From the FAQ used to inform discussions before adoption of the policy

How does this benefit faculty authors?

• Repeated studies indicate that scholarly articles that are available in open access form are downloaded and cited more often than articles published only in subscription-based journals, and that citations occur more quickly than with a traditional publication cycle
• Duke will provide persistent storage of and access to a digital copy of your work, ensuring that it will continue to be available to readers even if access is no longer possible through the original publisher’s online service.
• You will have a persistent web address for each of your articles that can be used for citing your work, and that you can use for links in academic or personal web pages and social networking sites, and which can be e-mailed to colleagues who want to read your work. This will save the labor of repeated scanning and file management. The web page at Duke that this address points to will have a link to and citation information for the original article on the publisher’s site as well as an archival copy in the Duke repository that will be accessible to those who do not have subscription access to the published version.
• Research funding mandates are becoming more common, and pending federal legislation would vastly increase the numbers of funded research works for which open access will be a requirement. A license given to Duke will allow the university to make th/e process of fulfilling these mandates much easier for individual authors.
• Because Duke will hold a cumulative license in the scholarly works of its faculty authors, the university will be able to negotiate directly with publishers on behalf of covered authors. This can make the process of publication and open access deposit much easier. View comment on the success of this process at Harvard

How does this benefit Duke?

• Using the opportunities provided by the Internet and digital technologies to improve access to the scholarly work produced by Duke faculty helps the university fulfill its fundamental educational mission.
  • Specifically, greater access to scholarship serves the strategic goals of greater international impact and collaboration. Such access can also foster and facilitate greater interdisciplinary collaboration and enhances university’s goal of using knowledge in the service of society.
• By creating a university-managed repository of scholarship at Duke, the University can showcase the work of its faculty across disciplines without interfering with the normal interests and expectations of each individual author.

Benefits For:

1. The Academic Researcher:

2. increase the visibility of your research findings, your work is easier to disseminate, easier to find and easier to read
3. make it easier to manage your list of publications on your personal website and your organization’s website
4. give you a place where your scholarly works are permanently stored, whether they are a PDF of a journal article, a Microsoft Word document of a technical report, a Microsoft PowerPoint file of a conference poster, a JPEG file of a photograph, an audio file of a musical performance or a video file of a speech
5. enable a simple web address to your piece of work that can be cited in subsequent works or easily refer other interested parties too
6. make possible easy access to materials previously only available in print e.g. theses, dissertations
7. give an indicator of the impact your research is having in your field, help identify who is reading your work (or at least from where they are accessing it) and encourage impact to be more related to the merit of your work and not the name of the journal in which it is finally published
8. offer new opportunities for publishing your works e.g. as part of a virtual journal, for others to comment on your work and provide feedback
9. encourage others to do the same, so you can easily find and read the work of your colleagues and others
10. make it easier to keep abreast of the latest research findings (certainly within the University)
11. for those working in a fast-moving field e.g. computer sciences or electronics, enable quick and dated dissemination or your research findings, which could establish prior discovery
12. have a safe, backed-up and secure place to store your scholarly works
13. have an organized single point of reference for your work, accessible 24/7, readable from any web-enabled device (Windows PC, Apple MAC, PDA, mobile phone), from work, from home, while you are abroad at a conference etc.
14. reduce your workload associated with managing your portfolio of scholarly works (or at least not add to it)
15. improve your understanding of copyright, make you aware of your rights and maximize the return of your efforts
16. meet and manage the requirements of funding bodies with respect to disseminating your research outputs and ensure you can confidently tick this box on new funding applications

17. Research Administrators, Research Managers, Librarians, and Senior Academic Staff, Heads of Faculty/School:

18. provide new opportunities for the archiving and preservation of valuable digital works
19. provide meaningful reports on scholarly work, which can act as a barometer of research activity in a particular field, help to identify trends and inform managers involved in strategic planning
20. provide timely alert messages on latest submissions which can increase awareness and responsiveness of support functions and managers
21. facilitate cross-boundary research, by cataloguing scholarly works according to the subject material and not (solely) the affiliation of the author
22. reduce duplication of records and inconsistencies in multiple instances of the same works
23. reduce some of the mundane activities of managing digital collections by automating common tasks and harvesting information from other sources

24. Benefits for the University (and its component parts):

25. demonstrate to its employees, in particular the academic community, that individuals and their work are valued, by supporting mechanisms that reduce workload and maximize the benefits to them of their efforts
26. provide a reference point for scholarly works that can interoperate with other systems and maximize efficiencies between them by sharing information
27. increase the visibility, reputation and prestige of the institution
28. improve the accuracy and completeness of the institution’s record of scholarly works
29. ease the management of an institution’s intellectual property rights by raising awareness of copyright issues and facilitating the recording of relevant rights information
30. provide a resource of information for a 'shop window' or marketing tool to show others how the institution is making a difference, this would act to entice staff, students and funding
31. act as a tool to support externally and internally driven audits of research activity e.g. annual reviews, accreditation
32. reduce total cost and risk of ownership, in particular incurred by an institution’s component parts who might be supporting equivalent services locally (or at least allow local resource to be allocated to alternative activities)
33. offer greater flexibility and integration than other mechanisms of disseminating scholarly works (e.g. disparate independent system/websites) with more coherent security and preservation of digital materials
34. contribute to the mission and values of an institute, in terms of openness, freedom-of-speech and equality-for-all

35. Benefits for the global community:

36. assist research collaboration through facilitating free exchange of scholarly information
37. aid the public understanding of research endeavors and activity
38. reduce costs (or at least allow their reallocation) associated with publisher subscriptions

[Adapted from http://www.irproject.manchester.ac.uk/about/businesscase/index.html]