Connexions: An Alternative Approach to Publishing

1
Connexions An Alternative Approach to Publishing
Connexions Project http//cnx.rice.edu
Geneva Henry Executive Directory, Digital Library
Initiative and Connexions Project ghenry_at_rice.edu
15 September 2004
2
Overview of Talk

• Background on Start of Connexions Project
• Summary of Goals
• Project Overview
• Discussion of Publication Alternative
• Summary

3
Mission

• Provide and maintain a commons where individuals
  and communities worldwide can create and freely
  share knowledge

4
Connexions
5
Connexions Objectives

• Provide a content commons of free,
  interconnected educational materials
• Facilitate access to the commons and foster its
  growth
• Facilitate content reuse
• Foster community participation in the commons
• Ensure sustainability of this resource into the
  future

6
Connexions Approach

• Modularity
• Interconnectedness
• Open licensing
• Creative Commons By license only require
  attribution for reuse
• Collaboration
• Open participation

7
Conceptual Model Components
8
Content Types

• Module
• Single topic building block
• Standalone, but cross-linked
• Course
• Sequence of modules
• Customizations

9
Editing Environment

• Workspaces (private and group)
• Collaboration
• Create and manage content

10
Repository

• Storage
• Version Control
• Access
• Search

11
Viewing

• Single modules
• Multiple formats
• Courses
• Persistent navigation
• Module customization

12
Technology and Tools

• Content modules encoded in XML
• Database to organize modules (eventually
  distributed)
• Authoring tools and workgroups to facilitate
  collaboration
• Course Composer to assemble modules
• Annotation to personalize modules
• Roadmap to navigate and explore
• Discussion forums for feedback, communication
• REST architecture
• All software is open source
• Approach find existing open source projects and
  contribute back to them
• Only do new s/w project if nothing else suitable
  exists
• Its all about community
• Tools in live use at a range of institutions
  globally
• Full Version 1.0 launch February 2004

13
Content Adaptation

• Support for multiple languages
• Content in English, Chinese, Japanese, Thai,
  Portuguese, French, others
• Multiple presentations
• Web (interactive)
• Print (pdf)
• View modules or courses

14
(No Transcript)
15
Intellectual Property
16
Music
17
Biodiversity Data
18
Mathematics / Engineering
19
(No Transcript)
20
(No Transcript)
21
(No Transcript)
22
(No Transcript)
23
Open Content Licensing

• Current IP regime discourages sharing
• Creative Commons licenses provide common legal
  vocabulary for sharing content
• By or Attribution Only license provides the most
  open terms of use
• Sharing and (re)use requires that IP be
  integrated into content
• Publisher collaborators
• Kinkos, Cambridge University Press

24
Publishing Alternative

• Open Content, post publication peer review
• Many more eyes see quicker
• Fixes to errors occur more rapidly
• Notion of lenses to filter based on community
  needs
• Who pays not the author, not the consumer
• Integrate research findings into the curriculum
  more quickly
• Spawn new research more rapidly
• Print on demand and at a significantly lower cost
  than traditional publications
• BROAD IMPACT no limits on distribution,
  encourages value-add by allowing commercial use
  while keeping knowledge free and open

25
Prototype Communities

• International Community in Digital Signal
  Processing (DSP)
• Rice, Illinois, Ohio State, Georgia Tech,
  Michigan, Polytechnic, Cambridge, École
  Polytechnique, ENST, ENS Lyon, INRIA (France),
  EPFL (Switzerland)
• National Instruments and Texas Instruments Japan
• Spontaneous contributions from NTNU (Norway),
  Univ. Verona (Italy)
• Electrical and Computer Engineering (Rice core
  curriculum)
• goal 15 interlinked courses with prerequisites
  is gt1/3 complete
• Bioinformatics (Rice, Baylor, MD Anderson,
  University of Houston)
• genetics, statistics, computer science,
  bioengineering,
• Botany/Biodiversity (BRIT, AMNH)
• Music appreciation and theory (college and K12)
• UC Merced

26

• Content Commons
• 2,100 new modules
• More than 40 courses

• User Community
• 450,000 users
• 96 outside Rice University
• 2000 author accounts

27
Commons and Usage Growth

• To date
• 2100 modules
• more than 40 courses
• Worldwide authorship
• ECE, CS, bioinformatics, math, nanotech,
  physics, statistics, botany, music,

Hits Q4 2002 6,0008,000 a day Q1 2004
150,000250,000 a day
28
Growth in Module Revisions
10,098
1 version
more than 5 versions
25 versions
1725
29
Views by User Address
9.2 million views over six months
In 2 years, views have increased from less than
1,000 up to 20,000 per day.
30
Views from Colleges Universities
domestic (.edu) and international
32 of total
Top 20 educational institutions (excluding Rice
149,000 views)
Institutions teaching courses through Connexions
31
Worldwide Access
from 157 out of 243 assigned country codes
25 of total

• Next most
• prevalent
• countries
• Finland
• Denmark
• Sweden
• Japan
• United States
• Israel
• Belgium
• Switzerland
• Greece
• Pakistan
• Spain
• Mexico
• Argentina
• etc.

32
Interdisciplinary Team
33
http//cnx.rice.edu