Pressemitteilungen
Pressemitteilungen vor Januar 2016 finden Sie im Pressearchiv.
bloxberg becomes the first Association for the Advancement of Science and Blockchain e.V.
Protaras, Cyprus – October 26-27, 2022 – the bloxberg project becomes the first Association for the Advancement of Science and Blockchain
The fifth bloxberg summit took place as a hybrid conference in Protaras, Cyprus, from October 26-27. This time the annual Consortium meeting was organized for the fifth time in a row by the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) in collaboration with the University of Nicosia, one of the bloxberg founders. The meeting was hosted at the Sunrise Pearl Hotel by the University of Nicosia. Twenty-two institutions took part in this year's summit. Next to the sessions on member activities, bloxberg projects, and working group updates, a significant change took place regarding bloxberg's legal status.
What started as a project becomes the first Association for the Advancement of Science and Blockchain
Originally, bloxberg started as a project in 2019 with eleven research organizations from ten different countries. With the groundbreaking decision made at the last summit in London, the bloxberg consortium agreed on founding the bloxberg Association for the Advancement of Science and Blockchain e.V. under German legislation. At this bloxberg summit, that decision was finalized.
The Association has been established with an in-person signing ceremony by 13 founding members with eleven research organizations and two individual members.
The foundational document has been signed by the following research organizations: Max Planck Society, Faculty of Organizational Sciences at University of Belgrade, Faculty of Organization and Informatics at the University of Zagreb, University College London (UCL), IT University of Copenhagen, University of Geneva, University of Kassel, University of Nicosia, Westfälische Hochschule University of Applied Sciences, Wrocław University of Science and Technology and Zhejiang University.
Soulla Louca, Professor at the University of Nicosia and founding member of the bloxberg project and Association:
“I feel honored that our University has organized this far-reaching fifth summit for bloxberg. The University of Nicosia is part of bloxberg from the beginning, and I am very happy about the further development of this wonderful initiative. We are looking forward to continue our collaboration with this vibrant, global academic community.”
Roman Beck, Professor at the IT University Copenhagen and founding member of the bloxberg project and Association:
"bloxberg is an amazing project that now reached its next milestone. What started with eleven research institutes in 2019 became the biggest proof of authority DLT system with over 50 universities from around the world, creating a unique 'blockchain for science' decentralized infrastructure. With the incorporation as Association according to German law, bloxberg has reached its next level, which allows the network to grow and provide more services for science in the future."
Tomaso Aste, Professor at University College London:
“The fact that bloxberg was initiated in a Bavarian castle during a snowstorm makes it already legendary. With bloxberg, we are laying down the backbone for robust recording of scientific activity through a dedicated blockchain infrastructure. This will help research, academia, and society at large. I am honored to be one of the founding members and to serve on the bloxberg executive board.”
Sandra Vengadasala, bloxberg initiator and deputy manager of the Max Planck Digital Library:
“In 2019, we started with a small consortium with the intention to do a blockchain project together. Three years later, we are the largest Proof of Authority network in the world, with over 50 research institutions as node validators! Therefore, the transformation from a consortium to a legal Association marks a new era for bloxberg. Let's be excited to see what will happen in the next three years!”
The Association continues to grow
bloxberg has been growing as a project for nearly five years and has over 50 members at the time. With the status of an Association, all former consortium members can become Association members now by signing an Association membership. By joining the Association, institutions have the possibility to shape the future of bloxberg collectively.
About bloxberg
bloxberg's mission is to advance science with its own blockchain infrastructure and to enable society as a whole to secure data with the reputational proof of research organizations worldwide. It broadens the scientific landscape of regionally and nationally governed blockchain networks. This makes it the first globally maintained decentralized scientific network for scientists.
Dedicated to this mission, the bloxberg Association facilitates and accelerates the decentralized blockchain bloxberg and scientific applications running on top of it. The excellent reputation of the participating research organizations encourages scientists worldwide to utilize the bloxberg network and the applications built on top of the infrastructure.
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About the Max Planck Society
The Max Planck Society conducts basic research in the natural sciences, life science, and humanities. The 86 Max Planck Institutes and 17 Max Planck Centers internationally focus on innovative research fields and address forward-looking scientific questions. The Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) is a central unit of the Max Planck Society that supports scientists with a broad portfolio of services in the fields of information provision, publication support, and research data management. MPDL is a founding member of the bloxberg blockchain and represents the Max Planck Society within the consortium.
Max Planck Society
Max Planck Digital Library
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Fourth bloxberg Summit 2022
London, UK – May 3-4, 2022 – the fourth bloxberg summit takes place with major changes regarding the research network’s future direction.
The fourth bloxberg summit took place as a hybrid conference in London from May 3-4, 2022, at University College London (UCL). The bloxberg summit is the annual meeting of the bloxberg consortium, organized for the fourth time in a row by the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) and this time in cooperation with UCL, one of the founding members of bloxberg. The meeting was hosted by UCL at the LABS workspace at 90 High Holborn building.
More than 25 research organizations participated in the summit to decide on several proposals regarding the future development of the bloxberg network.
With the first vote, the consortium made a groundbreaking decision, introducing a significant and forward-looking change for the future of the network: the "bloxberg Association for the Advancement of Blockchain in Science" is going to be founded under German legislation this year. Refining bloxberg's governance model followed this proposal. In the third decision, the consortium agreed to introduce tokenomics to bloxberg to ensure sustainable funding of the infrastructure. Finally, the consortium members supported a technical proposal to move from a monolithic to a modular architecture with the current bloxberg infrastructure as Layer1.
Friederike Kleinfercher, bloxberg Initiator and Deputy Manager Max Planck Digital Library:
"I am really thrilled about the vivid bloxberg consortium. Again, the current summit showed that bloxberg is driven by academic enthusiasts who see the potential of blockchain in science, which resulted in groundbreaking decisions at the bloxberg summit 2022. The bloxberg association and the introduction of a sustainable tokenomics will take the project to a new level, enabling bloxberg to evolve and expand as the scientific blockchain infrastructure worldwide ".
Arshdeep Bahga, Georgia Tech alumni and founding member of the bloxberg network:
"bloxberg is a consortium blockchain network made by researchers for researchers. Over 50 universities from all over the world have come together to build the largest consortium proof-of-authority blockchain network for scientific applications. bloxberg will power a wide range of decentralized web3 applications for research and academic use cases. "
Prof Maria Frahm-Arp, Executive Director of the Library and Information Centre at the University of Johannesburg:
"bloxberg is a unique blockchain space where researchers can experiment and explore the endless possibilities blockchains open up on a large stable blockchain which is not a commercial space."
Eventually, the Max Planck Society, represented by MPDL in the consortium, was again elected to the Iron Throne. "We need a decentralized place to digitize academic processes with low fees and quality control by the global academic community. With the Max Planck Society, we have a strong leader to reach the high arching goals of bloxberg: To connect universities, offer a censorship-free publication system, support good causes all over the world and be energy, cost, and time-efficient. We as the Frankfurt School Blockchain Center, are happy to support this project." said Philip Sandner, Head of the Frankfurt School Blockchain Center.
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About bloxberg:
The bloxberg infrastructure is a secure scientific global blockchain established by a consortium of researchers and research organizations to provide science with decentralized services worldwide. It broadens the scientific landscape of regionally and nationally governed blockchain networks and is the first globally maintained decentralized scientific network for scientists.
The bloxberg consortium aims to foster collaboration among the global scientific community, empowering researchers with full, autonomous services that transcend institutional boundaries. The excellent reputation of the participating research organizations encourages scientists worldwide to utilize the bloxberg network and the applications built on top of the infrastructure.
bloxberg
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About the Max Planck Society
The Max Planck Society conducts basic research in the natural sciences, life science, and humanities. The 86 Max Planck Institutes and 17 Max Planck Centers internationally focus on innovative research fields and address forward-looking scientific questions. The Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) is a central unit of the Max Planck Society that supports scientists with a broad portfolio of services in the fields of information provision, publication support, and research data management. MPDL is a founding member of the bloxberg blockchain and represents the Max Planck Society within the consortium.
Max Planck Society
Max Planck Digital Library
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Transformative agreement signed between the Microbiology Society and the Max Planck Digital Library
The Microbiology Society and the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) are pleased to announce a three-year transformative agreement starting in 2022. The Publish and Read model will enable researchers of 86 Max Planck Institutes in Germany to publish any article accepted for publication in the journals of the Society open access, without having to pay Article Processing Charges (APCs). Through the agreement, MPDL will cover costs of open access publishing of articles in both fully open access and hybrid journals, allowing scientists to retain copyright and secure the broadest possible readership for their work.
Ralf Schimmer, Head of Information at MPDL, said: “Showing a clear commitment to an open, transparent, and sustainable scholarly communication environment, the Microbiology Society is one of the pioneers in the transition of paywall-based scholarly publishing to open access. We are delighted to enter into this agreement, marking a further step in the Max Planck Society’s strategy to enable open dissemination of research, in line with the principles of the OA2020 Initiative and the Berlin Declaration on Open Access”
Peter Cotgreave, Chief Executive of the Microbiology Society: “Our focus at the Society has always been publishing for the community. As a small publishing society, we are delighted to work with the Max Planck Digital Library to help increase the amount of microbiology papers that we publish OA in our journals, to enable researchers a simple and cost-effective means to publish compliantly, and to improve societal access to – and therefore benefit of – the science we publish.”
The agreement marks a significant milestone in the Microbiology Society’s transformation strategy. The number of institutions worldwide under the Society’s Publish and Read agreements has more than doubled year on year since 2020, paving the way towards an Open Access future.
Member institutions (affiliated authors can check their availability here) are offered:
- Unlimited Open Access: any article published in Society journals where the corresponding author is from a Publish and Read institution will be Open Access by default.
- Unlimited usage: any user associated with a Publish and Read institution can access the entire archive of Society content, back to 1947, for reading and for text and data mining.
The Publish and Read agreement covers unlimited reading access and provides uncapped publishing rights without author-facing charges across all the Society’s six journals including hybrid title Microbiology, Journal of General Virology, Journal of Medical Microbiology, International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology, and fully OA titles Access Microbiology, Microbial Genomics.
The Max Planck Society is Germany's premier research organization. Since its establishment in 1948, over 20 Nobel laureates have emerged from the ranks of its scientists, placing it on a par with the best and most prestigious research institutions worldwide. The more than 15,000 publications each year in internationally renowned scientific journals are testimony of the outstanding research work conducted at Max Planck Institutes.
The Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) is a central scientific service unit within the Max Planck Society dedicated to the strategic planning, development and operation of the digital infrastructures necessary for providing its institutes and their scholars and scientists with research information, support for web-based scholarly communication, research tools and research data management and software licensing.
ABOUT THE MICROBIOLOGY SOCIETY
The Microbiology Society is a membership charity for scientists interested in microbes, their effects and their practical uses. It is one of the largest microbiology societies in Europe with a worldwide membership based in universities, industry, hospitals, research institutes and schools.
Our principal goal is to develop, expand and strengthen the networks available to our members so that they can generate new knowledge about microbes and ensure that it is shared with other communities. The impacts from this will drive us towards a world in which the science of microbiology provides maximum benefit to society.
Microbiology Society contact
Jade Heyman, Journal Sales and Transformation Manager
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Max Planck Digital Library contact
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