This post on PKP’s year in review and event recap is part of PKP’s inaugural newsletter issue, “Archipelago”.
As a community-driven project, the Public Knowledge Project finds great value in participating in and hosting in-person and online events to get closer and share experiences with community members worldwide.
Reflecting on the events PKP has hosted and participated in this year helps build a broader vision of our global community while reminding us of how significant community contributions are for the project.
The last year was an event in itself, as 2023 marked the 25th anniversary of the project. In this tone of celebration, PKP actively organized about 20 events, some in conjunction with other organizations.
PKP News and reporting events
In August 2023, PKP hosted its Annual General Meeting, an online presentation welcoming the community to learn about the yearly milestones achieved, news about software development, research and grants information, and a transparent report of how the organization uses its resources.
The Development team held two webinars to share with the community the latest developments news and the status of the software so far. The webinars took place in August and November – see the recordings on our YouTube channel.
PKP and Coalition Publica webinars
In line with the mission of sharing knowledge, PKP and Coalition Publica have organized a series of webinars on topics of interest to the community. Among the topics covered during last year’s webinars were:
- Inclusion in the DOAJ: A panel discussion
- DOAJ Indexing
- Creative Commons Licensing
- Multilingualism best practices in OJS (available in English and French)
- Visibility through National portals
Events co-hosted with organizations and institutions
Having a community of users with members all over the world can pose challenges when reaching out to different regions. However, it is the community members themselves who bring us closer to them through online and in-person events that PKP co-hosts.
Some of the events that were co-hosted with institutions were:
- OJS workshop – co-hosted with Charutar Vidya Mandal (CVM) University, access the event’s website.
- OJS workshop – co-hosted with the Indian Institute of Technology- Delhi, access here.
- OJS workshop for the South Indian open access publishing community – in person, co-hosted with Amal Jyothi College of Engineering
- OJS webinar – co-hosted with the State Scientific and Technical Library of Ukraine, access the resulting materials here.
- OJS-ORCiD webinar for the Indonesian user community.
PKP in-person events
One of the best ways to get together and share experiences with the community is the PKP Sprints, two or three-day in-person events in different locations. In 2023, PKP organized two Sprints, one in Copenhagen, hosted by the Royal Danish Library during the Summer, and one in Hannover, hosted by Technische Informationsbibliothek (TIB) during the Fall, welcoming participants to work on improving the software in working groups.
As an example of the power of collective community working groups driving PKP software development, here’s a breakdown of results from the Copenhagen Sprint:
- Group 1 – Importing content into OJS
- Group 2 – DOAJ and PKP collaborative opportunities
- Group 3 – Multilingual metadata in Crossref
- Group 4 – Setting publication dates for old published content
- Group 5 – Public peer-review
- Group 6 – User invitation process
- Group 7 – Multilingual form fields and data input
Visit the Hannover Sprint Roundup for more details on the results of that event.
In addition to the Sprints, PKP had its first event entirely in Portuguese in Brazil, hosted by Instituto Biológico de São Paulo at the end of July, where the participants had the initiative to give workshops on topics and needs in the use of the software they find in the journals of the region.
Sponsored by PKP: Student Journal Forum
The Student Journal Forum is an event organized by a group of Canadian institutions that aims to bring together students involved in the creation or production of a student journal. Last year marked the second round of PKP sponsorship for this event which made waves in raising awareness about the Canadian publishing landscape, open access, and student publishing in particular.
During the Forum, student journal teams can make presentations about their processes, challenges, and opportunities, listen to other students to learn from their experiences, and have contact with professionals in academic publishing and journal editing. Questions about supporting the Forum or getting involved can be directed to Kristin Hoffmann, Co-Chair of the Student Journal Forum 2024.
PKP Global Presence
In addition to the events that PKP organizes and sponsors, the PKP team is present at important events in the field of research, scholarly publishing, and Open Access, such as Software Freedom Day, Open Access Week, the Charleston Conference, the Frankfurt Book Fair, the Diamond Open Access Global Summit, and the Bogotá Book Fair, among others.
Other events in which the PKP team participates include webinars, workshops, panel discussions, and presentations on topics related to Open Access, publishing software, and trends in scholarly publishing. To learn more about the events in which the team participates, follow us on social media.
Further, Kevin Stranack, PKP Director of Operations, reflected on 2023 and 25 years of the project, in this post. In conclusion, the 2023 events demonstrated the collective dedication and significant milestones reached, reflecting our commitment to the community. In each event, each volunteer and partner always contribute to PKP’s progress.
As we move into the new year, we hope that 2024 will be a year of seeing us again at these events and that our entire community, to whom we are so grateful for the support, can join us.
Jump to other newsletter sections
📌 Welcome to PKP’s Newsletter, Archipelago!
📌 Celebrating 25 years and collaborating for the future
📌 Country feature: ORCID and OJS in Indonesia
📌 An update to PKP Member structure
📌 PKP announces new Development Partnership with Sachsenkonsortium
