The Alliance of German Science Organisations extends the Priority Initiative ‘Digital Information’ until the end of 2017

For a better exchange of academic information 

18-2-2013 — /europawire.eu/ — The academic world needs a free, unrestricted and quick exchange of information. To further emphatically pursue this aim, the German Science Organisations started the second phase of the Priority Initiative ‘Digital Information’ on 1 January. As a result, the partner organisations’ policies and practical decisions in relation to digital research infrastructures will be pooled and the skills and resources used will be coordinated for a further five years. The initiative’s main objective will continue to be to improve access to research data and make this as open as possible.

In the first phase of the collaboration (from 2008), the partner organisations developed joint principles, strategies and guidelines on national licensing, the backup of research data, the development of virtual research environments, a national hosting strategy and the Open Access paradigms. In the political sphere, the Alliance has acted as the voice of the academic world to advocate a research-friendly copyright law.

The extension of the Alliance initiative aims to heighten the integration of the results of the coordination processes conducted to date into everyday academic practice. One particular focus is the transformation of the academic publication system to Open Access – with both ‘gold’ (initial publication) and ‘green’ Open Access (secondary publication in a repository). The Alliance of German Science Organisations will continue to advocate the creation of legal, financial, technical and organisational conditions at both national and international level to enable and implement Open Access publication in the academic world on a broader basis.

Through this initiative, the Alliance of German Science Organisations is helping to create an open exchange of knowledge and information within Europe as a research area.

For further information, please visit: http://allianz-initiative.de.

The Alliance of German Science Organisations is an association of the most important German science and research associations. It comments regularly on matters of science policy, research funding and the structural development of the German academic system. The Alliance’s members are the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), the German Research Foundation (DFG), the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, the Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres, the German Rectors’ Conference, the Leibniz Association, the Max Planck Society and the German Council of Science and Humanities.

The Alexander von Humboldt Foundation

Every year, the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation enables more than 2,000 researchers from all over the world to spend time researching in Germany. The Foundation maintains a network of well over 25,000 Humboldtians from all disciplines in more than 130 countries worldwide – including 49 Nobel Prize winners.

Joint declaration of:

• Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
• German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina
• German Academic Exchange Service
• German Research Foundation
• Fraunhofer- Gesellschaft
• Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres
• German Rectors’ Conference
• Leibniz Association
• Max Planck Society 
• German Council of Science and Humanities.

Contact

Regine Laroche
Sandra Schulmeister
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Georg Scholl
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Tel.: +49 228 833-258
Fax: +49 228 833-441
presse@avh.de