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In December the higher education structural funds project (Hochschulraumstrukturmittelprojekt) "Austrian Transition to Open Access (AT2OA)" was authorised by the Austrian Federal Ministry of Science, Research and Economy. The 21 public universities cooperate on this project running from 2017 to 2020 in order to promote open access through concerted measures. Constitutive on OANA's "suggestions for the implementation of Open Access in Austria" published in 2015 four subprojects have been developed. These subprojects' main focuses are drafting an expert's report about the financial impact of a total adjustment to open access on a national and institutional basis, the extension of existing consortium licences with an open access component, establishment of an open access publishing fund as well as the promotion of open access monographs and suitable open access infrastructures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Berlin Declaration on Open Access to scientific knowledge was published in October 2003. All over the world initiatives and projects were started. However, in Austria Open Access got little attention over many years. This was confirmed by a study among Austrian universities on behalf of the Council of Austrian University Libraries. Finally at the turn of the year 2012/2013 the Open Access Network Austria and the university infrastructure project E-Infrastructure Austria were started to push Open Access in Austria on a national level. So 10 years after the Berlin Declaration Austria set up the preconditions to establish sustainable Open Access. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on a workshop on open access publishing, held in Vienna, Austria, on October 22, 2013. Topics of discussion included electronic scholarly publishing, international efforts to define open access policies such as the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities, and institutional repositories.

This report outlines the status quo concerning the Open Access activities of the 21 Austrian public universities. The findings are based on a survey conducted with affiliated university libraries in February and March 2012. The survey was published as a report in May 2013 and paints a mixed overall picture that is at least characterised by a few remarkably successful activities on the local level. Nonetheless, the developments outlined in this study have gained momentum in the last months. Particularly the recent launch of OAN A can be perceived as a turning point. Thus further support and implementation of Open Access at Austrian public universities have become more achievable than ever before. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Helmut Hartmann responds to questions on the introduction of electronic full text resources in Austrian academic libraries as well as consortia, covering the development from the pioneering days of the late nineties to the institutional establishment of the Austrian Academic Consortium (Kooperation E-Medien Österreich). Both major achievements and unfulfilled desiderata of his directorship are mentioned. Starting out from his rich experience, he provides some interesting insights into international collaboration for consortial licenses and highlights the relationship between publishers and consortia. The interview also reflects Hartmann's personal view on the open access movement and the future of libraries and consortia. Finally drawing upon his expertise as a lecturer of LIS at various universities and the Austrian National Library, he pleads for courage, curiosity and commitment as the most desirable qualities in future librarians. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present contribution relates about current projects and trends in Austrian librarianship in 2012. Network projects and cooperation projects are presented as well as important projects of the Austrian National Library and of the Council of Austrian University Libraries. Themes such as Open Access, provenance research of Nazilooted property, education in the field of library, information and documentation, conferences and publications of the library associations and library and information policy in Austria are mentioned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Austrian Open Access Publishing Bibliography includes articles about Open Access Publishing in Austria and articles of Austrian authors about Open Access Publishing that are indexed in DABI - Datenbank Deutsches Bibliothekswesen (http://dabi.ib.hu-berlin.de/) and in E-LIS - Eprints in Library and Information Science (http://eprints.rclis.org/). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Task Force on "Open Access at universities in Austria" was set up by the Council of Austrian University Libraries in November 2011. The group was charged with the analysis of the current policy framework of Open Access and to identify projects that deal with the "golden road" and the "green road" to Open Access at universities in Austria. The working group started off by conducting a survey in early 2012 of all Austrian university libraries to gather information on their experiences with the implementation of Open Access. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities has created awareness for Open Access also among Austrian scientists, librarians and funding organizations. Due to the lack of initiatives on the national level, Open Access activities in Austria are currently taken on mainly by the Vienna University of Vienna, the Austrian Academy of Sciences and the Austrian Science Fund. More than 40 Austrian scientists have expressed their arguments in favor of Open Access in testimonials which have been available online since summer 2012 on the website of the Austrian Science Fund. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The EU funded Study of Open Access Publishing (SOAP) run from March 2009 to February 2011. More than 53.000 people worldwide participated in this online-survey on the Golden Road to Open Access, among them about 46.000 scholars. The paper will put a spotlight on the input of the 462 Austrian scientists who took part in this survey. It analyses their answers to 9 selected questions out of the survey's original total of 23 questions. A focus is put on significant differences in these answers between scientists from Austria and Germany. The financial supporting structure for Open Access in Austria is quite dissimilar from Germany hence differences should be expected. Even so 89% of scientists in both countries agree that Open Access is helpful in their own field of research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports on the "Open Access and Open Data" international conference held in Köln, Germany, on December 13 and 14, 2010. The article discusses the theme "The Open Access Advantage" as referred to by speakers including professor Dieter Stein, Dr. Alma Swan, a consultant in scholarly communication, and Celina Ramjoué a representative of the European Commission.

The article reports on the third Open Access Tagen conference held at the Universität Konstanz university, in Konstanz, Germany, from October 7 to 8, 2009. The emphasis was on the topic of open access in the combined German-speaking areas of Germany, Austria and Switzerland. In addition to the conference a trade show was held to give an overview of current projects, journals, and services available to create open access publishing.

The article reports on satellite conferences between the Hochschulbibliothekszentrum des Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen (hbz - College Library Center of North-Rhine Westphalia) ) and the Deutsche Zentralbibliothek für Medizin (ZB MED - German Central Library for Medicine) in Düsseldorf, Germany in November 2008. The Open Access Conference addressed the theme "Changing Scholary Communication in the Knowledge Society."

The article reports on an April 2008 conference on "E-Journals in Practice" at the Free University of Bozen, Italy. Topics discussed included licensing and monitoring of eJournals, journal management, open access library materials, and systematic peer reviews. The final discussion revolved around the implementation and application of library use and user statistics.

The article announces the establishment of the Open Access Netzwerk Austria (OANA) on November 21, 2012, a library association, lobby group, and advisory body concerning open access publishing, as outlined in the Berlin Declaration on Open Access to Knowledge in the Sciences and Humanities.