Spotlight on: Open Journal Systems (OJS)

The judges have selected a shortlist of three for the ALPSP Impact Award 2024. This year's awards are sponsored by PA EDitorial.

The finalists will be showcased in a lightning session at the ALPSP Conference on 11 September. The winners will be announced at the ALPSP Conference Awards Dinner on 12 September in Manchester.

In this series, we hear from each of the finalists.

Tell us about your organization

The Public Knowledge Project is a faculty-led research and development initiative at Simon Fraser University and Stanford University. Founded in 1998 with the intent of opening access to knowledge, PKP facilitates public and researcher access to its free and open source software, as well as supporting it with open education resources and conducting scholarly communication research. Its team of developers, researchers, and community support personnel are funded through research grants, library membership, and by providing hosting services for its software.  

What is the project/product that you submitted for the Awards?

Open Journal Systems (OJS) is an open source journal management and publishing platform developed by the Public Knowledge Project that has grown over the last twenty years into the world’s most widely used platform with over 44,000 journals deploying it around the world, with the software available in roughly 30 languages (provided by the user community), with many of the journals bilingual, while publishing research in 60 languages. In terms of impact, OJS has enabled global participation in the digital publication of peer-reviewed research and has given rise to the Diamond Open Access model (with no fees for authors or readers). 

Tell us a little about how it works and the team behind it

As an open source platform, users freely download and install OJS locally on their web servers, where it can generate any number of journals, each of which offers a setup wizard for organizing and filling out the journal, workflow, and website, with a choice of languages and other features. OJS can then serve to receive submissions, manage their peer review through multiple rounds as needed, and then see through their copyediting and production. Issues can be assembled and published on OJS where they are then indexed in Google Scholar and other services, as well as being preserved in the PKP Preservation Network. The team behind OJS is globally distributed and divided among developers, community support personnel, and researchers, with the institutional support of Simon Fraser University. The larger community of OJS users provides software translations, participates in software sprints, and develops open source plugins for special features that are shared by all.

In what ways do you think it demonstrates innovation?

OJS demonstrates innovation by providing the academic community with an open source infrastructure that combines editorial management with a publishing platform, enabling community translations of the software, using a plugin architecture that enables community users to develop additional features for the benefit of all, as well as a template structure that makes for easier innovation in journal design and layout. Financing the continuous development of this software over the last two decades has meant a creative combination of research grants with library OJS-user memberships, while providing some hosting support to a very small proportion of those employing the software.  

What are your plans for the future?

In terms of what lies ahead for OJS, we’re refreshing the default journal design to give the journals a more effective and stylish reading environment for scholarly publishing; exploring ways of automating the markup of authors’ submission for the ready production of JATS XML, HTML and PDF versions for purposes of reviewing, editing, and publishing; improving the editorial workflow for more efficient handling of submissions; collaborating with Stanford University Press to bring Diamond Open Access to university presses as a viable alternative for scholarly societies and other journals; and introducing a Publication Facts Label for use with every article as a means of addressing research integrity and educating the public about scholarly publishing standards.

About the author

John Willinsky is professor at Simon Fraser University and Khosla Family Professor Emeritus, Stanford University, as well as founder of the Public Knowledge Project.

More information

Public Knowledge Project. 

Open Journal Systems. 

PKP community software sprints. 

PKP Preservation Network. 

Publication Facts Label. 

Spotlight on: JSTOR Access in Prison

The judges have selected a shortlist of three for the ALPSP Impact Award 2024. This year's awards are sponsored by PA EDitorial.

The finalists will be showcased in a lightning session at the ALPSP Conference on 11 September. The winners will be announced at the ALPSP Conference Awards Dinner on 12 September in Manchester.

In this series, we hear from each of the finalists.

Tell us about your organization

At ITHAKA – the successful non-profit behind JSTOR, Constellate, Ithaka S+R, and Portico  –we believe that everyone deserves access to higher education, no matter their resources or circumstances. Our mission is to expand access to knowledge and higher education around the world by working to make it more affordable, to improve outcomes for students and researchers, and to preserve knowledge for future generations.

What is the project/product that you submitted for the Awards? 

JSTOR Access in Prison is a transformational initiative designed to extend access to education and knowledge to the millions of people incarcerated in prisons, jails, and detention centers around the world. With initial support from groups like the Mellon Foundation and Ascendium Philanthropy, we have built a program that helps people expand their horizons, and their post-release opportunities, by giving them access to the same high-quality scholarly resources available to their peers on traditional college campuses. 

Tell us a little about how it works and the team behind it

Thousands of correctional facilities offer at least nominal access to educational programs, but the concrete walls we build to keep people in also keep information out. Access to media is restricted, and media review policies designed to prevent access to harmful or risky material also prevent access to innocuous information or legitimate academic research. Technology limitations further restrict access: Fewer than ten US prison systems allow internet access on government-issued laptops or desktops. 

Effectively, prisons are information deserts. Students in these environments have not had a genuine opportunity to develop research skills or to pursue new ideas and information that might enrich their lives and inspire change. Without access to outside knowledge, their world contracts to the walls of their institution. Without access to knowledge, access to education cannot improve lives. 

JSTOR Access in Prison is changing that with an innovative program that gives people in correctional facilities access to the same scholarly research material available to their peers in traditional college settings. JSTOR is committed to democratizing access to knowledge and helping colleges and universities serve the needs of all of their students, regardless of their circumstances. 

To accommodate the unique concerns of departments of corrections, we offer tiered access options, specialized training materials, and assistance with secure technology and digital devices. Students in the most restrictive settings have access to an “offline” version that provides full search results and the full text of 1,500 of the most-used articles on JSTOR; others have mediated access or full access to the same JSTOR used by their peers on traditional campuses. 

Today, JSTOR is available in more than 1,100 US prisons and nearly 200 prisons in other countries, serving almost a million people. Direct access to scholarly resources helps these students master research skills and encourages academic curiosity. It also reduces administrative burdens on higher education in prison programs, allowing those programs to serve more students. In Australia, one program expanded its enrollment from 40 students to 200 thanks to these economies of scale. 

In what ways do you think it demonstrates innovation?

The carceral system is currently one where many who leave end up returning. This reality falls short of our collective desire for incarcerated people who serve time to effectively and productively reintegrate into society. Doing so is not possible without personal growth and some level of hope and aspiration. Through the JSTOR Access in Prison initiative, we are working to enable growth and change through knowledge for what is largely an unseen and underserved population. 

While students in prisons are like those on college campuses, their learning settings could not be more different. We have been intentional about understanding the unique needs of these environments – the concerns of departments of corrections, the financial and technical limitations of the potential users, and the intellectual curiosity of people who are often getting their first realistic chance at higher education. With that understanding, we have worked to deliver a program that is responsive to everyone’s concerns and provides broad access to high-quality scholarship that supports learning and empowers learners.

We also lead with our mission by working to expand access to this population as broadly and affordably as possible. Our financial model is focused on ethical, sustainable pricing; we actively avoid the pernicious and often predatory practices that have dominated this space. Existing vendors charge exorbitant fees to departments of corrections and content providers to establish access and then charge high usage fees directly to the end users, who can ill afford to pay and have no access to free market alternatives. In contrast, we are taking a more traditional and ethical approach: We do not charge any incarcerated person to use JSTOR or to acquire the technology needed to use it. Neither do we add fees to colleges or universities; if their students in traditional settings have access to JSTOR, so can their students in carceral settings. 

The early results of this mission-oriented work have been impressive. In the US, programs have noted increased educational participation and reduced behavioral problems. One woman, sentenced as a juvenile decades ago, has gained her freedom, is working toward a public health degree, and was a finalist for a 2024 Watson Fellowship. Many others have written to tell us how access to JSTOR helped them advance their education and achieve their goals. 

Ninety-five percent of people in prisons will eventually be released; access to knowledge and education while in prison increases their chances for a better life out of prison. By bringing academic resources to a setting that is renowned for limiting access to ideas, JSTOR Access in Prison is laying the foundation for new ideas to flourish, and hopefully each person will leave prison with an expanded understanding of the world around them. 

What are your plans for the future?

The successes of these students and this initiative demonstrate that access to academic research in carceral settings is necessary, valuable, and practical. Now, we intend to expand JSTOR Access in Prison to more correctional facilities and to provide more educational material tailored to their unique needs. We will continue monitoring the program and collecting evidence on long-term impacts with the help of academic partners. 

We are also working with departments of correction and philanthropic organizations to ensure that academic library resources remain available over the long term. Access to scholarly resources is a cornerstone of successful higher education programs, of course, but our goal is to enshrine access for any person who wants it, regardless of whether they are enrolled in any college or university program. Our mission is to expand access to knowledge and education, and we will continue advocating for access to these life-changing resources for any incarcerated person who wants to learn, grow, and explore the world of knowledge and ideas that is humanity’s common inheritance. 

Women attending Portland Community College while incarcerated at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Salem, Oregon. Photo Credit: Morgan Godvin.

Women attending Portland Community College while incarcerated at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Salem, Oregon, observed by journalist Charlotte West (right). Photo Credit: Morgan Godvin.

College class in women’s prison in Coffee Creek Correctional Facility in Salem, Oregon. Notice the secure laptop computer, plastic three-ring binder, and prison ID on a lanyard. Photo Credit: Morgan Godvin.

About the author

Stacy Lyn Burnett, MBA, has led the effort to bring JSTOR Access in Prison to scale. She first discovered JSTOR as a student of Bard Prison Initiative in a New York state prison.

More information

https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/jstor-access-in-prison/

https://daily.jstor.org/the-impact-jstor-in-prison-has-made-on-me/

Spotlight on: The Forest of Biologists

The judges have selected a shortlist of three for the ALPSP Impact Award 2024. This year's awards are sponsored by PA EDitorial.

The finalists will be showcased in a lightning session at the ALPSP Conference on 11 September. The winners will be announced at the ALPSP Conference Awards Dinner on 12 September in Manchester.

In this series, we hear from each of the finalists.

Tell us about your organization

The Company of Biologists is a not-for-profit publishing organisation dedicated to supporting and inspiring the biological community. The Company publishes five specialist peer-reviewed journals: Development, Journal of Cell Science, Journal of Experimental Biology, Disease Models & Mechanisms and Biology Open. It offers further support to the biological community by facilitating scientific meetings, hosting three community sites, providing travel grants for researchers and supporting research societies.

What is the project/product that you submitted for the Awards?

The Forest of Biologists is a project that we are very passionate about and we are thrilled it has been shortlisted for the ALPSP Impact Award 2024. It aligns with the concerns of biologists worldwide about climate change and biodiversity loss, with a clear focus on biodiversity.

Tell us a little about how it works and the team behind it

We plant a tree for each article published in our journals and help to protect areas of ancient woodland on behalf of our peer reviewers (in partnership with the Woodland Trust). The idea was that with each publication we make one tiny contribution to improving biodiversity – and by adding up each of these tiny impacts, we can achieve something substantial in the fight against climate change and biodiversity loss. We also built a game-inspired website through which our communities could view virtual representations of their trees (and learn more about the real-life trees) and track our progress.

The seed for this idea was planted by Steven Kelly, Professor of Plant Sciences at the University of Oxford and Editor-in-Chief of Biology Open at the time. In the process of development that followed, we included internal and external stakeholders, including Directors and a group of early-career researchers who all gave valuable feedback throughout, making sure that the final product aligned with the needs of our audience. In-house, many staff have been enthusiastic contributors and as the Publisher, I have championed the project (and visited each woodland site to check on our trees). 

In what ways do you think it demonstrates innovation?

Like many other publishers we care deeply about the environment, and sustainability is a key consideration in many things we do. We feel we have made a significant commitment to biopositive publishing by embedding our actions into our core publishing activities and ensuring that our trees are responsibly planted with longevity in mind. In addition to the environmental impact of planting and protecting trees, we hope to make a significant contribution to counteracting biodiversity loss by creating new woodland habitats and helping to protect the unique biodiversity in ancient woodlands. We’re delighted that our initiative also has an educational element, emphasising the importance of trees and woodlands in the fight against climate change and biodiversity loss with the young people involved. We hope The Forest of Biologists provides an encouraging example of biopositive publishing that others may choose to emulate as we consider the effects of our activities on the environment. 

What are your plans for the future?

We have seen an overwhelmingly positive response to the initiative, from authors, readers, reviewers and librarians, which makes us even more excited to consider our next steps. We have already started discussions with the Woodland Trust on options for the future and, for now, we will almost certainly continue to focus on trees and woodland. But after that, we might well consider expanding into other areas or ecosystems.

About the author

Claire Moulton is the Publisher at The Company of Biologists, where she is responsible for the company’s journal and digital content strategy. 

Previously, Claire worked for Elsevier, where she was responsible for the Current Opinion and Trends journals. She has a background in molecular and developmental biology. 

More information

The Forest of Biologists.

The Company of Biologists.

Spotlight on: Research Organization Registry (ROR)

The judges have selected a shortlist of four for the 2024 ALPSP Award for Innovation in Publishing. This year's awards are sponsored by PA EDitorial.

The finalists will be showcased in a lightning session at the ALPSP Conference on 11 September. The winners will be announced at the ALPSP Conference Awards Dinner on 12 September in Manchester.

In this series, we hear from each of the finalists.

Tell us about your organization

Fun fact: ROR itself is not an organization! It is an initiative jointly operated by California Digital Library, Crossref, and DataCite – three organizations with deep ties to the publishing, research, infrastructure, and library communities that represent ROR’s key stakeholder constituencies. The three operating organizations share the responsibilities of resourcing and governing ROR per a multi-year Memorandum of Agreement first executed in 2020. As an initiative that first emerged through a series of meetings and collaborations beginning in 2016, ROR is committed to incorporating and addressing the input and needs of its global user base. Our operations and activities aim to be transparent and participatory. We hold open community meetings every other month to discuss plans and share progress, actively solicit feedback on product development decisions, and post about our processes publicly on GitHub and other channels so that everyone can see and contribute to what we are working on.

What is the project/product that you submitted for the Awards?

We submitted our proposal for the ROR registry, which encompasses the dataset itself (unique persistent identifiers and associated metadata for research and funding organizations), an accompanying suite of tools for querying, integrating, and matching ROR data, and a comprehensive and responsive process for curating registry data and releasing regular updates. 

Tell us a little about how it works and the team behind it

ROR addresses a complex problem with a simple solution. Before ROR, there was no free, open, and reliable way to identify and connect the institutions that employ and fund researchers to the works those researchers produce. Some identification solutions did (and still) exist, but these were proprietary services that only certain users could afford, not fully open for global usage by humans and machines and interoperability across systems, or not tailored to specific research and publishing use cases. The niche that ROR fills is to provide a single, well-scoped, open dataset that can be used in any system to normalize and exchange information about institutions and make it easy and more efficient to identify and track research activities at the institutional level. Data is publicly available for anyone to query and integrate, and we release new registry updates every month so integrators can grab the latest additions and changes. We actively add new records and modify existing ones to ensure registry data is comprehensive and up to date, and to provide as much metadata as possible to support discovery and disambiguation. There is no cost to submit updates to the registry, and no cost to use the data. Integrators build organization lookups and other implementations to normalize institutional names in their systems, and they can provide ROR IDs to metadata sources like Crossref, DataCite, and ORCID, which enables more precise reporting and tracking of research outputs in the downstream systems that rely on these metadata sources. 

As for the people behind ROR: we are a small and nimble team based across ROR’s three operating organizations, which means that in addition to supporting day-to-day work on ROR, we support and are connected to the activities and wider communities that our organizations are engaged with. There is more to ROR than the team, however: we are also fortunate to have an active and engaged network of supporters and advisors who provide important guidance and input on our development work, metadata curation processes, and strategic directions. 

In what ways do you think it demonstrates innovation?

ROR is not the first or only organization identifier, but it is unique and innovative because it is the only one that is completely free and open, specifically designed for research workflows and research infrastructure, uniquely suited to address a range of use cases, recommended in national persistent identifier strategies, and developed as a community-driven initiative. It’s a single, streamlined, and powerful service that can help make everyone’s metadata cleaner and more connected. 

What are your plans for the future?

This is an exciting time for ROR’s growth as we are seeing greater adoption in systems and services around the world to address a range of use cases. We continue to actively maintain registry data for quality and completeness as more and more users depend on it, and we are investing in scaling our workflows and infrastructure to support increased demand - the API, for instance, regularly sees 20 million requests every month. With rising adoption as well as growing interest overall in greater metadata connectivity through persistent identifiers, we are seeing an increased role for ROR to play in helping to manage, clean up, and connect massive volumes of legacy data, so we’re fine-tuning our API to leverage machine-learning technologies in support of large-scale matching and reconciliation. With the forthcoming deprecation of Crossref’s Open Funder Registry, we’re also completing our work to map Funder IDs to ROR and continuing to engage with funders and other stakeholders to support them through this transition. 

Example record from search UI:

Example ROR-powered typeahead lookup for affiliation and funding information:

About the author

ROR Director Maria Gould has led the initiative since 2018. She is also Director of Product at DataCite.  

More information

Research Organization Registry (ROR).

Spotlight on: Signals

The judges have selected a shortlist of four for the 2024 ALPSP Award for Innovation in Publishing. This year's awards are sponsored by PA EDitorial.

The finalists will be showcased in a lightning session at the ALPSP Conference on 11 September. The winners will be announced at the ALPSP Conference Awards Dinner on 12 September in Manchester.

In this series, we hear from each of the finalists.

Tell us about your organization

Signals is a London-based startup, launched in December 2023, on a mission to restore trust in research. We are a team of former researchers with a deep interest in scholarly publishing and research integrity, and a proven track record of building products for publishers and researchers. Signals is already helping publishers to identify problematic articles at submission and in their portfolios. 

What is the project/product that you submitted for the Awards?

Signals addresses the pressing need of tackling publishing integrity issues that are eroding trust in research. These issues are difficult to detect at scale, but Signals aims to help solve this problem by providing researchers and publishers with the information they need to understand the trustworthiness and value of research articles. Our product analyses published articles, manuscripts, and entire journals, to help publishers and researchers improve their research integrity workflows and make rapid, informed decisions on articles they are working with. 

Tell us a little about how it works and the team behind it

Signals evaluates research articles by surfacing signals from the complex networks of articles, authors, institutions, and citations, combined with signals from experts, including sleuths and researchers. 

The Signals team has deep expertise in the scholarly publishing industry. Co-founders Andrew Preston, Elliott Lumb, and Tiago Barros bring extensive experience in building products for publishers and researchers from their previous roles at Publons, PeerRef, Faculty Opinions, and Sciwheel. Lead Engineer, Florin Asăvoaie, was the Solutions Architect for Hindawi’s Phenom platform. His engineering expertise and experience in the industry are accelerating Signals’ development. Nicko Goncharoff, our Commercial Lead, has over two decades of commercial experience in STM research software and publishing. Finally, Christos Petrou, with his expertise in scholarly publishing analytics, provides Signals with invaluable contributions on developing and refining our signals.

In what ways do you think it demonstrates innovation?

Signals has a unique and innovative strategy to restore trust in research, based on these key pillars:

• Positioning: Signals is built for the entire research community. Research integrity doesn’t just affect publishers. It affects researchers, institutions, and anyone engaging with research. To restore trust in research it’s essential that everyone has access to the information they need to evaluate research.
• Network: Signals has a novel approach to evaluating research articles. By using a combination of insight from the networks of article metadata and contributions from experts, our data graph improves over time as the scholarly record grows and articles are cited and engaged with. Using this approach, our product currently flags 89% of known problematic articles.
• Transparency: Signals evaluations are transparent and actionable. We show why articles are potentially problematic and provide the necessary context to understand the basis of the evaluation. This enables individuals to make rapid and informed decisions on articles and simultaneously recognize and report false positives, enabling us to constantly improve Signals’ accuracy. 
• Trust: Signals doesn’t just flag potential issues, it also show why articles are trustworthy. This enables individuals to spend less time evaluating every article for potential issues, improving workflows.

What are your plans for the future?

We’re focused on addressing the urgent challenges faced by publishers. In the near future, we plan to extend our offering to research institutions, helping them to play a decisive role in identifying and preventing research fraud. There is a clear need to expand the use of Signals across the research ecosystem, to provide article-level insight for anyone engaging with research, including pharmaceutical companies, government, and healthcare professionals. Our goal is to amplify trustworthy, valuable research that advances our knowledge and supports progress. 

About the author

Elliott Lumb, Co-Founder, Signals.

Elliott is a Co-Founder of Signals. He has a PhD in medicinal chemistry, had several roles at Frontiers, consulted for publishers on their Open Access portfolio, and was the founder of PeerRef. 

More information

Signals.

Spotlight on: The Papermill Alarm

The judges have selected a shortlist of four for the 2024 ALPSP Award for Innovation in Publishing. This year's awards are sponsored by PA EDitorial.

The finalists will be showcased in a lightning session at the ALPSP Conference on 11 September. The winners will be announced at the ALPSP Conference Awards Dinner on 12 September in Manchester.

In this series, we hear from each of the finalists.

Tell us about your organization

We love working with data, but we prefer working with you. Clear Skies was founded to support publishers. We believe that a robust, healthy peer-review system is critical to the future of research integrity. Our services are designed to support the challenging work publishers do to maintain that system while limiting the risk presented by research fraud. 

This is not a "move fast and break things" startup. We believe strongly in responsible science and ethical methods. We move with care and we respect that, behind every paper (real or fake) there are real people whose careers depend on fair consideration. For that reason, we present our findings in context and use an evidence-based approach to surface actionable information. We also avoid surfacing information that might be misleading or harmful. Much like an editorial process - the value comes as much from what we don't put out as from what we do.

What is the project/product that you submitted for the Awards?

The Papermill Alarm

Tell us a little about how it works and the team behind it

The Papermill Alarm is the name we give to the alerting system that sits on top of our analytics.

That gives us an early-warning system which is available as an API through a direct agreement, or via our partners at STM, Morressier, and others (to be announced). 

Sitting underneath that simple output, we have several pipelines of advanced analytics which feed into our dashboard Web Application. The dashboard surfaces important leads for investigation. What you don't see are the 50 or so different methods for detecting problematic papers that we tested and discarded. We retain only the few methods that provide genuine predictive power. Those methods include advanced AI textual analysis and network analysis. 

The system improves perpetually as new data comes in from publishers. It is self-improving and self-correcting. At this stage, the underlying data is a completely unique resource describing the papermill problem in detail across the whole industry.

The Papermill Alarm was created, built, tested, and deployed at industry-scale by Adam Day. However, around 20 individuals have contributed to Clear Skies and we have built a specialised core team over the last couple of years. We give particular thanks to Adrian Stanley whose support has been incredible. 

In what ways do you think it demonstrates innovation?

It was the first of its kind. The Papermill Alarm came to market in 2022 before there was any automated service dedicated to papermill detection. It's easy to see that this kind of scalable method is possible now, but at the time it wasn't clear and it took considerable testing and iteration to get there. From that initial market of 1, it has inspired numerous others to create their own papermill-detection services. 

What are your plans for the future?

The future is collaboration. We want to develop our team and work with everyone throughout the research community: first, to shine a light on the problem, but secondly to help tackle it as a team with an informed perspective.

Indeed, currently, we are developing our team to reach the next level. Stay tuned!

Image caption: a semantic space showing Papermill Alarm alerts for a publisher. Each dot is a paper. Red and orange regions represent areas of concern.  

About the author

Adam Day is the CEO of Clear Skies. He has a background in physics, machine-learning, journals-editorial and data science. He writes a popular blog about research integrity.

More information

Clear Skies.

 

Spotlight on: Morressier's Integrity Manager

The judges have selected a shortlist of four for the 2024 ALPSP Award for Innovation in Publishing. This year's awards are sponsored by PA EDitorial.

The finalists will be showcased in a lightning session at the ALPSP Conference on 11 September. The winners will be announced at the ALPSP Conference Awards Dinner on 12 September in Manchester.

In this series, we hear from each of the finalists.

Tell us about your organization

Morressier provides publishers and societies with workflows for transforming scholarly communications. We empower you through the entire publication journey, from the first spark of an idea right through to journal submission and peer-review. We offer integrity-protected workflows across the following products: Proceedings Manager, Integrity Manager, and Journal Manager. Driven by the belief that technology can help create a world in which all scientific outputs are traceable and trustworthy, Morressier is headquartered in Berlin and has offices in London and Washington DC.

What is the project/product that you submitted for the Awards?

Morressier’s Integrity Manager, launched in May 2023, addresses the integrity crisis in scholarly publishing with a comprehensive platform designed for detecting research fraud and managing investigations. By integrating both proprietary technology and top third-party tools, Integrity Manager effectively identifies a wide-range of issues, including plagiarism, citation misconduct, AI-generated text, image manipulation, and institution verification. This unified approach eliminates the need for publishers and societies to negotiate with multiple vendors and upload documents to various systems.

Additionally, the platform centralizes integrity investigation management, enabling users to track and analyze all investigation activities and data in one place. Integrity Manager reduces manual workload, lowers costs, and provides actionable insights through detailed reporting. By boosting trust in the scientific record and supporting early fraud detection, the platform streamlines editorial workflows, ensures high-quality publications, and minimizes costly retractions.

Tell us a little about how it works and the team behind it

Morressier’s Integrity Manager performs a wide-range of sophisticated checks on manuscripts to ensure research integrity and streamline the editorial process. Here’s how it works:

Types of Checks

• Plagiarism Detection: Uses advanced algorithms to compare manuscripts against an extensive database of previously published works to identify potential plagiarism or paraphrasing.
• Citation Misconduct: Flags excessive self-citations or unusual citation patterns that may indicate inappropriate citation practices.
• AI-Generated Text Detection: Scans manuscripts for sections likely generated by AI, using sophisticated AI-detection tools to ensure content authenticity.
• Image Manipulation Detection: Compares images in manuscripts against a vast repository to detect potential manipulations or duplications, including zooms, flips, and cropping.
• Institution Verification: Checks for consistency and validity of institutional affiliations, helping to confirm the authenticity of authors' identities.
• Tortured Phrasing Detection: Identifies potentially problematic phrases often associated with paper mills or automated content generators.
• Flagging Cited Retracted Content: Cross-references citations with a database of retracted papers to prevent the propagation of flawed research.
• Paper Mill Alarm: Public - Scan for submissions suspiciously similar to known paper mill generated content. 

Investigation Management

Integrity Manager not only conducts these checks but also integrates them into a unified investigation management system. Here’s how the integrity management module centralizes the investigations workflow:

• Centralized Tracking: All alerts and flagged issues from the various checks are consolidated in one platform, enabling users to track and manage investigation activities.
• Streamlined Workflow: Users can access all relevant data and investigation outcomes from a single interface, reducing the complexity and administrative burden of managing multiple systems.
• Actionable Insights: The platform offers actionable insights and recommendations based on aggregated data, helping editorial teams make informed decisions and take appropriate actions.
• Historical Data Access: Maintains a record of all investigation activities and outcomes, facilitating ongoing monitoring and trend analysis to prevent future issues.

By integrating robust checks with a centralized investigation management system, Integrity Manager enhances the efficiency and effectiveness of research integrity teams.

Our team behind Integrity Manager is composed of experts in publishing, technology, data science, and research integrity, and we have over 100 years of experience in the publishing industry between us! We collaborate closely with senior leaders in the publishing industry, leveraging their insights to refine and enhance our platform continually, with new features released every 2 weeks. Our Strategic Advisory Board, established in December 2023, plays a crucial role in guiding our development efforts based on real-world needs and challenges.

In what ways do you think it demonstrates innovation?

Integrity Manager is innovative in several key ways:

• Comprehensive Integration: Integrity Manager is the only enterprise-grade solution for integrity checks on the market. 
• Integrity Investigation Management: The first independent tool on the market offering comprehensive investigation management.
• Automation and Efficiency: The platform automates many manual tasks, significantly reducing the workload for editors and reviewers while lowering costs for publishers.
• Actionable Insights: Detailed reporting and analytics provide actionable insights, enabling the development of robust research integrity policies and the identification of broader trends.
• This all-in-one approach not only streamlines the integrity management process but also enhances the effectiveness of fraud detection and investigation.

What are your plans for the future?

We are continuously expanding the capabilities of Integrity Manager to cover more aspects of research integrity and further integrate emerging technologies. We aim to provide the most sophisticated tools for detecting and preventing research fraud, including advanced verification checks for authors and institutions to enhance credibility and reduce fraud risk. We frequently refine our platform based on user feedback and industry trends. Our goal is to continue to be the leading research integrity solution in the scholarly publishing industry, setting new standards for quality and trust in academic research.

About the author

Robyn Mugridge, Sales Director, Morressier

Robyn joined Morressier as Sales Director in 2024, bringing extensive experience from several international publishers. At Morressier, Robyn plays a pivotal role in expanding partnerships and driving the adoption of innovative integrity solutions. Previously, as Head of Publishing Partnerships at Frontiers, Robyn developed a passion for collaborating with societies and modernising publishing technology. In addition, as Co-Chair of the ALPSP Education Committee, Robyn enjoys bringing publishing professionals together to tackle shared challenges in the journal publishing industry.

More information:

Morressier Research Integrity Manager. 

Exploring AI Copyright Policy in the UK

By Will Crook, Head of Policy and Communications, Publishers' Licensing Services – Platinum Sponsor of the University Press Redux Conference 2024.
 

On 24 July 2019, on his first day at 10 Downing Street, Dominic Cummings, the prime minister’s Chief Advisor, was pictured wearing an Open AI t-shirt. Although perhaps overlooked at the time, Dominic Cummings’ wardrobe choice reflected the UK government’s belief that AI was going to be the solution to a lot of the UK’s economic problems, such as low growth and poor productivity. With the aim of establishing the UK as an ‘AI superpower’ and an international home to AI innovation, the government published its AI strategy in 2021 and outlined what it would do to facilitate AI innovation. One area it turned to was copyright.

Copyright has always been a target when new technology is adopted that challenges its basic principles, or when those developing that technology complain it limits innovation. The problems caused by the adoption and use of the photocopier led to the creation, by publishers, of Publishers’ Licensing Services (or as it was then, the Publishers Licensing Society) in 1981 as a voluntary solution to put pressure on copyright. More recently, the 2011 Hargreaves Review into IP and innovation led to the introduction of the current copyright exception for non-commercial text and data mining (TDM). As it has done before, with AI looked upon as a crucial technology for future growth, the government looked at the copyright framework and how it could be changed to help AI developers, who complained that licensing copyright protected content was expensive, inconvenient and prohibitive to growth.

In 2022, after consulting on a range of potential options, the government announced it was to introduce a new copyright exception for TDM for any purpose with no ability for a rightsholder to opt out. The new exception would have drastically widened the current exception for TDM and would have weakened the UK’s copyright framework meaning that rightsholders would have no ability to consent to the use of their works in generative AI training or receive any renumeration. The response from the creative industries to the government’s decision was unanimous, with strong opposition across the whole sector from publishers, authors, visual artists and musicians. At the time, a creative industry colleague dryly commented that the government’s decision had done something almost unprecedented and had united the whole sector in agreement around one issue. Thankfully, the government heard that opposition and relented, scrapping the intention to introduce a new copyright exception in February 2023.

With the criticism of its previous approach in mind, the government decided to continue to look at the relationship between copyright and AI in a more balanced way. Towards the summer of 2023 the Intellectual Property Office arranged a working group comprised of rightsholder representatives and AI developers to meet for a series of roundtables to discuss the drafting of a voluntary code of practice for the use of copyright protected works in AI. However, talks were difficult with the government showing little direction on copyright and preferring to be an ‘honest broker’, and with trust damaged amongst the participants after the failed exception proposal coupled with the refusal of some AI participants to acknowledge the need to obtain a licence. These elements with the increasing amount of litigation in the US and UK by rightsholders against AI developers meant that the talks ultimately proved fruitless and work to develop the code of practice was brought to a halt by government in early 2024.

With an abandoned new copyright exception and a collapsed code of practice process, where will the government turn next? 

In February 2024, the government announced that it would pursue a ministerial-led process and that details of further engagement were to be announced in due course, which so far has failed to materialise. Meanwhile, away from the executive, MPs and committees in both houses of parliament have been strongly supportive of rightsholders and copyright, and highly critical of the government. Baroness Stowell, Chair of the House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee recently wrote to the secretary of state complaining that the government’s lack of decisiveness and action to protect copyright had led to the deterioration of the framework and that time to act was running out before AI business models became ‘entrenched and normalised’. The government’s inaction is sharply reflected by progress being made in other jurisdictions on AI, such as the European Union that recently adopted its own AI Act that included provisions on transparency and adherence to copyright. Perhaps indicative of where the government find themselves on copyright and AI, in the House of Lords last week, the Minister for AI and IP, Viscount Camrose predicted that copyright would need to be modified through legislation to reach a solution but gave no details of what changes would be made. One thing, however, above all other matters, will likely intervene before anything is decided by the current administration: the next general election.

It is highly likely that the Labour Party will form the next government. Whilst it may be comforting to think that Labour may decide to take a stronger pro-creative industries copyright stance, the reality is that whoever the next IP minister is they will face the same scenario with some AI developers continuing to use content without permission and ignoring copyright. The new minister will be asked by officials to decide on a solution whilst under the same economic pressures of the current government. As focus turns to future policy, Labour has so far not given much away as to what it may choose to do. Labour’s recently published Creative Industries Sector Plan is positive about copyright but does not include detail as to how the UK’s framework would be protected or indeed strengthened in the face of pressure from AI developers. 

All the while, as the above has been playing out in Westminster, publishers have used the time to strike licensing deals with AI developers. What was a nascent market is now developing, as publishers better understand the needs of AI developers and how their content is being copied and used in large language models and generative AI. Where medium and small publishers may be commercially disadvantaged in negotiations, collective licensing solutions are also being developed that offer publishers control and the ability to earn for the use of their content. These welcome developments weaken the government’s view of copyright’s relationship with AI ingestion as difficult and complex. If anything, it shows that clear opportunities to license exist for publishers and that AI developers are willing to obtain them to use the valuable, curated content they need for their models. If AI is to continue to innovate and become a trusted everyday tool at home and work, the government would be wise to remember that it also needs an economically sustainable publishing industry to continue to provide high quality, curated content in appropriate formats to fuel that innovation, with copyright again crucially providing the balance needed for that partnership to blossom. 

About the author

Will Crook, Head of Policy and Communications, Publishers' Licensing Services Ltd.

Will joined PLS in December 2021 after working in Westminster for six years as a researcher for Andrew Bingham MP and for former Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, Rt Hon John Whittingdale OBE MP. His main responsibilities are to engage with members of both houses in parliament on issues affecting copyright and licensing, to respond to relevant government consultations on behalf of PLS and ensure that PLS and mandating PLS publishers are updated on policy issues.

About Publishers’ Licensing Services

Publishers’ Licensing Services (PLS) has provided rights and licensing services to the publishing industry since 1981. A non-profit, owned and directed by the four main UK publishing trade associations, our primary role is to maximise the value of published content, enable its legitimate re-use, and protect copyright through effective secondary licensing, permissions, and rights management services. In 2023-2024 PLS collected and distributed more than £43 million to over 4,500 publishers.

Sustainability – The Challenges for the year ahead, and where to look for help

By Jonathan Huddart, Head of Sales, CPI (UK) – Silver Sponsor of the University Press Redux Conference 2024.

Over the past two years Sustainability and the Environmental impact of the printed book or journal has been a topic of discussion that every publisher wants to engage with; but also, where businesses seem the least well informed and are searching for good and trusted sources of information. 

The subject area is vast, whether it is preparing your business for your Scope 1, 2 and 3 reporting, researching the upcoming legislation on Deforestation (EUDR) or responsibilities within the supply chain to reduce waste, carbon footprint and make active supplier decisions.

At CPI we have chosen to engage with the following accreditation bodies, The Bookchain Project, Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) and Ecovardis, all of these organisations audit the supply chain on behalf of our customers and help to provide a standardised platform for our reporting. 

In addition, CPI has signed up to ClimateCalc, a measuring tool which will enable the whole group to provide accurate scope 1, 2 & 3 reporting for both our business needs and those of our customers. 

Reporting of this data remains the biggest challenge as we see it. CPI has over 500 active customers, each of which currently may have a different reporting requirement and request different information from us, depending on where they are on their Environment & Sustainability journey. During the last two years we have created dedicated roles in the business to support this requirement, which adds cost to the supply chain and new demands on the business. As we continue this critical journey, we will all need to work closely with each other to help mitigate and address these growing costs.

Moving into 2025, there are several legislative changes which impact print and production. Most noticeably the European Union Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR). EUDR is legislation that has been designed to minimise consumption of products coming from supply chains associated with deforestation or forest degradation. EUDR entered into force on 29 June 2023. From 30 December 2024 EUDR is to be applied for all commodities entering into or leaving the EU market. It covers a number of product, Cocoa, Coffee, Palm Oil and Wood (where the paper comes in) to name a few. CPI has produced a guide for this to help educate our sector.

The EPR legislation is UK law, reporting has started for the annual year 2023. From June 2025, the costs for management of packaging waste will increase significantly as household collection costs are to be covered by this new legislation. EPR is a replacement for the existing Waste packaging scheme although they run alongside each other for 18 months.  Fines will apply to non-confirming companies, there have been criminal convictions for non-compliance in the last year of the Waste Packaging scheme as companies and regulatory bodies start to focus on compliance. 

For the last few years, I think that businesses have been encouraged to engage in the Sustainability discussion, as we move into 2025 everyone is going to need to ensure that their vendors are complying with their obligations and are truly focused on their legal and ethical responsibilities. This is no doubt a challenge for printer, publishers and distributors across the supply chain, but something that we need to work together to ensure we represent our sector in the best possible way and giving all our customers the information and comfort that they need that we are all working responsibly to the same goals. 

About CPI

CPI stands at the forefront of the UK's book printing industry, offering unparalleled expertise and a global print network to publishers and self-publishers alike. With over a decade of commitment to excellence, CPI provides tailored service models to meet diverse business needs, from Zero Inventory solutions to Global Print Solutions. Leveraging cutting-edge inkjet digital printing technology and integrated supply chain solutions, CPI UK produces a staggering 160 million books annually across seven specialised sites. 

About the author

Jonathan Huddart, Head of Sales, CPI, UK.

Jonathan has previously held several sales and customer roles across the business. As Head of Sales for CPI, he works closely with customers to ensure that they are making the best use of all the supply chain solutions that are available. 

More information:

Instagram: @cpi.group
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Linkedin: @CPI Books UK
TikTok: @cpibooksuk

Harnessing Tech for Scholarly Impact: Five Ways Systems Empower Academic & Scholarly Publishers

By Mark Collins, Virtusales Publishing Solutions – Silver Sponsor of the University Press Redux Conference 2024.

At the London Book Fair this year, Virtusales Publishing Solutions hosted a panel at the Research & Scholarly Publishing Forum, exploring the evolving landscape of academic and scholarly publishing. The session offered a platform for sharing insights and strategies, shedding light on the latest trends and challenges shaping academic publishing today. Among the mission-critical themes discussed, technological advancement emerged as a key driver of transformation in the publishing industry. As Jim Ramage, Elsevier’s Senior Director, Software Engineering, commented during the panel, technology has the capacity to benefit stakeholders across the supply chain, including authors and readers: 

“All aspects of the publishing cycle — end-to-end — can be speeded up, enhanced, automated, and can take out costs. That benefits all stakeholders in the industry, absolutely everyone, and that's a positive thing.”  Jim Ramage, Senior Director, Software Engineering, Elsevier.

In this rapidly changing environment, more and more publishers are moving from incumbent suppliers and systems to advanced, publishing-specific software designed to drive efficiency and innovation; ultimately enabling them to stay ahead of the curve and adapt to industry demands as they emerge. But with so many systems ‘out there’, how can you tell the progressive apart from the disruptive? And what does progressive technology look like today?

Here are some pointers to consider:

1. Unification: Streamlining Workflows for Enhanced Efficiency

One of the primary advantages of advanced systems is their ability to unify workflows, providing a comprehensive solution for managing all types of products. By consolidating all their publishing processes into a single platform, publishers can streamline operations, increase visibility of data and assets, and make informed decisions across the publishing lifecycle. Unification not only enhances efficiency but fosters collaboration and innovation company wide.

2. Digital Asset Workflows: Facilitating Collaboration and Task Management

Advanced systems offer robust Digital Asset Management (DAM) capabilities, enabling publishers to effectively store, manage, transform, and share assets across departments. By combining and centralising data and assets within a single system, publishers can streamline processes, improve scheduling and task management, and ensure the secure storage and accessibility of vital resources. This integrated approach enhances productivity and accelerates the publishing process, driving better outcomes for publishers and business partners alike.

3. Full Integration: Maximising Sales Opportunities through Seamless Data Exchange

Seamless integration with various systems is another key feature of advanced publishing solutions. By facilitating the sharing, tracking, and reporting of critical information, advanced systems optimise data exchange to maximise sales opportunities. From product metadata to peer reviews and subsidiary rights, advanced systems enable publishers to share data seamlessly, and create tailored content (including AI sheets, ONIX feeds, reports and more) to meet third party requirements, strengthening relationships and ultimately driving revenue growth and market expansion. Flexible reports engines that can output a variety of industry standard formats and APIs also aid integration across your systems landscape, accelerating communication and saving time and resources.

4. Artificial Intelligence: Accelerating Operations and Enhancing Productivity

Advanced systems leverage Artificial Intelligence (AI) to accelerate operations and enhance productivity across the publishing lifecycle. From generating keywords to suggesting and editing copy text (from summarising descriptions to specific word counts and improving grammar, to facilitating translations, tagging images, and reworking copy for different markets and regions), AI acts as an assistive tool that can automate repetitive tasks, reduce manual effort, and unlock new possibilities for content dissemination. By adopting software that embraces responsible AI, publishers can ensure the security of their data and IP, save time and reduce costs, positioning themselves for success in a competitive market.

5. Continual Development: Future-Proofing Publishing Operations

Continual development is a hallmark of advanced systems, ensuring that publishers have access to the latest technology and tools. Some systems vendors offer inclusive upgrades as well as ongoing support, minimising disruption associated with the implementation of new technology, drastically reducing the need for training, and helping publishers to adapt to evolving industry trends seamlessly. This commitment to innovation empowers publishers to stay ahead of the curve, embrace the latest cutting-edge technology at the earliest opportunity, and future-proof their operations for long-term success.

Conclusion

Advanced systems play a pivotal role in empowering academic and scholarly publishing, enabling publishers to navigate industry challenges with confidence and agility, and embrace new opportunities as they emerge. By unifying workflows, centralising data and assets, ensuring full integration with internal systems, leveraging AI, and embracing continual development, publishers can transform their businesses, driving efficiency, innovation and growth in an ever-changing landscape.

About BiblioSuite

BiblioSuite is the system of choice among leading academic and scholarly publishers including Elsevier, Bloomsbury Academic, Mohr Siebeck and Sage Publishing, along with esteemed university presses such as Oxford, Harvard, Princeton, The MIT Press, and Edinburgh. If you're interested in learning more about how BiblioSuite can support your publishing endeavours, visit the Virtusales website. 

Read more about our LBF Research & Scholarly Forum panel plus customer success stories via the following the following links:

● Innovating Responsibly: AI Prototypes in Publishing

● Opportunities and Inconvenient Truths: Academic Insights from LBF’s Research & Scholarly Forum 2024 

● Revolutionise your publishing experience with BiblioSuite for Scholarly and Academic Publishers 

● The MIT Press consolidates six systems into BiblioSuite to optimise operational performance 

● Ohio State selects BiblioSuite to unify its book and journal workflows 

● Wilfrid Laurier University Press  selects BiblioSuite for enhanced funding management and reporting 

● University of Illinois Press adopts BiblioSuite to unify its publishing workflows

● Agent of Change: The Role of Technology in Publishing 

About the Author

Mark Collins, Director of Academic, Virtusales Publishing Solutions

Mark Collins has worked in the publishing industry for over 20 years with a number of global publishers, respected independents and academic and scholarly publishers implementing Virtusales' BiblioSuite publishing software. Prior to that, Mark worked at other publishers in a range of roles, including Wiley where he worked on implementing and delivering global technology solutions to the business.

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About University Press Redux 2024

The 5th ALPSP University Press Redux returns as an in-person event on 15 & 16 May 2024, in partnership with Edinburgh University Press. This is part of EUP’s 75th anniversary celebrations and will be held at the John McIntyre Conference Centre, The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK. Book your place.