Oxford Forum of Open Scholarship (OxFOS) 2027

Theme: The Costs of Knowledge 

Monday 8 March – Thursday 11 March 2027

Now in its fifth year, the Oxford Forum of Open Scholarship (OxFOS) is a University-wide conference for researchers, students, staff, and anyone else interested in making research more open and trustworthy. 

OxFOS is a chance to share ideas, learn, showcase your work, and interact with others passionate about the importance of making research more open, transparent and accessible. It is organised by the Bodleian Libraries in partnership with the Research Practice team and the grassroots researcher group, Reproducible Research Oxford (RROx). 

Online events will be taking place Monday to Wednesday, with an in-person conference at the Weston Library on Thursday 11 March. The conference and events are free to attend and open to all. 

Call for submissions – propose a talk or workshop

Submissions will be open from 31 July – 14 October 2026.

Submissions will be competitive, but we are committed to representation across all career stages and types of roles in research, and encourage all to apply. Submissions will be judged based on relevance to the theme and the quality of the abstract. 

For the 2027 event we welcome any submissions relevant to our theme: The Costs of Knowledge. How does open research affect the many-faceted costs (and benefits) of how we create, share, and sustain knowledge?

Our programme will be grouped around sub-topics of these various costs.

  • Time and effort costs: Creating and sharing knowledge takes time and effort. When is making knowledge open worth it? How can individual researchers prioritise what parts of their research to make open? How can we change systems to be more efficient and equitable—including how to reward and recognise researchers for making their research open? 
  • Financial costs: What are the effects of doing and sharing research within a system closely tied to commercial and private ownership of knowledge? How can we make it better align with the common good? How can individuals best navigate around these costs—e.g., how can researchers get funding for open research costs?
  • Social costs: Who gets to participate in creating knowledge, and who gets to benefit from it (both demographically and geo-politically) in open versus closed systems? How does openness affect social trust in research?
  • Systemic costs: How are changes in the openness of knowledge affecting our established cultures and systems of knowledge creation and dissemination, such as peer review, funding, institutions, publishing, academic discourse, and research careers? Is openness a help or hindrance to a research career, especially given the issues of short term contracts and researcher precarity? What are the reputational and personal costs and benefits?
  • Environmental costs: When do the energy costs of creating, sharing, and preserving knowledge become unsustainable, especially in an age of big data and AI? How does making knowledge open or closed affect that? What should we do?

For any proposals, these additional questions may help you hone your ideas:

  • Are the costs of open knowledge worth the benefits? When and why? 
  • How can we reduce the various costs and increase the benefits? What do we need to do individually, and collectively? 
  • Who should bear the costs? 
  • How does openness need to evolve to meet the demands of the future? 
  • Can openness benefit research by moving away from a money-centric culture? 

We welcome submissions in a range of formats. 

Sessions 

Possible session formats include: 

  • 10-minute lightning talks (7-minute talk with 3-minute Q&A). These might take the form of case studies demonstrating how using open practices or tools in your (or others’) research have affected the above costs of knowledge, or think pieces probing the questions in our sub-themes.
  • Workshops (30–90 minutes) 
  • Panels (30–90 minutes) 
  • Alternative formats such as interactive sessions, game shows, unconference sessions, etc. (30–90 minutes)

Deadline: 14 October 2026

Submit a proposal for a talk, workshop or other session

Posters 

Poster submissions will be accepted on a rolling basis from 31 July 2026 until 22 February 2027. 

The poster session at the in-person conference day (11 March 2027) will showcase projects at Oxford University and beyond relating to open research, open access, open publishing, open data and any other form of open. Posters can showcase any efforts or interests around 'open' – they don't have to be typical academic research projects (although they may be). The format of this event will be informal, with time for participants to talk to poster presenters during the breaks and the evening reception.  

Registration 

Registration will open in December 2026.