The ESR 10 fellowship on long-term business models in dissemination and publishing is now open for application until 20 February 2015. For details please see the announcement at Huygens ING and the DiXiT application check list.
The researcher will investigate the competing demands faced by digital scholarly editions: on the one hand the need for financial sustainability with respect to exploitation and maintenance, and on the other hand the general interest of the scholarly community in open access. Digital editions are usually created based on project funding, limited in time. After funding runs out, they need to be hosted, administered and maintained into an indefinite future. Is there a conceivable business model for the digital scholarly edition that will help the edition pay for its own maintenance while maintaining open access?
Aspects to be explored: viable policies for longer term valorisation and revenue; open access, exploitation and maintenance costs of digital editions; paper derivatives, event association, apps, ‘gamification’, e-learning, augmented reality knowledge aids, lite vs. full licensing, ‘freemium’ business models, subscription etc. The researcher will collaborate with publishers Amsterdam University Press, Open Book Publishers and Liguori.
Methods to be applied: literature research, case studies, surveys, user studies. One or more experiments with revenue-raising strategies in existing or future digital editions would be desirable.
