The Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) is one of the first services to be included in Infra Finder. In this post, we share a conversation between IOI’s Lauren Collister and Joanna Ball, Managing Director of DOAJ, about the experience of joining Infra Finder and DOAJ’s current initiatives.
Lauren: What was your experience in creating the Infra Finder entries for DOAJ?
Joanna: We felt that we were well-prepared to complete the intake form for Infra Finder, because there was some overlap with our POSI self-assessment and our experience as part of the FOREST pilot. We found that the Infra Finder form had some different areas where we could be more descriptive about our work, and the questions helped us see our programs in a different way. For example, we could write a description about our commitment to community engagement, and at first I thought this would be a challenge because we did not have any explicit materials on this topic. However, our DOAJ ambassadors have been actively working around the world since 2016, and we have a team of over 100 volunteers who help us process our applications. These programs are a perfect example of community engagement, and working with people who are passionate about open access and making open access journals more visible. That’s community engagement, built into the core of our approach to creating DOAJ.
Lauren: Was there anything you worked on because of the questions asked in the intake form?
Joanna: We are working to update some of our policies, particularly our Code of Conduct. We already had a zero tolerance policy and the roots of a Code of Conduct, but it was time to revisit and update that material. We also had some work on the back burner, such as sharing our technical roadmap, which this process has prompted us to finish and get ready for publication. Some of these things can be pushed back because they’re not always the most urgent topic to handle on a day-to-day basis. In that, Infra Finder was good for making us think about our long-term plans.
Lauren: Were there any questions that were difficult to answer?
There is a question that we think about all the time but don’t often take the time to drill down into, which is this: what systems interact with DOAJ? This is one of the benefits of open infrastructure, but also a pitfall — our metadata can be used by anybody, and they can do that without us knowing about it. Some of them contact us — the main discovery services for libraries, for example. But sometimes, we see a reference to our metadata in a tool or service that we were just learning about!
This is one of those thorny questions, because without knowing how widely your infrastructure is used by downstream services, it can be hard to clearly articulate your value, and can make your work more invisible.
Lauren: How is Infra Finder useful to you and the DOAJ community?
Joanna: The compare feature is very useful. For libraries like those that support us, we know that they are developing open research strategies and setting aside funds to support open infrastructure. With that comes criteria for evaluating the services to support, and Infra Finder brings many of those criteria together in one space. For DOAJ as an organization, I can use that same function to compare my service with others in the field and see where there might be gaps in what we are doing, or identify points of good practice within our community. This can foster the building of a community of practice, where we are collaborators and not competitors — we are a supportive community, and seeing another service on Infra Finder would encourage me to reach out to them to compare our experiences and practices.
Lauren: What advice would you give other infrastructure providers who are interested in being part of Infra Finder, and developing their own resources in these areas?
Joanna: I encourage them to join the community of practice. The IOI team is there to help if you have any questions, and the more services there are in Infra Finder, the more useful it will be. There are growing expectations from our community for this kind of transparency, and it’s important for institutions to ensure that they’re investing wisely.
Lauren: What news can we watch for from DOAJ and your community?
Joanna: We are working hard to get more journals indexed in DOAJ from outside of Europe and North America. We know that those journals will benefit the most from the visibility and quality assurance that we can give them. As such, we are reviewing our ambassador program to ensure that it’s effective and reaching the areas that we are prioritizing. We are also collaborating with Research4Life and the Academy of Science in South Africa (ASSAf) to deliver several webinar series this year in different languages on publication standards and DOAJ indexing.
We recently ran a community consultation to find out more about how the community uses our metadata, and to ensure that the data we collect meets their needs. We received an amazing 1700 responses to the survey from across the world, and are currently running a series of follow-up interviews. We’re looking forward to sharing the results with the community later in the year.
And finally: do look out for the announcement on the publication of our roadmap!
Lauren: Besides checking Infra Finder for updates, how can readers learn more about this work and keep up with the other news from DOAJ?
Joanna: The best way is to subscribe to our blog, which we just recently re-launched. There, you can learn about our latest news and updates, as well as any calls for volunteers or ambassadors to be part of our community.
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This post is part of our “Infra Finder Spotlight” series. To stay updated on posts from this series and more from Invest in Open Infrastructure, please sign up for our newsletter. If you’d like to see an organization in the spotlight, let us know in our Infra Finder Feedback Form.