AAA is thrilled to announce the availability of a freshly-updated “Objects for Review” workflow tool to transform book reviews. Using funds from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, AAA and Public Knowledge Project extended an object for review plugin included in its popular Open Journal Systems application. The original plugin, developed by PKP partners at Freie Universität Berlin, is free to use and available in recent versions of OJS (2.4.4+). The updated version will be released shortly under the same open source license.
Major updates to the Objects for Review support:
- All-digital book review workflow. Digital versions can be made available via the plugin, reducing the carbon footprint from a print-centric process and eliminating the costs associated with packaging and mailing bound books to journal offices and then onto book reviewers.
- Ease of use for participating publishers. With the help of feedback and testers from presses like Duke University Press, University Press of Colorado, and University of New Mexico Press, the software features an ONIX ingest and supports netGalley digital proofs.
Using this software means that simultaneous publication of reviews and reviewed books is now possible: Publishers can upload uncorrected page proofs; interested reviewers can potentially view these texts within days; and book reviews can potentially be published in tandem with book releases, thus sparking conversation, sales, and interactions with front list books.
AAA’s installation is called Anthropology Book Forum, under the editorship of Justin Shaffner. Participating publishers can upload any book for review that have published in 2015 or are forthcoming.
The Objects for Review program plugin may revolutionize book reviews, but the plugin supports a range of digital objects; journals who use the plugin could consider using the software to review digital photographs or digital music. For those interested in the updated plugin when it is available, please either follow the PKP blog http://pkp.sfu.ca/blog or send PKP an email pkp.contact@gmail.com.
