SeDOA consortium begins work 

At its meeting on 11 December 2024, the Joint Committee of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) approved the SeDOA consortium's initiative to establish a national Service Centre for Diamond Open Access. Submitted under the call “Fresh Momentum for Diamond Open Access”, the project will initially receive funding for three years. The national Service Centre is aimed at researchers who act as editors of scholarly publications, as well as all others involved in managing publication media at publicly funded or non-profit institutions. The services provided will support the establishment and further development of these scholarly publishing infrastructures.

The DFG issued a call for proposals in January last year seeking to establish a national Service Centre with the aim of enhancing the performance capacity of Diamond Open Access publishing infrastructure in Germany and boost its international networking. In doing so, the DFG continues to pursue its long-standing commitment to a scholarly-led publishing system as well as introducing fresh areas of focus in this field.

As research-led and, in many cases, researcher-owned opportunities for publication, Diamond Open Access offerings are of immense importance in creating a publishing system for science and the humanities that promotes diversity, multiple perspectives, needs-based equity and quality orientation.

Organised as a decentralised network, the SeDOA consortium is made up of 15 research institutions under the leadership of ULB Darmstadt and other associated partners. They will seek to establish a single point of contact with an efficient communication infrastructure, promote the Diamond Open Access concept within the community, raise the visibility of existing publication infrastructures, and contribute to optimisation of the latter. They will also provide their own supplementary and innovative services. Planned activities include the following: needs assessments, the provision of information material, guidelines and advisory support, the organisation of workshops and training courses, legal advice, the preparation of legal opinions on a case-by-case basis, extensive national and international networking and communication activities, identifying and taking into account disciplinary specifics, e.g. through scholarly societies, enhancing the data basis by setting up a registry, and dynamically advancing Diamond Open Access by means of innovative concepts and approaches in the SeDOA Innovation Lab (SIL). As the German Diamond Capacity Centre, SeDOA will form part of a European network, thereby boosting international cooperation.

The funding of the national Service Centre requires adjustments to the DFG funding programme “Infrastructures for Scholarly Publishing”. The new version of the programme guidelines, DFG form 12.11, is available on the programme website. 

Further Information

Website of the Service Centre for Diamond Open Access (SeDOA).

Call for Proposals “Fresh Momentum for Diamond Open Access”.

Funding programme “Infrastructures for Scholarly Publishing”.