The way how scientific dissemination occurs is changing profoundly. Journals and books (monographs) are being published in digital form, often exclusively. There are two main reasons that explain this tendency. On the one hand, the scientific world moves towards publishing open access research findings. On the other hand, there is the fact that the traditional channels to distribute and disseminate printed scientific monographs are disappearing, making the accessibility of these monographs weak.

Digitizing and putting on the internet the research published as monographs is an opportunity for sectors that until now have had low visibility on the net. This argument is valid both for scientific disciplines, usually humanities and social sciences, and for languages other than English. At the same time, digital publishing requires an infrastructure that is not always within the reach of publishing institutions of academic and research monographs.

The digital platform MACO (Monografies Acadèmiques Catalanes en Obert, Catalan Open Academic Monographs) intends to ensure the dissemination and visibility of the research done in Catalonia by public and private institutions of teaching, research, and dissemination. MACO allows the discovery and reuse of these publications, as well as increases their impact. MACO is a platform, not a publisher. It provides the infrastructure and expertise that publishing institutions need for digital and open publishing.

The publishing institutions themselves enter the information on the monographs and their chapters. MACO gives access to open monographs, even though some of them may be under an embargo period sometimes. Access to full-text monographs is free of cost, but acts of reproduction, distribution, public communication or total or partial transformation are subject to the conditions of use of each monograph, and may require express written consent of the author/s or publishing institutions.

MACO works with the DSpace open source program DSpace and follows the Open Archives Initiative (OAI) Interoperability Protocol, which makes it possible to increase the visibility of the deposited monographs by being offered jointly with other international repositories (such as OpenAire).

MACO is a project of the Consorci de Serveis Universitaris de Catalunya (CSUC).

If you want to participate in MACO or have more information on this repository, contact maco@csuc.cat.