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Oya Yildirim Rieger is associate university librarian for digital scholarship and
preservation services at Cornell University Library. She oversees the library’s digitization,
online repository, digital preservation, electronic publishing and e-scholarship initiatives
with a focus on needs assessment, requirements analysis, business modeling and
information policy development. She can be reached at oyr1<at>cornell.edu.

O
ver the past two decades, advancements in information and
communication technologies have ushered new modes of knowledge
creation, dissemination, sharing and enquiry. Open access has

emerged as an alternative and viable publishing model and an increasingly
vital component of the scholarly communication infrastructure. The vision
of an open and robust information infrastructure aims to facilitate the broad
dissemination of research outputs of all types – including research data – to
allow use, nullification, refinement and reuse. Creating a ubiquitous,
comprehensive and linked research data environment requires a seamless
network of content, technologies, policies, expertise and practices. It is also
critical to view this scholarly organization as an enterprise that needs to be
maintained, improved, assessed and promoted overtime.
Open access does not entirely remove fees and access limitations, but it

replaces and reconfigures them for the key stakeholders in the scholarly
communication endeavor.As we explore a range of issues related to research
data curation and management, it is prudent and timely to consider how
these services will be maintained and developed in order to flourish over
time. What we may consider an exploratory or pilot initiative often ends up
transitioning into production, sometimes with insufficient time to think
through implications. Therefore as we envision research data support, it is
critical that we consider long-term development and management issues
upstream as a component of an enduring service infrastructure. Simply put,
sustainability is the capacity to endure. For repositories, sustainability entails
long-term maintenance of responsibility, which has technical, socioeconomic,
policy and business dimensions and encompasses the concept of stewardship,
the responsible management of resource use.At the heart of the concept is
the ability to secure resources such as technologies, expertise, policies,

Feature

Sustainability: Scholarly Repository as an Enterprise
by Oya Yildirim Rieger

C O N T E N T S N E X T PA G E > N E X T A RT I C L E >< P R E V I O U S PA G E

EDITOR’S SUMMARY
The expanding need for an open information sharing infrastructure to promote scholarly
communication led to the pioneering establishment of arXiv.org, now maintained by the
Cornell University Library. To be sustainable, the repository requires careful, long term
planning for services, management and funding. The library is developing a sustainability
model for arXiv, based on voluntary contributions and the ongoing participation and
support of 200 libraries and research laboratories around the world. The sustainability
initiative is based on a membership model and builds on arXiv’s technical, service,
financial and policy infrastructure. Five principles for sustainability drive development,
starting with deep integration into the scholarly community. Also key are a clearly defined
mandate and governance structure, a stable yet innovative technology platform,
systematic creation of content policies and strong business planning strategies.
Repositories like arXiv must consider usability and lifecycle alongside values and trends in
scholarly communication. To endure, they must also support and enhance their service by
securing and managing resources and demonstrating responsible stewardship.

KEYWORDS

digital repositories management

information infrastructure governance

scholarly communication

mailto:oyr1<at>cornell.edu


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visions and standards needed to protect and enhance the value of a service
based on the needs of the user community technologies. In the pursuing
discussion, based on Cornell’s experience with arXiv, I highlight the key
premises of sustainability.

arXiv Sustainability Initiative
Started inAugust 1991 by Paul Ginsparg, arXiv.org is internationally

acknowledged as a pioneering digital archive and open-access distribution
service for research articles. The e-print repository, which moved to the
Cornell University Library in 2001, has transformed the scholarly
communication infrastructure of multiple fields of physics and plays an
increasingly prominent role in mathematics, computer science, quantitative
biology, quantitative finance and statistics.As ofAugust 2012, arXiv
included over 770,000 e-prints. In 2011 there were 76,578 new submissions
and close to 50 million downloads from all over the world. arXiv’s
operating costs for 2012 are projected to be approximately $550,000,
including six FTE staff, server maintenance and networking.
Since January 2010, Cornell University Library (CUL) has undertaken

an effort to establish a sustainability model for arXiv.As a three-year
interim strategy for 2010-2012, CUL initially established a voluntary
institutional contribution model and invited pledges from 200 libraries and
research laboratories worldwide that represent arXiv's heaviest institutional
users. Since scholars worldwide depend on the stable operation and
continued development of arXiv, this strategy aimed to reduce arXiv's
dependence on a single institution, instead creating a broad-based,
community-supported resource. Keeping open access academic resources
such as arXiv sustainable entails not only covering the associated operating
costs but also continuing to enhance the resources’ value based on the needs
of the full range of user communities. Cornell’s sustainability initiative has
striven to assess and strengthen arXiv’s technical, service, financial and
policy infrastructure. One of the goals of the business planning initiative has
been to engage the institutions that benefit from arXiv to assist in defining
the future of the service.
The arXiv membership model, which will be launched in 2013, is an

outcome of the three-year planning process and was facilitated with a
planning grant from the Simons Foundation. The model is founded on a set
of operating principles for arXiv and presents a business model for
generating revenues. The background information about the planning
activities is available at http://arxiv.org/help/support. The business model is
composed of four sources of revenue: Cornell’s annual funding of $75,000
per year and indirect expenses (represents 37% of direct expenses), $50,000
per year gift from the Simons Foundation, annual fee income from the
member institutions and a $300,000 per year challenge grant from the
Simons Foundation based on the revenues generated through membership
payments. The substantial gift from the Simons Foundation aims to
encourage long-term community support by lowering arXiv membership
fees, making participation affordable to a broad range of institutions. Based
on institutional usage ranking, the annual fees are set in four tiers within the
$1,500-3,000 range.

Sustainability Principles
arXiv as a sociotechnical system consists of technical systems and

standards – activities and practices involved in developing and using the
system and the social arrangements and organizations that provide it with a
structural framework. The sustainability planning process aims not only to
investigate how to diversify revenue models but also to ensure that arXiv
strives to meet a set of operational, editorial, financial and governance
principles and can set an example of a transparent and reliable community-
supported service. Based on Cornell’s experience in planning the future of
arXiv, the following discussion proposes five sustainability principles,
including the consideration of disciplinary cultures, creation of a governance
structure, stability of technological components, creation of content policies
and adherence to managerial best practices [1]

Deep Integration into the Scholarly Community and Scholarly Processes.
Disciplinary characteristics, work practices and conventions of academia
play an important role in researchers’ assessment and appropriation of
information communication technologies. Repository deployment cannot be
fully understood without comprehending how a specific technology is

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N E X T A RT I C L E >

http://arxiv.org/help/support


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embedded in its social context. The information and communication
technology integration characteristic of disciplinary communities often
mirrors underlying differences in epistemic cultures. arXiv is a scholarly
communication forum informed and guided by scientists and the scientific
cultures being served. Through Paul Ginsparg’s leadership, which is rooted
in both the academic and information science communities, the service has
consistently focused on the disciplinary cultures represented in the digital
repository and on community need [2]. arXiv’s wide international
acceptance attests the importance of relying on user- and evidence-based
strategies for informing IT modifications and enhancements, user support
services and associated repository policies.

Clearly Defined Mandate and Governance Structure. Although best
practices in developing technical architectures and associated processes and
policies underpin a digital repository, organizational attributes are equally
important. The Trustworthy RepositoriesAudit & Certification: Criteria and
Checklist (TRAC) tool (http://trac.edgewall.org/) emphasizes that
organizational attributes affect the performance, accountability and
sustainability of repositories. The first criteria in the TRAC assessment tool
are governance and organizational viability. Similarly, subject repositories
must have clearly defined mandates and associated governance structures to
reflect a commitment to the long-term stewardship of a service.
The general purpose of governance is to ensure that an organization has

the means to envision its future and the management structures and processes
in place to ensure that the plan is implemented and sustained. Good
governance is participatory, consensus oriented, accountable, transparent,
responsive, efficient, equitable and inclusive. However, it also needs to be
nimble and flexible – not allowing any gridlocks or excessive groupthink.
The key editorial, governance and economic tenets of arXiv are delineated

by a set of principles (https://confluence.cornell.edu/x/xKSTBw). CUL holds
the overall administrative and financial responsibility for arXiv’s operation
and development, with strategic and operational guidance from its Member
Advisory Board (MAB) and its ScientificAdvisory Board (SAB). CUL
manages the moderation of submissions and user support (including the
development and implementation of policies and procedures), operates

arXiv’s technical infrastructure, assumes responsibility for archiving to
ensure long-term access, oversees arXiv mirror sites and establishes and
maintains collaborations with related initiatives to improve services for the
scientific community through interoperability and tool sharing. MAB is
elected from arXiv’s membership and advises CUL on issues related to
repository management and development, standards implementation,
interoperability, development priorities, business planning and financial
planning. SAB is composed of scientists and researchers in areas covered
by arXiv and provides advice and guidance pertaining to the intellectual
oversight of arXiv, with particular focus on the policies and operation of
arXiv's moderation system.

Technology Platform Stability and Innovation. The existing repository
ecology is a complex of architectures and features that are optimized to fulfill
the specific needs of institutional, subject or archival repositories. The
landscape is becoming even more heterogeneous with the addition of
scientific social networking sites that profile local scholarly activities and
open data initiatives that focus on data curation models.A critical component
of a sustainability plan is to consider this rich context and understand how
the service fits within the broader framework. In particular, we need to
factor in the following three aspects:

� Interoperability arrangements that link a given repository to related
systems, services and communities

� Features that support supplementary information objects such as
underlying data, auxiliary multimedia content and research
methodologies

� Functionality and arrangements that lower barriers to contributing
content to multiple complementary repositories.

Among the critical roles of repositories is facilitating the preservation
function. Digital preservation (used interchangeably with archiving) refers
to a range of managed activities to support the long-term maintenance of
bitstreams, thereby ensuring that digital objects are usable. However, ensuring
enduring access involves more than bitstream preservation. It must provide
continued access to digital content through various delivery methods.As we
assess the value of subject repositories, it is important to differentiate

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http://trac.edgewall.org/


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between bitstream preservation and preserving access.Also, some subject
repositories may opt to institute best practices for managing digital content
but may not be in a position to assume full preservation responsibilities. It is
therefore critical to assess the clearly defined roles and associated
procedures that pertain to this responsibility.
There is often an inherent tension between technological stability and

innovation.Although dependability and consistency are important service
attributes, also essential is keeping pace with evolving user needs through
research and development (R&D) projects.Accordingly, assessing resource
needs and planning for investments in staffing and equipment are
challenging tasks on both the maintenance and R&D fronts. However, given
the uncertainties associated with the development and testing of new
features and services, an innovation agenda needs to be carefully thought
out in order to ensure that operational stability is not undermined.
The sustainability of arXiv also depends on enabling interoperability and

creating efficiencies among repositories with related and complementary
content to reduce duplication of efforts. For instance, Cornell has collaborated
with the NSF Data Conservancy project (http://dataconservancy.org/) to
launch a pilot interface that allows arXiv submitters to upload data associated
with their articles directly to the Data Conservancy repository. Links to the
data are added in the arXiv record automatically. This service is a research
project, however, and arXiv and the Data Conservancy make no guarantee
about continued availability of datasets uploaded via this mechanism past
the end of 2011.

Systematic Development of Content Policies. Content curation and
stewardship roles have traditionally been shared by libraries and publishers –
publishers with a focus on creation and distribution and libraries specializing
in discovery and preservation. In digital information environments, repository
services such as arXiv blur the distinction between libraries and publishers.
An essential criterion in assessing open access, online resources is the
availability of clearly defined collection policies and submission guidelines
that reflect the content curation and stewardship role of the hosting institution.
Although arXiv is not peer-reviewed, submissions are reviewed by

subject-based moderators.Additionally, an endorsement system is in place

to ensure that content is relevant to current research in the specified
disciplines. It is also critical to have clearly articulated policies about the
copyright status of the deposited materials as well as conflict management
processes (such as responding to concerns in regard to rejected submissions).
arXiv supplements the traditional publication system by providing immediate
dissemination and open access to scholarly articles (which often appear
later in conventional journals).
arXiv complements, rather than competes with, the commercial and

scholarly society journal publishing market.Among the challenges are
ensuring the authority and integrity of e-prints and distinguishing between
succeeding versions, such as a pre-print paper and its published version in a
scholarly journal. It is therefore critical that the repository and preservation
community address the versioning of scholarly articles, tracking them from
initial submission to pre-print archive to final publication in a formal
scholarly journal. Other challenges include linking the burgeoning corpus of
institutional repositories with related subject repositories in order to achieve
version control as well as creating a critical mass of related materials on
particular topics. Cornell’s participation in the Open Researcher and
Contributor ID (ORCID) author identifiers initiative (http://www.orcid.org)
aims to enable better author linking and allow improvements in ownership
claiming.

Reliance on Business Planning Strategies. Business plans offer an overall
view of a given product and its relevant user segments, key stakeholders,
communication channels, competencies, resources, networks, collaborations,
cost structures and revenue models. The primary purpose of a business
planning process is to convey a clear value proposition to justify investment
in a service or product by its potential users. The value proposition describes
the benefits that a product or service provides. In other words, value
propositions respond to this question:Why should an institution purchase your
product or service? Since the focus of the value proposition is on the customer,
it should be stated from the end-users’ perspective.Value propositions may
be based on a range of characteristics such as service features, customer
support, product customization and economical pricing. The key challenge
in creating a value proposition is addressing the needs of all stakeholders.

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http://dataconservancy.org/


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For instance, in the case of arXiv, the stakeholders include scientists, libraries,
research centers, societies, publishers and funding agencies.Although they
are likely to have common goals, each group attaches value to a specific
aspect of arXiv. For instance, from the end-users’ perspective, scientists’
highest priority for arXiv is likely to be the robustness and reliability of the
repository and access features.
Business models also convey financial plans. In a collaborative business

model such as the arXiv Membership Model it is critical to clearly define
and justify the pricing model and the budget to understand how revenues are
being generated and spent. Maintaining, supporting and further developing
a repository involve a range of expenses including management,
programming, system administration, curation, storage, hardware, facilities
(space, furniture, networking, phone), research and training (such as attending
meetings and conferences), outreach and promotion, user documentation
and administrative support.

Looking Ahead
The arXiv case study illustrates the need to manage repositories holistically

by taking into consideration a range of lifecycle and usability issues, as well
as factoring in changing patterns and values of scholarly communication
ecology. Increasing emphasis on open science and the burgeoning data
management mandates usher a complex suite of technology, policy and service
needs. We must consider the sustainability requirements upstream and

remember that the services we are experimenting and creating now have
long-term implications. Bowker et al. [3] argue that understanding the new
information infrastructures requires an integrative view that goes beyond
studying only technical, organizational or social aspects. Such an integrative
approach involves comprehending the emerging infrastructure within the
context of day-to-day routines, evolving academic practices and business
procedures.Viewing scientific repositories as enterprises will ensure that
the emerging scholarly communication structures and practices will be
effective, efficient and enduring. �

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Resources Mentioned in the Article
[1] Rieger, O.Y. (2011). Assessing the value of open access information systems:

Making a case for community-based sustainability models. Journal of Library
Administration, 51, 1:485-506.

[2] Ginsparg, P. (2011). arXiv at 20. Nature, 476, 145–147, doi:10.1038/476145a.
Retrieved August 21, 2012, from
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v476/n7359/full/476145a.html.

[3] Bowker, G.B, Baker, K., Millerand, F., & Ribes, D. (2007). Towards information
infrastructure studies: Ways of knowing in a networked environment. In J.
Huntsinger, M. Allen, and L. Klasrup (Eds.), International Handbook of Internet
Research. London: Springer.

N E X T A RT I C L E >

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v476/n7359/full/476145a.html

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