This workshop will provide insights into the ongoing activities to adopt open workflows within library publishing. Via the example of Iowa State University Digital Press, we will explore how libraries can collaborate with open infrastructures such as Thoth Open Metadata, Janeway, and Pressbooks to implement open practices utilising open data and open protocols to improve findability of their valuable outputs. ISU Digital Press is considering the adoption of an open ecosystem of interoperable, community-led infrastructures, covering aspects of editorial (Janeway & Pressbooks) and metadata management (Thoth Open Metadata), hosting and distribution (Thoth Open Metadata & OAPEN), discoverability (Directory of Open Access Books, multiple aggregators via Thoth), archiving (Thoth Open Archiving Network), and usage monitoring (OPERAS/Thoth) of open access books. By collaborating to ensure interoperability and accessible, seamless workflows across vital infrastructures that meet individual publisher needs, we showcase how a more robust, sustainable, and equitable ecosystem for open access books is being embedded by library publishers. We will also seek to shed light on questions and issues that have emerged during the adoption of those open workflows, such as that of mapping different forms of long-form publishing outputs (e.g. textbooks, OER in a broader sense) onto metadata management, dissemination, and archiving processes to ensure long-term availability of those open resources, Following a round of brief introductory presentations from Iowa State University Digital Press, and the infrastructures involved, we invite participants to engage in an open discussion of the topics raised, to learn more about attendants’ backgrounds, needs, and recommendations – with an aim to scope applicability of the proposed workflows to different national and regional contexts and corresponding specificities that exist in library publishing across the globe.
Building on work by the Association of University Presses’ Library Relations Committee and initiatives spearheaded by leaders of the HBCU Library Alliance, University of Vermont Press, and University of Guam Press, this panel demonstrates how libraries and university presses can develop and sustain support models for Black and Indigenous scholars. We will discuss training and mentoring programs, intentional acquisitions and peer review practices, open access and other equity concerns.
Library publishing often relies on librarians taking on journal “hosting” or publishing roles, despite having little experience with publishing. Key to this role is working with editors, who may also be new to the “back end” of publishing. Whether nurturing a collection of existing journals, or guiding a new journal toward its first issue, it can be challenging to build relationships with editors, understand the needs of the journals, and build the necessary skills. As a librarian who is still relatively new to library publishing, I am interested in the practices, ideas, and challenges of others who are working with similar programs. The session will be a semi-structured discussion intended to provide librarians an opportunity to ask questions and share strategies. Likely discussion topics include: • Strategies for communicating with editors and understanding their needs • Identifying and prioritizing useful library interventions (some possibilities: indexing, preservation, and accessibility) • Resources and strategies for learning about publishing • Decision making around taking on new journals • Development of policies to guide this work In order to help attendees turn this conversation into action, we will use a notes document to gather suggestions and resources.
Library publishers are responsible for more than just the content we publish; we are responsible for the containers we put it in. While we champion Open Access, the infrastructure we lease from vendors often undermines the values we claim to uphold. Consider the reality of our vendor platforms: You can have perfectly accessible PDFs, but if a blind author cannot navigate the submission dashboard, your program is exclusionary. Similarly, you can remove the financial paywall for your readers, but if your vendor replaces it with a surveillance dragnet, you haven’t made the research free—you’ve just changed the currency. The commercial surveillance of user data in academic systems continues to grow unchecked. The April 2026 Department of Justice (DOJ) deadline for WCAG 2.1 AA compliance has passed, leaving libraries to face legal liability for the accessibility of these third-party platforms. We cannot code our way out of these problems; we must negotiate our way out. This session frames the license agreement as the library’s and library publisher’s most powerful tool for enforcing equity. We will present SPARC’s work on privacy contract negotiation alongside an initial landscape analysis of accessibility clauses. Participants will discuss how to move beyond checking the Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) to demanding binding contract language that protects user data and ensures legal compliance. Join us to strategize how we can hold our infrastructure vendors accountable to our values and the law.
