Middlebury and other colleges in the “Oberlin Group” have been institutional members of the Public Library of Science (PLOS) for many years. First, a bit of background: PLOS was established in 2000 to provide high-quality peer-reviewed open-access (i.e. it doesn’t cost the reader anything – no subscription fees) online journals in the biological sciences. While most journals in the “hard” sciences rely on subscriptions from readers and publication fees from authors, PLOS relies solely on publication fees from authors.

For a modest annual fee, our membership with PLOS has enabled our faculty to publish articles in PLOS journals for a discounted publication fee. Recently, the Oberlin Group was informed that PLOS is discontinuing the institutional member program – and its discounted publication fees. Please note this does NOT mean that PLOS will cease publication of its journals. PLOS Biology (the first PLOS journal), and the other PLOS journals will continue to be published, online, accessible to anyone, anywhere. If you have questions, please email eaccess-admin@middlebury.edu

Emdbedding Digital Literacies and enabling change – Report form the “Changing the Learning Landscape” London Event

The Internet of Things – The Internet of Things has emerged as one of IT’s hottest trends of 2013. We have a great set of resources to help you figure out how it can help your business.

Why is Science Behind a Paywall? – The evolution of and economics behind the current model of scholarly communications.

What’s new in MOOCs? “Coursera is recasting itself as a platform for credit-bearing courses that would be offered to students enrolled at multiple campuses within a public-university system.”

Staff matters. “Another side-effect of the executive belief that ‘life is elsewhere’ is that staff members aren’t utilized in transformational efforts. In the pigeonholing that can take place between HR and executive leaders, staff can be overlooked.”

Following up on last week’s Friday Link regarding Jeffrey Beall – A publisher threatens to sue him for “a billion dollars.” Good luck with that.

A stalwart in the field muses on why the academic publishing market is so zany. “The biggest problem is the fact that each participant in the system receives distorted and radically incomplete market responses to its inputs.”