I met Information System Director of Airlangga University, dr. Dripa Sjabana, M.Kes, in Surabaya today. The purpose of the meeting is to understand their strategy on electronic platform known currently as Airlangga University e-Journal. I learned that the university is actually working to catalize the digitization of national-wide research results, whether from universities or societies and encompassing all subject fields.
Too ambitious? Not really. With the start of 22 journals within the university itself and preliminary commitment from 22 more Indonesian pretigious universities, the goal will be achieved in forseeable future. “We don’t talk commercial with these journals,” Dripa said. “We even encourage them to provide full text download for all the articles, even though the print versions are for sale; they must very clear what they want: commercial or exposure and commerial is certainly won’t be achievable with the current situation.”
“It will be like Stanford’s Highwire,” he explained further. “People know Highwire but not neccessary the Stanford University itself. It seems that Airlangga University would like to assume the role like Stanford University here in Indonesia.
The tangible result of this meeting is that Graha Ilmu, would like to introduce the electronic journal hosting to all universities in contact with the company. It would help Airlangga University obtain more content while at the same time improve Graha Ilmu service to the higher education world.
Posted by Kosasih Iskandarsjah
