Concept and USP

The NetAcademy is a knowledge network for the scientific community. Its outstanding values lie in:

1. A common logic focused on the requirements of scientific communities: Knowledge is a shared good. It is generated and discussed openly. The pro and contra arguments of reasoning follow open standards and agreements and are made comprehensible for the community. Following this academic commitment, the NetAcademy platform organizes academic content basically in the modules
   • a glossary which explains the terminology (definitions, theory, concordant and discussed knowledge) used in this community;
   • an expert directory which indicates the professional participants (teachers, authors, editors, students, managers, etc.) in this community, and makes them tangible,
   • a publications database or library which grants open online access to research documents, publications and discussions of the participants in this community.
   Besides these modules which build the base of all academic research, there are other as e.g. the organization modules for peer reviewing and for project management.

2. A federated network system for interdisciplinary research: Knowledge is an interminable and encompassing good. It eventually merges initially different research areas and thus creates the ever growing landscape of our knowledge. Following the interdisciplinary development, the NetAcademy platform pursues and eventually enables a global, interdisciplinary encyclopaedia. How? On the one side, the content of each NetAcademy module can be accessed as a confined entity. On the other side, it also emerges as part of a vast landscape of knowledge. Because all modular based NetAcademy content gets classified, recombined an exchanged in meta databases which allow for a holistic view onto research. Like this, the knowledge landscape spreads and eventually becomes a living alignment of academic knowledge.

3. A distributed information system which is able to save the advantages of print publication and archiving online:
   • The NetAcademy Universe is not centralistic. Each NetAcademy instance is free to use its own document server. Thus, academic archiving is guaranteed, as there is no risk of document loss (e.g. because a server breakes down or is migrated to another party).
   • Quality control is provided. Each NetAcademy releases what sort of quality standards they respond to. The NA Universe offers modules for review processes, from simple authorization by the editor up to double blind peer review as practiced in academic A journals. Thus, academic quality is guaranteed, as - although the quality level may differ from one NA instance to the other - there always is a reference which adjusts a document's quality to a comparable academic standard.
   • Authentic, not corrupted documents can be provided by using secure management modules which the NA Universe offers for each NA instance (among others, the possibility to publish in print with the NetAcademy Press). Thus, academic reliability of protected data, i.e. of a reliable citation procedure, is guaranteed.