On 18 Sep 2010, at 21:59, Velterop wrote: o Make a repository easy to find (a Google search for "University of X repository" more often seems to produce a link to an article or press release about the repository than a link to the repository itself, at least on the first few pages of the search results â repositories often have names or acronyms that make them difficult to find if you don't know the name) o Draw attention, unambiguously and very clearly, on the repository home page, to the possibility of submitting a paper/manuscript (e.g. a brightly coloured "submit now!" button) o Make the deposit procedure very, very easy and intuitive. Involve UX experts where possible. o Make deposit the *prime* focus of the repository. Repositories and their contents can be searched in a variety of ways and via many routes, but submission of articles can only take place via the repository's own web site.
I'd like to take this opportunity to mention the new JISC DepositMO project whose aim is to increase the ease of deposit into repositories chiefly by allowing direct deposit from word processors, office programs and the computer desktop ("save as..." and "send to..." directly into EPrints or DSpace). Although the repository's web interface should be a useful and advantageous environment for the author as well as the reader, the fact is that depositing is An Extra Thing to add to the author's workflow, and it might help to woo some recalcitrant professors if it appeared to be the same thing as "saving a new copy" and it could be achieved in the familiar interface of Microsoft Word. I don't think that technology changes alone will stimulate more Self Archiving (improve the repository! make it more friendly! make it faster! make it more useful!) There has to be a combination of social, management and technological advances all pressing in the same direction. Make Open Access policies mandatory, make open access practices a key part of your institutional business activities and make open access technology as useful as possible. --- Les Carr http://blogs.ecs.soton.ac.uk/depositmo/ PS Please note that the work of DepositMO (where MO stands for Modus Operandi) is building on the SWORD protocol for repository deposits and on Microsoft's Article Authoring Add-in.