August 3, 2023

MIT Press’s Direct to Open (D2O) achieves second year goal, opens access to eighty-two new books in 2023

raldrich | Direct to Open, Open Access

With 322 participating libraries and new consortium agreements, the D2O publishing model has now opened access to more than 160 scholarly monographs and edited collections

Thanks to the support of libraries participating in Direct to Open (D2O), the MIT Press will publish its full list (see below) of 2023 scholarly monographs and edited collections open access on the MIT Press Direct platform. 

Launched in 2021, D2O is a sustainable framework that harnesses the collective power of libraries to support open and equitable access to vital, leading scholarship. D2O moves scholarly books from a solely market-based, purchase model, where individuals and libraries buy single eBooks, to a collaborative, library-supported open access model. Instead of purchasing a title once for a single collection, libraries now have the opportunity to fund them one time for the world through participant fees. 

“With the successful conclusion of our second year of Direct to Open, we are thrilled to make the Press’s complete list of 2023 monographs openly available,” said Amy Brand, director and publisher of the MIT Press. “This achievement comes at a pivotal time for open science, research, and publishing and would not be possible without the partnership and collaboration of D2O member libraries and consortia. Together, we are proving open access scholarship is not only achievable, but sustainable and scalable.”

In its second year, 322 libraries, an increase of 33% from the first year, from around the globe committed to support D2O. Expanding D2O’s international footprint, the Press also entered into all-in agreements with Big Ten Academic Alliance and the Konsortium der sächsischen Hochschulbibliotheken, as well as central licensing and invoicing agreements with Council of Australian University Librarians, Center for Research Libraries; Greater Western Library Alliance, MOBIUS, Northeast Research Libraries, Jisc, Partnership for Academic Library Collaboration and Innovation, SCELC, and Lyrasis.

“When we launched Direct to Open two years ago, we passionately believed that taking action to foster a more equitable, sustainable, and open scholarly communication ecosystem was vital and urgent,” said Amy Harris, senior manager, library relations and sales at the MIT Press. “Success was not guaranteed and has required dedicated, hard work to achieve this year; but we have been truly humbled by the support of all of the participating libraries and our consortia partners.”

In the coming year, the Press will seek to expand library participation in the model. Supporting libraries not only contribute to opening frontlist titles, but also receive exclusive participation benefits including term access to a backlist collection of over 2,400 titles. To learn more about Direct to Open, or to sign-up to become a participating library, visit direct.mit.edu/books/pages/direct-to-open or contact the MIT Press library partnerships and sales team.

List of MIT Press 2023 monographs and edited collections included in the Direct to Open model:

Learn more about Direct to Open