The role of research libraries in the consolidation of the PID landscape

Abstract In the autumn of 2021 the Knowledge Exchange (KE) commissioned a study on the current persistent identifier (PID) landscape with an emphasis on the risks and trust-related issues posed by its rapidly evolving character [1]. The KE is a collaboration network between the national research information management offices of six European countries (SURF in the Netherlands, Jisc in the United Kingdom, the German Research Foundation DFG, the Finnish CSC, DeiC in Denmark and the CNRS in France) all of which feature advanced PID implementation strategies. The outcomes of this project were released in Feb 2022 [2] and include an overarching report „Building the plane as we fly it: the promise of PIDs” and seven case studies examining the current status of the PID landscape for various types of PIDs – such as author IDs, OrgIDs, Crossref DOI-based grant IDs, PIDs for research instrument and facilities and International Generic Sample Numbers (IGSNs). The consultants behind this work – the four co-authors of this contribution – are also active as scholarly communications experts at their institutions. They subsequently included in their final report a specific reference to researchperforming organisations (RPOs) and their libraries in the recommendations for a trustworthy development of the PID landscape going forward. The role of libraries for an orderly consolidation of PID adoption is perceived to be very significant. Libraries are often the main contact points for research support, which puts them at the core of any PID-related dissemination effort towards researchers. They also tend to play a key role in the content management workflows for institutional systems such as repositories and CRISs, where research funders are increasingly requiring PIDs to be included [3]. Finally, research libraries are typically best placed to push for an institutional PID policy [4] and even to pilot the early implementation of emerging PIDs such as organisational IDs (RORs), Crossref DOI-based grant IDs issued by research funders or Research Activity IDs (RAiDs). This contribution summarises the findings of the PID study conducted for the KE – which was based on a wide number of in-depth interviews with experts in the domain from various countries, organisations and roles/ stakeholders. A special emphasis is made on what research libraries should be aware of and what role(s) they can play in an area in which they are often already represented via ORCID consortia or other collaborative networks. Some early best practices are discussed as well as a number of challenges posed by the highly fragmented current PID landscape in terms of actors, competing technical solutions and frequent lack of awareness of PID-related initiatives going on in parallel