Submissions are invited for the 18^th Munin Conference on Scholarly Publishing, 8–10 November 2023, that will take place both onsite in Tromsø and online. The Munin Conference is an annual event on all aspects of scholarly communication, with a focus on open science. You are invited to send in contributions on all aspects of scholarly communication, but we would like to highlight the following topics: Open Science and society; Research integrity and publishing ethics; Artificial Intelligence and scholarly communication; Open repositories; New horizons in metrics and research assessment. 

Submissions are invited for the 18th Munin Conference on Scholarly Publishing, 8–10 November 2023, that will take place both onsite in Tromsø and online. The Munin Conference is an annual event on all aspects of scholarly communication, with a focus on open science.

About this year’s topics

You are invited to send in contributions on all aspects of scholarly communication, but we would like to highlight the following topics.

Open Science and society

The principles of open science have the potential to foster openness and inclusion through unobstructed and borderless sharing of knowledge. The use of citizen science can increase public trust, foster community engagement and democratize the scientific endeavour, ensuring the inclusion of knowledge and practices (such as those of minoritized and indigenous groups) that may otherwise be overlooked by mainstream science. Ensuring transparency and FAIRness of research data will be instrumental as we attempt to tackle societal issues in areas such as global health and sustainability. In this theme we welcome any contributions that consider these and other connections between open science and wider society.

Research integrity and publishing ethics

Research integrity and publishing ethics are recurring topics at the Munin conference. Openness, transparency and equity are important for responsible conduct of research, in all its stages. Is the scholarly community well on the way to solving the reproducibility crisis? Will advances in artificial intelligence bring about a new crisis in research integrity? How do we ensure that standards are upheld in international research and publishing collaborations in view of the current geopolitical situation? What are the pressing challenges in editorial practices and how should they best be approached? We particularly invite contributions on the connection between equity and research integrity (e.g. related to the Cape Town Statement and the CARE Principles).

Artificial Intelligence and scholarly communication

Recent developments in artificial intelligence (AI) have created new possibilities for the scientific community, but also pose new challenges for the transparency and accountability of research. How are AI tools changing the nature of scientific production, and what are the new developments in research methodology that AI is engendering? To what extent do ethical frameworks in research need to be updated? What consequences does AI have for dissemination (e.g. changes in editorial practices) and evaluation of research? We invite contributors to reflect on the impact that the emergence of advanced AI may have on research and research communication.

Open repositories

The Munin Conference owes its origins to the launch of UiT’s open research archive (Munin) in 2006. 17 years later and the Munin repository is set to be replaced by the national research archive, which will integrate several of Norway’s various institutional repositories and current research information system (Cristin) into a single service. To mark the occasion, we include open repositories among our special topics for this year’s conference. How is the role of repositories for publications, data and other research outputs changing? How is their position within the broader Open Science ecosystem evolving? What do next-gen repositories look like? And what are the models, frameworks, technologies and policies that need to be in place for us to develop them?

New horizons in metrics and research assessment

In recent years, there has been growing concern about the limitations of current systems for research assessment, which often rely heavily on publication-based indicators. Several initiatives have addressed the need to reform evaluation of the quality and impact of research. How are these initiatives being put into practice? An important aim of these initiatives is to develop ways of assessing research quality and academic careers with an emphasis on a wider set of research results and competences. This has led to discussions regarding what research activities should be recognized and meritorious, and how to avoid opaque and unpredictable assessment criteria. What is the future of research metrics in this changing landscape? And how will reform of research assessment affect scholarly communication?

Contribution formats

Submissions are invited for the following conference formats:

• Presentations, 20 minutes + Q&A
• Interactive sessions, 30 minutes
• Workshops 60-90 minutes
• Onsite posters

Indicate whether you would need participants to prepare for your session, and in what way (watch a short video, read a paper, prepare questions or use cases, etc).

For each contribution, at least one of the presenting authors must be onsite, but the committee can consider digital-only contributions. When submitting your abstract, please indicate whether you would like to be considered for digital-only participation.

Abstracts (max 3000 characters, including spaces) must be sent in via Septentrio Conference Series. All contributors must provide a bio (up to 100 words), and ORCID, if any.

Important dates:

• Abstract submission deadline – 16 June 2023

• Notification of acceptance – 30 June 2023

Organizing committee

It is the organizing committee that is responsible for the selection of abstracts. The organizing committee consists of research support staff at UiT:

• Aysa Ekanger
• Bror-Magnus S. Strand
• Cornel Borit
• Eric Kama Steinberg
• Huw Grange
• Linnea Nordström
• Per Pippin Aspaas
• Tanja Larssen