissteigerungen im Bereich der wissenschaftlichen Zeitschriften und auf den hemmenden Effekt, den ein eingeschränkter Zugang auf den Forschungsprozess hat.

  Die Verhandlungen mit Elsevier waren im Juli 2018 ausgesetzt worden, da der Verlag nicht bereit war, ein tragfähiges Vertragsmodell anzubieten, das einen freien Zugang zu allen Veröffentlichungen von Autoren deutscher Institutionen ermöglicht. Die Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler an den Einrichtungen ohne Elsevier-Zugang machen nun Gebrauch von alternativen Zugangswegen zu wissenschaftlichen Inhalten. In Zusammenarbeit mit den Institutsbibliotheken bietet die Max Planck Digital Library einen Bestellservice an, der die Versorgung mit den Inhalten, die ab Januar wegfallen werden, weiterhin sicherstellt.

  „Wir wollen einen echten Paradigmenwechsel im System des wissenschaftlichen Publizierens und damit die Möglichkeiten des digitalen Zeitalters endlich ausnutzen“, so Gerard Meijer, Direktor am Fritz-Haber-Institut der MPG und Mitglied im DEAL-Verhandlungsteam. In einer weiteren Unterstützungsaktion für das Projekt DEAL traten 13 prominente Wissenschaftler der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft von ihren Positionen als Herausgeber sowie als Mitglieder von Beiräten der bei Elsevier erscheinenden Zeitschriften zurück.

  „Verträge nach dem Modell ‚Publizieren und Lesen‘ sind ein zentrales Instrument der Open-Access-Transformationsstrategie, die sowohl von DEAL auf Bundesebene als auch durch die Max-Planck-Gesellschaft in der internationalen Initiative Open Access 2020 vorangetrieben wird“, sagt Ralf Schimmer, Stellvertretender Leiter der Max Planck Digital Library. „Unser Ziel ist es, den Publikationsoutput der MPG über diese Verträge im Laufe der nächsten Jahre nahezu komplett frei zugänglich zu machen. Mit vielen der für die Max-Planck-Gesellschaft wichtigen Verlage, wie z.B. Springer Nature, Royal Society of Chemistry und Institute of Physics Publishing, ist der Einstieg in das neue Modell bereits gelungen. Weitere Verlage werden in 2019 folgen.“

  Die Max-Planck-Gesellschaft zählt 14.000 Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler, die jährlich rund 12.000 neue Forschungsartikel veröffentlichen, von denen rund 1.500 in Elsevier-Zeitschriften erscheinen.

   

• New transformative Open Access Agreement with Oxford University Press

  The Max Planck Digital Library established a central transformative Open Access agreement with Oxford University Press (OUP) allowing Max Planck Members to publish Open Access in OUP’s journal collection. Open Access charges will be covered centrally by MPDL as of submission date January 1, 2019.

  OUP press release

   

   

   

• Die 14. Berliner Open-Access-Konferenz sendet ein starkes Signal an die wissenschaftlichen Verlage

  Vom 4. bis 5. Dezember haben 170 Teilnehmer aus 37 Ländern weltweit darüber diskutiert, wo die Forschungsorganisationen und ihre Bibliothekskonsortien in ihren Verhandlungen mit den wissenschaftlichen Verlagen stehen, um das wissenschaftliche Publizieren auf Open Access umzustellen. An der 14. Berliner Open-Access-Konferenz, die von der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft veranstaltet und von der Max Planck Digital Library im Auftrag der Initiative „Open-Access 2020“ organisiert wurde, nahmen Vertreterinnen und Vertreter von Forschungsförderungsorganisationen, Bibliotheken und Regierungen, Forschungsverbänden und anderen Dachorganisationen teil.

  Um den Übergang vom subskriptionsbasierten System des wissenschaftlichen Publizierens zu Open-Access-basierten Geschäftsmodellen herbeizuführen, erreichte die Konferenz einen Konsens zwischen den verschiedenen internationalen Gemeinschaften. Ein Schwerpunkt wurde auf transformative Vereinbarungen gelegt (z.B. „Read and Publish“), die derzeit als die geeignetsten Instrumente im Übergang zu Open Access gelten. Wie aus Erklärungen von Vertretern Japans, der Vereinigten Staaten, Südafrikas und anderer Länder deutlich wurde, geht die Bereitschaft, diesen Ansatz zu verfolgen, inzwischen über Europa hinaus, und wird derzeit von mehreren Ländern übernommen. Dies wurde insbesondere in einer Erklärung Chinas deutlich, der Nation mit dem größten Anteil an Forschungspublikationen.

  

  Nachdem sich alle Organisationen am ersten Tag der Konferenz über die Ziele und Strategien abgestimmt hatten, wurden die CEOs der drei größten wissenschaftlichen Zeitschriften-Verlage – Elsevier, John Wiley & Sons und Springer Nature – vom Präsidenten der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, Martin Stratmann, am zweiten Tag eingeladen, die weltweite Nachfrage nach transformativen Vereinbarungen zu diskutieren. Die Forschungsgemeinschaften wollen sich zu einem vollständigen und sofortigen Publizieren in Open Access verpflichten, zur Beibehaltung der Urheberrechte und zur Aushandlung transformativer Vereinbarungen, die befristete, vorübergehende und kostenneutrale Mittel für den Wechsel zu einem vollständigen Open Access innerhalb weniger Jahre darstellen. Dabei wird davon ausgegangen wird, dass Kosteneinsparungen folgen werden, wenn die Marktkräfte erst einmal greifen. Die Verlage wurden aufgefordert, sich nach diesen Grundsätzen für einen vollständigen und sofortigen Übergang zu Open Access einzusetzen.

  Es zeigte sich auch, dass es eine starke Übereinstimmung zwischen den Ansätzen von OA2020, Plan S, dem Jussieu Call und anderen Ansätzen gibt, die sich für mehr Open Access im Bereich wissenschaftlichen Publizierens einsetzen.

  Weitere Berichte werden in Kürze auf der Homepage der 14. Berliner Open-Access-Konferenz veröffentlicht:
  https://oa2020.org/b14-conference/

  Außerdem:

  Bericht in der Süddeutschen Zeitung online

  Nature News-Beitrag zur Konferenz (englisch)

   

• The Novel Blockchain Consortium for Science: bloxberg @ Blockchain Munich Meetup

  As a keynote speaker the MPDL presented their new project bloxberg at the last Blockchain Munich Meetup. The bloxberg infrastructure is a secure global blockchain established by a consortium of leading research organizations to provide scientists worldwide with decentralized services based on the bloxberg-blockchain. It aims to foster a collaboration among the global scientific community, empowering researchers with robust, autonomous services that transcend institutional boundaries. For example, with consented transactions on the bloxberg infrastructure, research claims need not be limited to one institution alone, but can be confirmed by the whole trusted network. Additionally, researchers can also leverage bloxberg to create a transparent footprint of their work, without revealing its content.

  The vision is to have sufficient representation from various scientific entities participating in the consortium, so that the network itself may replace traditional scientific infrastructure such as closed-access publishing of research results, among others.

  A great deal of interest was shown by the participants who were really interested in the topic of Blockchain in Science. The MPDL’s vision was lively discussed during and after the talk.

  We would like to thank everyone who joined us at the Blockchain Munich Meetup and we hope to see everyone soon!

  

  

   

• Software Licensing Service jetzt online!

  Der Software Licensing Service der MPDL ist seit heute online. Der zentrale Service richtet sich an alle Institute und Einrichtungen der MPG und zielt darauf ab, eine Grundversorung mit Software und Online Services ähnlich zur Grundversorgung mit Literatur in der MPG aufzubauen. Auf unserer neuen, MPG-internen SoLi-Website finden Sie alle Informationen zu den lizenzierten Produkten, Vertragskonditionen und Organisation des Services.

  https://www.soli.mpdl.mpg.de

   

• Neuer Open-Access-Rahmenvertrag mit der Royal Society

  In Ergänzung zu unseren bestehenden Rahmenverträgen werden nun auch die Kosten für das Open-Access-Publizieren bei der Royal Society zentral übernommen. Publizierende aus der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft können somit in den beiden Open-Access-Zeitschriften der Royal Society "Open Biology" and "Royal Society Open Science" publizieren, wobei die Publikationsgebühren über den neuen Vertrag abgedeckt werden. Mehr Informationen zu unseren Open-Access-Verträgen finden Sie hier:

  https://www.mpdl.mpg.de/en/services/service-catalog/oa-goldpublishing

   

• Do you know what could make writing articles easier?

  We are piloting a new tool that, different from Google Docs, also gives authors the ability to collaborate in the article writing process and share references, figures, equations and tables--all in one environment. This new tool is called SciFlow, an authoring platform that has been expressly customized for Max Planck Society researchers. In SciFlow you will find style templates required by the journals that are most popular among MPG researchers, making it easy to format your article for submission and re-submission according to different journal requirements.

  If you have not yet tried SciFlow, go to https://www.sciflow.net where you will find a dedicated Max Planck Society landing page to get started and additional information on open access publishing (access from within a Max Planck IP range required). This new tool is brought to you by the Max Planck Digital Library, your information service provider.

  How can we make your work easier? MPDL would like to learn more about the tools and services you use and prefer when you are writing and publishing scientific papers, such as collaborative writing and reference sharing tools like SciFlow, authoring and language editing services, independent peer review services (not associated with a journal), or post publication research communication services. Tell us how we can make your work easier by responding to two quick questions that will help us understand the tools you find useful and what further tools you would like. We want to anticipate your needs and provide you with the best service possible.

  Go to the survey:

  Tools and services for scientific writing and publishing

  Thank you for your time and do not hesitate to contact us.

• Ein Werkstattbericht: Artikel über das Handling von Offsetting-Verträgen an der MPDL erschienen

  Offsetting-Verträge sind Open-Access-Geschäftsmodelle, die Subskriptions- mit Publikationsgebühren verrechnen. Als Instrumente der Open-Access-Transformation sollen sie den Übergang zu reinen publikationsbasierten Open-Access-Modellen ermöglichen. In der neuen Ausgabe der Bibliotheks-Fachzeitschrift „ABI Technik“ geben Adriana Sikora und Michael Schlachter Einblick in die Backoffice-Arbeit mit den Offsetting-Verträgen der MPDL. Von der Autorenidentifikation bis zur Rechnungsbearbeitung werden alle Arbeitsabläufe dargestellt und Herausforderungen und Probleme aufgezeigt.

  Zum Artikel

• Neuer Open-Access-Vertrag mit IOP Publishing

  Publikationen von Max-Planck-Autorinnen und -Autoren mit dem Status "corresponding author" werden ab 2018 auf der Grundlage eines neuen Vertragsmodells in ausgewählten Zeitschriften des Verlags Institute of Physics Publishing (IOP) unter der freien Open-Access-Lizenz CC-BY veröffentlicht. Gleichzeitig besteht weiterhin ein MPG-weiter Zugriff auf alle Zeitschrifteninhalte der Kollektion IOPscience extra.

  Dieses neue Vertragsmodell ist ein weiterer Meilenstein entsprechend der Strategie "Open Access 2020". Im Rahmen von OA2020 möchte die MPDL die Verträge mit wissenschaftlichen Verlagen auf ein Open-Access-Modell umstellen, sodass perspektivisch der gesamte Publikationsoutput der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft, wie bereits 2003 in der Berliner Erklärung gefordert, ohne Barrieren zugänglich und nachnutzbar ist. Der Verlag IOP zählt zu den zwanzig wichtigsten Publikationsorten für die Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft.  

  Weitere Informationen für Max-Planck-Autoren

  Pressemitteilung von IOP

• Blockchainify your research data!

  Munich, February, 2018 – The Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) is pleased to announce a new pilot project with Bernstein Technologies GmbH (Bernstein), which will give MPG-scientists access to the groundbreaking blockchain technology to certify their research data on the Bitcoin Blockchain.

                      

  In particular the collaboration between Bernstein and the MPDL will launch a custom version of the Bernstein web application and grant access to a selected group of users within the MPG. Using this technology Bernstein allows researchers at the MPG to create a digital trail of records of their innovation. Therefore designs, inventions and proofs of use can be registered to obtain blockchain certificates that prove ownership, existence and integrity of any IP asset. Thanks to a unique cryptographic layer all notarized information will remain entirely private.

  “Being able to certify research data at any state is a big step towards proving and securing data ownership. We are happy to offer our MPG-researchers such an easy while, at the same time, secure tool to certify their research data” says Dr. Frank Sander, General Manager of the MPDL. Marco Barulli, Managing Director of Bernstein is thinking ahead and states that “the present collaboration may also evolve in the implementation of a defensive publishing service combining blockchain certificates and IPFS (InterPlanetary File System) decentralized data storage”.

  Both parties believe blockchain and other decentralized technologies will have a strong impact on the way knowledge​ ​will​ ​be​ ​registered​ ​and​ ​shared​ ​in​ ​the​ ​future​ ​to​ ​the​ ​benefits​ ​of​ ​science,​ ​art,​ ​innovation​ ​and​ ​society.

  About Bernstein

  Bernstein is a German startup offering blockchain-based solutions for securing intellectual property assets.  It combines blockchain certifications with digital timestamps issued by official Time Stamp Authorities​ ​(TSA)​ ​in​ ​different​ ​geographies. It allows companies to create a digital trail of records of their innovation processes using blockchain technology. To learn more visit: https://www.bernstein.io/

  About Max Planck Digital Library

  The Max Planck Digital Library is a service unit within the Max-Planck-Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaften e.V. (MPG) dedicated to the strategic planning, development and operation of the digital infrastructures necessary for providing Max Planck Institutes with scientific information, publication support and​ ​research​ ​data​ ​management​ ​services. To learn more visit: https://www.mpdl.mpg.de/

• Super Start der MPDL-Service Roadshow 2018 in Hannover

  Auch im neuen Jahr steigt die Begeisterung an den MPDL-Services weiter an: so wurden wir am 25. Januar vom MPI für Gravitationsphysik (Albert-Einstein-Institut) im Rahmen seines wöchentlichen Institutsseminars eingeladen, um unser Portfolio vorzustellen. Hiermit hatte die MPDL-Service-Tour einen erstklassigen Start für die kommende Roadshow 2018 mit einem vollen Saal und vielen Fragen der Forschenden zu den vorgestellten Services.

  Ein riesen Dank geht an Dr. Frank Ohme für die Einladung ans MPI für Gravitationsphysik und dessen Gastfreundschaft!

   

  

• Max-Planck-Gesellschaft unterstützt SciPost

  Auf Initiative führender Max-Planck-Wissenschaftler unterstützt die Max-Planck-Gesellschaft die Weiterentwicklung des Open-Access-Publikationsportals SciPost mit einer Einmalzahlung von 20.000 €. SciPost will innovative Wege für das wissenschaftliche Publizieren im Bereich der Physik etablieren und nutzt dabei den Preprint-Workflow des Repositoriums ArXive. Die SciPost-Journale operieren nach dem Open-Access-Model. Für einzelne Artikel werden dabei keine Publikationsgebühren erhoben („Platin“ Open Access).

  Zur SciPost Pressemitteilung

• It’s the workflows, stupid! Artikel über die Anforderungen an Offsetting-Verträge erschienen

  In der aktuellen Ausgabe des britischen Bibliotheks-Journals "UKSG Insights" erläutern Graham Stone (Jisc) und Kai Geschuhn (MPDL) strategische und vertragliche Voraussetzungen für neue Open-Access-Vertragsmodelle, die derzeit unter dem Label "Offsetting" diskutiert werden. Der Artikel stellt die Ergebnisse zweier Workshops vor, welche im Rahmen der an der MPDL geleiteten Initiative "ESAC" durchgeführt wurden. Auf den Workshops in 2016 und 2017 diskutierten die Mitglieder von Bibliothekskonsortien verschiedener Länder untereinander und mit Verlagen die grundsätzliche strategische Ausrichtung von "Offsetting" im Rahmen der Open-Access-Transformation sowie die praktischen Anforderungen für die Implementierung der neuen, auf Publikationsgebühren basierenden Vertragsmodelle.

  "Offsetting" oder auch sog. "Read and Publish" Vertragsmodelle stehen vielfach in der Kritik, finanziell nicht nachhaltig zu sein und die Fehlentwicklungen des derzeitigen Subskriptionswesens für wissenschaftliche Zeitschriften, wie etwa die Monopolisierung des Zeitschriftenmarktes, weiter zu befördern. Allerdings fehlt es derzeit sowohl auf Anbieter- als auch auf Kundenseite an einer klaren Zielvorstellung für die derzeitigen Verträge, die vielmehr ein Übergangsmodell darstellen als einen neuen Standard. In dieser Phase bietet sich auch die Möglichkeit, bisherige Verhandlungspraktiken und Kostenstrukturen zu hinterfragen und neu zu denken. Des Weiteren zeigt die Praxis, dass das Gelingen von publikationsbasierten Open-Access-Verträgen auch stark von der Skalierbarkeit der Prozesse zwischen den Verlagen und ihren Kunden abhängt. Auch hier gilt es, rechtzeitig auf Automatisierung und Standardisierung hinzuwirken, um Transparenz und Effizienz für das neue Modell sicherzustellen. Der Artikel stellt diesbezüglich ein Anforderungsdokument vor, das im Anschluss an den 2017er-Workshop veröffentlicht wurde. Die "Customer recommendations for article workflows and services for offsetting/ open access transformation agreements" geben Empfehlungen und Good Practices zu Fragen wie Identifizierung der berechtigten Autoren durch die Verlage, Metadatenaustausch und Abwicklung der Rechnungsstellung und des Reportings.

  Zum Artikel

   

   

   

• DAS SUBSKRIPTIONSWESEN BEENDEN, IN OPEN ACCESS INVESTIEREN!

  Open in order to innovate!

  Im Rahmen der internationalen Open Access Woche 2017 startet die Initiative OA2020 ihren neuen Webauftritt mit einem Apell an Wissenschaftseinrichtungen und Bibliotheken weltweit zur Beendigung des traditionellen Subskriptionswesens und zur Reinvestition der in den Subskriptionen gebundenen Finanzmittel in innovative und nachhaltige Open-Access-Modelle.

  Zur vollständigen Pressemitteilung

• Große Begeisterung an den MPDL-Services am MPI für molekulare Biomedizin in Münster

  Das Interesse an einem Vortrag zu den MPDL-Services war auch am MPI für molekulare Biomedizin so groß, dass die MPDL gebeten wurde beim MISS-Seminar am 20. Oktober ihr breites Portfolio an Angeboten vorzustellen. Im gutbesuchten Auditorium wurde bereits während des Vortrags sowie danach angeregt diskutiert. Auch die Happy Hour am Abend bot eine gute Plattform zum weiteren Meinungsaustausch.

  Ein großer Dank geht an Dr. Gabriele Bixel, Vertreterin der wissenschaftlichen Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter des Instituts, die die MPDL nach Münster eingeladen hat!

  

• MPDL unterstützt NachwuchswissenschaftlerInnen beim PhDnet GöHub in Göttingen

  Am 7. September wurde die MPDL vom Max Planck PhDnet GöHub nach Göttingen eingeladen. Das jährliche Treffen fand dieses Mal am MPI zur Erforschung multireligiöser und multiethnischer Gesellschaften statt. Innerhalb dieses Rahmens konnte die MPDL erfolgreich ihre Services vorstellen, die von den Teilnehmenden mit großer Begeisterung aufgenommen wurden.

  Facebook Max Planck PhDnet

  

  

• MPDL partners with 1science

  The Max Planck Digital Library set up an agreement with the Canadian based information provider 1science. By this, Max Planck affiliates receive access to the 1science database "1findr" which is considered to be world’s largest curated open access discovery platform.

  Read 1science press release

   

• Open Science Days 2017 am 16./17. Oktober

  Die Max Planck Digital Library möchte Sie herzlich zu den Open Science Days 2017 einladen.
  
  The event will take place at the Harnack House in Berlin and is going to extend over one and a half days (October 16/17). It is directed at researchers and specialists from inside and especially from outside the Max Planck Society who are interested in an interdisciplinary communication about Open Science.
  
  For the upcoming event we have chosen to focus on a topic which has been immensely popular among information specialists in recent years: Open Research Data
  Apart from the Open Access movement, this probably is the most prominent area of Open Science right now. Since this issue has been widely discussed at numerous conferences or workshops dealing with Open Science for quite some time now, we would like to review and take stock of the preliminary development and discussion so far.
  
  The conference language will be English. The participation fee is 100 € and the number of participants is limited to 60 persons.
  
  For registration and a preliminary program please visit: http://osd.mpdl.mpg.de.

• New Open Access Agreement with Hindawi

  The Max Planck Digital Library established a new central agreement with Open Access publisher Hindawi, allowing Max Planck authors to publish Open Access in all Hindawi journals. Open Access charges for all corresponding authors with a Max Planck affiliation will be covered centrally by MPDL as of submission date August 1, 2017.

  Hindawi press release

  MPDL central Open Access agreements

   

• MPDL supports Open Library of the Humanities

  The Open Library of Humanities is an academic-led, gold open-access publisher with no author-facing charges. With funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the platform covers its costs by payments from an international library consortium, rather than any kind of author fee.

  Read the OLH press release

• Electronic Laboratory Notebook Software „labfolder“ also available via MPG central installation

  The electronic laboratory notebook software “labfolder” is now also available via the central MPG installation https://labfolder.mpdl.mpg.de provided by the MPDL. The Data will be securely stored at the GWDG.

  Basically, all Max Planck institutes and facilities of the MPG, as well as institutes and facilities, whose provider, scientific sponsor or cooperation partner is the MPG, are able to use the software.
  For usage of the central MPG installation please create a new user account at https://labfolder.mpdl.mpg.de. Please be aware that during your signup you have to be inside the Max-Planck IT-infrastructure.

  In addition to an account in the central MPG installation, labfolder can also be set up as an in-house service at the respective institute. Thereby, the emerging data will be stored in locally operated server environments.
  For using a local labfolder installation, Max Planck researchers need to contact the in-house IT department and/or library team on-site. Cooperation with researchers outside the Max Planck Society are possible, but are potentially limited by regulations of the respective Max Planck Institutes.

  Please feel free to contact the Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!.

• [workspaz] turns to «collective»

  [workspaz], the scientific collaboration and communication platform has been renamed due to compliance reasons. Its new name is: «collective».
  The platform can now be reached under https://collective.mpdl.mpg.de. [workspaz] URLs will be redirected to the new domain.
  «collective» is a customized version of the open source software Open Atrium.

  The platform offers the following functionalities:

  • Spaces for institutes, departments, project teams etc.
  • Multiple differentiation possibilities of permission setting (public and private groups or spaces which can be structured hierarchically)
  • Within your workspace you can have calendars, document sections (e. g. to make a wiki) and areas to upload and structure your files/data
  • You can also start discussions and do simple project management by using the task lists tool within your workspace

  The «collective» team will gladly establish a working area for you within the «collective» platform.

  How to start:

  1. Register and contact the support
  2. Individualise your space
  3. Invite your team
  4. Collaborate & communicate

  Please feel free to contact the team using Diese E-Mail-Adresse ist vor Spambots geschützt! Zur Anzeige muss JavaScript eingeschaltet sein!

• American Physical Society joins SCOAP3

  The American Physical Society (APS) and CERN, as the host organization of SCOAP3, have entered into an open access agreement. Under this agreement, which will be in effect come January 1st, 2018, high-energy physics (HEP) articles will be published open access at no direct costs to the authors in three of the leading APS journals (Physical Review C, Physical Review D and Physical Review Letters).

  Press release CERN

  Press release APS