Open Access Week 2012 will take place October 22-28 all over the world.

Networked Researcher is convinced, as the Open Access Week web site says, that

"“Open Access” to information – the free, immediate, online access to the results of scholarly research, and the right to use and re-use those results as you need – has the power to transform the way research and scientific inquiry are conducted. It has direct and widespread implications for academia, medicine, science, industry, and for society as a whole.

Open Access (OA) has the potential to maximize research investments, increase the exposure and use of published research, facilitate the ability to conduct research across available literature, and enhance the overall advancement of scholarship. Research funding agencies, academic institutions, researchers and scientists, teachers, students, and members of the general public are supporting a move towards Open Access in increasing numbers every year. Open Access Week is a key opportunity for all members of the community to take action to keep this momentum moving forward."

Networked Researcher invites all our registered contributors (if you aren't one yet here's how to join us) to get involved by participating in our Open Access Week 2012 Networked Researcher Blogging Unconference.

• Participation will be through posts (of any length; they can be quite brief) on our blog during that week.
• All blog posts will be categorised with "Open Access Week 2012" and will be archived on Networked Researcher under said category.
• Posts can address any aspects related to open access (OA); all points of view are welcome.
• All contributions need to observe our Community Policy. 
• There is no need to submit an abstract. 

Some examples of topics that can be addressed are:

• Open access and academic publishing; business models, peer review.
• Open access and public libraries.
• Open access and institutional repositories.
• Open access and research impact.
• Open access and Open Educational Resources.
• Open access and publicly funded research.
• Open access publishing and social media; interactions, tools, studies, metrics.
• Open access and government, democracy, citizen participation.
• Open access in the humanities and social sciences; comparisons with open access in science.
• Open access and the digital humanities; humanities computing. 
• Open access and intellectual property and copyright; creative commons licensing.
• Open access in international development. The open access movement in different countries.
• Open access and health information provision, for example about HIV and AIDS.

As a symbolic recognition of their work, Networked Researcher will post a printed certificate (and a digital version too!) of participation to those bloggers who contribute posts of more than 1000 words that week.

Since Open Access Week is a a reputed international event (now on it's sixth year) this is potentially a good opportunity of raising your academic research/publication profile by reaching a targeted, specialised audience.

We'll use the #NetResOA hashtag on Twitter to share the blog posts.