Press Release: An OA Repository for Israel

[Alexei Koudinov <koudinov@inbox.ru>]

Israel Scholar Works to Expand Israel and Global Jewish Scholar 
Communication Tradition

By publishing the first postscript article, Israel Scholar, a web 
based independent non-profit educational organization based in 
academic town of Rehovot, Israel, officially launched today The 
Israel Scholar Works.

Israel Scholar Works (ISW) is a digital archive (repository) for 
creative work by the faculty, staff and students of Israel 
Academic Institutions and Jewish scholars all around the world. 
Run by scholars, Israel Scholar Works aims to facilitate 
innovation in the production and dissemination of Israel 
scholarship, to promote and unite Israel and global Jewish 
scholarship, to make it available to a wider audience, and to 
help assure its long-term preservation.

Israel Scholar, its partners in Israel and across the global 
academic world are reshaping scholarly communication. Taking 
digital age advantage of the modern Internet technology and its' 
end-user availability, Israel Scholar has established the Israel 
Scholar Works, where every Israel and/or Jewish scholar can 
personally permanently archive his or her creative work, and make 
it freely available for peers and for the public. Such archive 
thus provides a platform to have Israel scholars' rights to 
regain control over their scholarship realized easily.

While Israel Scholar Works present focus is postscript (or 
postprint) archiving of articles originally published in 
peer-reviewed journals and dissertations by Israel/Jewish 
scholars, in future the Repository will offer direct control over 
creation and dissemination of the full range of scholarly output, 
including pre-publication materials, conference proceedings, book 
chapters and teaching series. Importantly, it will cross 
disciplinary boundaries, giving it a wider scope than any journal 
or any small set of journals.

This is especially important, because current scholar publishing 
models are not economically sound and do not serve the public 
interest. Academic researchers, faculty and students have access 
to a decreasing fraction of relevant scholarship. New software 
tools and technologies, however, are being developed, tested and 
implemented. In addition to The Works, Israel Scholar runs Israel 
Scholar Communication Scrolls section that help scholars to 
realize that the responsibility and rights of regaining control 
of scholarly communication rests with them.

Sadly, "Israel does not have the level of Open Access activity 
that we see in any other part of the world with comparable levels 
of higher education and research," says Peter Suber, a leading 
proponent of Open Access, Open Access project director of 
Washington, DC based non-profit Public Knowledge, and the author 
of Open Access News. Israel Scholar Works founder Dr. Alexei 
Koudinov "is the leading proponent of Open Access in Israel and 
is trying almost alone to change this," Professor Suber adds.

Israel Scholar aims to raise the profile of Open Access among 
Israeli scholars, librarians, university administrators, and 
government officials, and help bring Israel to a level of 
recognition for its OA activity commensurate with its levels of 
scientific research.

Having a feasible development project (presented at the Society 
for Neuroscience annual meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, October 
14-18, 2006), Israel Scholar is open for grant or philanthropic 
support by an individual or organization.

Israel Scholar Works is available at www.israelscholar.org

For more information, please contact Israel Scholar at (972 54) 
796-8607 , skype userid akoudinov or 
postmaster[at]israelscholar.org .

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The above press release also available at:
<http://israelscholar.org/openaccess/2006/10/israel-scholar-works-to-expand-israel.html>