Academic-Led Publishing From the Experts Series: Interview with Dr. Michael P. Taylor

"What will it take for the majority of research to be academy-owned and open access? Here at Scholastica, we’ll be focused on this question during the first Academic-Led Publishing Day on February 7, 2019. We’re excited to be taking part in the global digital event, which is aimed at fostering discussions about current and potential academic-led publishing initiatives. Academic-led publishing refers to scholarly publishing initiatives wherein one or more academic organizations control decisions pertaining to copyright, distribution, and publishing infrastructure.

Academic-Led Publishing Day presents an exciting opportunity to build bridges between different stakeholders in the future of academy-owned publishing, including university-based publishers, professional associations, scholars, research funders, and service providers. As we lead up to the event, we wanted to start some discussions around academic-led publishing. In this blog series we interview OA experts about academic-led publishing initiatives that they’re involved in and their thoughts on what’s needed to make the majority of research academy-owned.

First in the series we welcome Dr. Michael P. Taylor, a computer programmer with Index Data and a paleontologist with the University of Bristol. He is an active advocate for open access to scholarship and open data. In the interview below he discusses his current OA advocacy and his hopes for academic-led publishing...."