This document discusses using ONIX, a metadata standard, to describe open access books in the book supply chain. It outlines some key issues for describing open access monographs in ONIX, such as identifying funders as publishers rather than authors and including links to open access licenses. Some proposed additions to ONIX are presented, such as new codes to flag items as unpriced or to link related print and electronic versions, which could be ratified for a future release. Overall the document examines how small changes to ONIX could better support describing open access books in the book supply chain.

1. ONIX for OA Books
Open Access Books and the Supply Chain
Graham Bell
EDItEUR
London, 1st–2nd July 2013

2. About EDItEUR
• not-for-profit membership organisation
• develops, supports and promotes metadata
and identification standards for the book,
e-book and serials supply chains
• based in London, with a global membership
of publishers, distributors, wholesalers,
subscription agents, retailers, libraries,
system vendors, rights organizations and
trade associations
• acknowledged centre of expertise on
standards and metadata for the industry

3. About ONIX
• the key international metadata standard for
the commercial book supply chain
• widely used throughout North America,
Europe, Japan, Russia, with early
implementations in China, India and parts
of the Arabic world
• developed originally by the AAP, but the
standard is now managed by EDItEUR
• EDItEUR membership supports development

4. About ONIX
• an open standard – documentation and XML
tools free of charge, no fees payable for use,
covered by highly-permissive licence and a
transparent governance process
• supports the business needs of a wide range
of stakeholders through entire supply chain
• two versions in current use – ONIX 2.1 and
ONIX 3.0
• 2.1 is more widely deployed in UK and US
• 3.0 enables richer description of e-books

5. <Contributor>
<SequenceNumber>1</SequenceNumber>
<ContributorRole>A01</ContributorRole>
<NameIdentifier>
<NameIDType>16</NameIDType>
<IDValue>0000000116216947</IDValue>
</NameIdentifier>
<PersonNameInverted>Peach, Ceri
/PersonNameInverted
ProfessionalAffiliation
AffiliationUniversity of Oxford/Affiliation
/ProfessionalAffiliation
/Contributor
3.0

6. Issues for OA monographs
• product identification and reporting
• crediting funders
• treat funders like publishers, not like authors
• links to licences
• could be CC, or might be a bespoke licence
• free of charge products
• links between e-book and print versions

7. ProductIdentifier
ProductIDType15/ProductIDType
IDValue9780007120765/IDValue
/ProductIdentifier

8. Publisher
PublishingRole01/PublishingRole
PublisherNameSpringer/PublisherName
/Publisher
Publisher
PublishingRole16/PublishingRole
PublisherNameWellcome Trust/PublisherName
/Publisher

9. SupportingResource
ResourceContentType99/ResourceContentType
ContentAudience00/ContentAudience
ResourceMode04/ResourceMode
ResourceVersion
ResourceForm01/ResourceForm
ResourceLinkhttp://creativecommons.org/
licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en_GB/ResourceLink
/ResourceVersion
/SupportingResource
3.0

10. UnpricedItemType01/UnpricedItemType

11. RelatedProduct
ProductRelationCode27/ProductRelationCode
ProductIdentifier
ProductIDType15/ProductIDType
IDValue9780007120765/IDValue
/ProductIdentifier
/RelatedProduct

12. Status of these changes
• the small number of necessary additions
described are currently ‘proposals’
• should be ratified by ONIX national groups,
added to next revision of the codelists and the
Implementation and Best Practice Guide
• discussing potential for simple ‘OA flag’ for
marketing purposes
• licence link is workable, but a better option
is to include with UsageConstraints
• may be added to ONIX 3.0.2 (~January 2014)

13. graham@editeur.org
www.editeur.org