Hybrid Publishing Lab
Academic communication in the digital age
The Hybrid Publishing Lab researches, develops and engages with new forms of academic publishing and communication for the digital era
Approach – working with publishers, librarians, software developers, and authors the Hybrid Publishing Lab engages with new concepts and technologies of digital publishing particularly focusing on the humanities. By embedding these results into economic projects, for example with setting up a "Hybrid Publishing Consortium" to consult about Open Source software solutions, academic research is not only turned into an applied experiment but into a business model. Central for the Lab's projects is the idea of open access regarding education, academic knowledge and research, as well as a strong curiosity about new business models in a disruptive digital environment.
Challenge – digital distribution channels have changed the access to science and education as well as the further use of academic knowledge thereby introducing important keywords like "Open Access" and "Open Science". New forms of communication are on the rise like scholarly blogs, videos of conference lectures, or the distribution of academic papers via the universities' repositories. However, for a qualitative evaluation, a consistent quotation, a long term data archiving as well as for an economically viable publishing solutions that will prove satisfactory still have to be found. The fascinating new technologies of a global, instant and interactive publishing have to be made available to the humanities in their digital era – an interesting and important challenge.
Information – The Hybrid Publishing Lab is part of the Centre for Digital Cultures (CDC), which brings together the transdisciplinary research on digital media of circa 80 academics of the EU funded Innovation Incubator at the Leuphana University Lüneburg. Headed by Dr. Mercedes Bunz with 20 staff members it is financed until end of July 2015. The activities at the Leuphana University Lüneburg provide a focal contact point for the region.
ACADEMIC PUBLISHING AND COMMUNICATION IN THE DIGITAL AGE
In collaboration with publishers, librarians, software developers and authors, Hybrid Publishing is a lab that engages with new concepts and technologies in digital publishing with a particular focus on the humanities. Embedding its research results in economic contexts, for example by setting up a Hybrid Publishing Consortium to consult about Open Source software solutions, the Lab both carries out applied experiments in publishing as well as incubating new businesses. Central for the lab's projects is the idea of Open Access regarding academic knowledge, research, and education as well as a strong curiosity about new business models in a disruptive digital environment.
Projects
HYBRID PUBLISHING CONSORTIUM
In partnerships with publishers and technology companies the Hybrid Publishing Consortium researched digital developments in publishing to establish an Open Source software infrastructure for small and medium-sized enterprises and university presses. Its focus was to simplify the process of multi-format publishing in the academic field.
www.consortium.io
EXPERIMENTAL PUBLISHING
Several experiments explored the unbound book in the digital age: "Book Sprints", a method for collaborative writing first developed by Adam Hyde, brought together a group to produce a book in 3-5 days; "The Personal Archive" rethought our relation to archives in the digital era; a cooperation with DIE ZEIT transformed analog learning materials into a hybrid format.
HYPER IMAGE
The innovative research environment allows any number of details, or subregions, within an image to be highlighted and described. It links annotations within a corpus to each other, making them accessible in indices. Interim results as well as final versions can be compiled at any time as an online/offline hypermedia publication.
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MESON PRESS
The research project published research on digital cultures and networked media to explore and apply new digital publishing practices. Its publications challenged contemporary theories and advance debates related to the Humanities in the digital age. Pushing the boundaries of the book, the press combined Open Access and thorough peer review with novel approaches like Book Sprints.
meson.press
CRITICAL KEYWORDS FOR THE DIGITAL HUMANITIES
Initialized by the Hybrid Publishing Lab this vocabulary discusses and positions key terms located at the intersection of digitalization and the humanities in which each keyword gives an overview of debates and discourses, daws out inherent tensions, and explores future directions.
cdckeywords.leuphana.com