Open Access and Research Conference - general comments

From Wednesday 24 September - Thursday 25 September, QUT Faculty of Law and the OAK Law Project ran the Open Access and Research Conference at the Stamford Hotel, Brisbane.

I think the conference was a great success. There were a great number of attendees both from Australia and abroad who were extremely knowledgeable about open access, e-research and the digital environment. These attendees included John Wilbanks of Science Commons, Alma Swan of Key Perspectives, Richard Jefferson of CAMBIA and Patent Lens, Professor Brian Fitzgerald and Professor Anne Fitzgerald of QUT Law Faculty, Maarten Wilbers of CERN, Professor Stevan Harnad (via video link), Tony Hey from Microsoft, Carolina Rossini formerly of Creative Commons Brazil and now based at Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society, Senator Kim Carr (via video link), Professor Warwick Anderson of NHMRC, Dr Andrew Treloar of the ANDS Establishment Project, Frederika Welle Donker of Delft University in the Netherlands, and many many more. The quality of attendees at the conference meant that the discussions which followed each presentation and continued into the morning tea and lunch breaks were some of the most interesting I have heard to date.

Senator Kim Carr's opening address strongly endorsed the principles of open access to knowledge and information, and referred to the recommendations made in the recently released green paper on the Review of the National Innovation System ("the Cutler Review"), of which there was much discussion generally at the OAR Conference. (For the relevant recommendations, see my earlier post).

On the first day, John Wilbanks gave an enlightening presentation that discussed how the internet is "democratizing knowledge" by breaking down the "guild culture" of experts on a particular topic and replacing it with a "network culture" where experts still have a role but where others have more input as well.

Then, Professor Brian Fitzgerald of QUT law faculty announced the upcoming collaboration between QUT and Richard Jefferson of CAMBIA.

On the second day, Maarten Wilbers of CERN fascinated everyone with pictures of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), which has just been turned on, and with an intriguing history of CERN and the role it has played in the open access and e-research movements, right from the creation of the world wide web by Tim Berners Lee through to the LHC today.

I was also very interested to hear from Frederika Welle Donker, who took us through the developments in Europe in relation to open access to public sector information (PSI) and materials. In particular, she discussed the European Union PSI and INSPIRE Directives.

The presentations of all participants will be available shortly on the OAK Law website.

Queensland Premier's Literary Awards

I am pleased to announce that a good friend of mine, Amy Vought Barker, has won the Queensland Premier's Literary Award in the Emerging Queensland Author category for her manuscript, Omega Park. Amy's manuscript will now be published by University of Queensland Press (UQP).

The full list of winners were reported in today's Courier Mail, or you can visit the Department of the Premier and Cabinet's website here.

Congratulations Amy!

[Update - see this post at Literary Minded]

just a quick note...

...to say that I have updated my CV to reflect that as of yesterday, I am now admitted as a legal practitioner in the Supreme Court of Queensland. There is a link to my CV in the right hand bar.

Update: conferences

This is just a reminder of the upcoming conferences at which I will be presenting:

Open Access and Research Conference

hosted by the OAK Law Project and QUT Faculty of Law, at the Stamford Plaza Hotel, Brisbane, Queensland, 24-26 September 2008

I am leading a workshop, with Scott Kiel-Chisholm and Anthony Austin, on Friday 26 September, 9:00am - 12:00pm, entitled, "Practical steps for handling copyright, IP and other legal issues.

Register here


eResearch Australasia 2008

Sebel and Citigate Hotels, Albert Park, Melbourne, Australia, 29 September - 3 October 2008

I am presenting in a workshop on Friday 3 October, entitled, e-Research in the Arts, Humanities and Cultural Heritage. My presentation will be on "Academic Authors, Publishing and Open Access in an e-Research Environment".

Register here

Innovation Review

venturous australia, the Report on the Review of the National Innovation System has just been released: see here.

I have yet to read the entire 228 pages of it; however, on a first skim, the interesting recommendations from my perspective are:

Recommendation 6.5
To build concentrations of excellence, encourage collaboration and achieve better dissemination of knowledge, introduce additional funding support for university and other research institutions to partner with each other and with other research organisations (national and international). Discussions about additional levels of support should occur during the projected
round of compact negotiations.

Recommendation 7.7
Australia should establish a National Information Strategy to optimise the flow of information in the Australian economy.
The fundamental aim of a National Information Strategy should be to:

• utilise the principles of targeted transparency and the development of auditable standards to maximise the flow of information in private markets about product quality; and
• maximise the flow of government generated information, research, and content for the benefit of users (including private sector resellers of information).

Recommendation 7.8
Australian governments should adopt international standards of open publishing as far as possible. Material released for public information by Australian governments should be released under a creative commons licence.

Recommendation 7.9
Funding models and institutional mandates should recognise the research and innovation role and contributions of cultural agencies and institutions responsible for information repositories, physical collections or creative content and fund them accordingly.

Recommendation 7.10
A specific strategy for ensuring the scientific knowledge produced in Australia is placed in machine searchable repositories be developed and implemented using public funding agencies and universities as drivers.

Recommendation 7.14
To the maximum extent practicable, information, research and content funded by Australian governments – including national collections – should be made freely available over the internet as part of the global public commons. This should be done whilst the Australian Government encourages other countries to reciprocate by making their own contributions to the global
digital public commons.

Recommendation 12.1
The Prime Minister’s Science, Engineering and Innovation Council should be replaced by a new National Innovation Council, chaired by the Prime Minister, and supported by a small but high level Office of Innovation. An International Innovation Advisory Panel would be formed to provide advice to the Council on international engagement.

Recommendation 12.8
That common metrics, performance indicators and mechanisms for collecting and sharing data be developed and adopted by all jurisdictions.

Recommendation 12.13
A National Centre for Innovation Research should be established to advance knowledge of the innovation system through high quality, independent research which is strongly relevant to policy and practice.


I am particularly excited to see Creative Commons licensing appear in Recommendation 7.8 and the notion of the "global public commons" in Recommendation 7.14.

I will post more on my thoughts about the Innovation Review once I have read the Report properly