Library Publishing Services: Strategies for Success: Final Research Report

This report briefly presents the findings and recommendations of the « Library Publishing Services: Strategies for Success » project which investigated the extent to which publishing has now become a core activity of North American academic libraries and suggested ways in which further capacity could be built.

The research described (consisting of a survey, some case studies, three workshops, and a set of further reading recommendations) was mainly conducted between October 1, 2010, and September 30, 2011.

It was supported by a grant from the Institute for Museum and Libraries Studies, made to Purdue University Libraries in collaboration with the Libraries of the Georgia Institute of Technology and the J. Willard Marriott Library at the University of Utah.

URL : http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/purduepress_ebooks/24/

Value and benefits of text mining Vast…

Value and benefits of text mining :

« Vast amounts of new information and data are generated everyday through economic, academic and social activities. This sea of data, predicted to increase at a rate of 40% p.a., has significant potential economic and societal value. Techniques such as text and data mining and analytics are required to exploit this potential.
Businesses use such techniques to analyse customer and competitor data to improve competitiveness; the pharmaceutical industry mines patents and research articles to improve drug discovery; within academic research, mining and analytics of large datasets are delivering efficiencies and new knowledge in areas as diverse as biological science, particle physics and media and communications.
We have explored the costs, benefits, barriers and risks associated with text mining within UKFHE research using the approach to welfare economics laid out in the UK Treasury best practice guidelines for evaluation. »

URL : http://www.jisc.ac.uk/publications/reports/2012/value-and-benefits-of-text-mining.aspx

Open access theses in institutional repositories an exploratory…

Open access theses in institutional repositories: an exploratory study of the perceptions of doctoral students :

« Introduction. We examine doctoral students’ awareness of and attitudes to open access forms of publication. Levels of awareness of open access and the concept of institutional repositories, publishing behaviour and perceptions of benefits and risks of open access publishing were explored.
Method. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected through interviews with eight doctoral students enrolled in a range of disciplines in a New Zealand university and a self-completion Web survey of 251 students.
Analysis. Interview data were analysed thematically, then evaluated against a theoretical framework. The interview data were then used to inform the design of the survey tool. Survey responses were analysed as a single set, then by disciple using SurveyMonkey’s online toolkit and Excel.
Results. While awareness of open access and repository archiving is still low, the majority of interview and survey respondents were found to be supportive of the concept of open access. The perceived benefits of enhanced exposure and potential for sharing outweigh the perceived risks. The majority of respondents were supportive of an existing mandatory thesis submission policy.
Conclusions. Low levels of awareness of the university repository remains an issue, and could be addressed by further investigating the effectiveness of different communication channels for promotion. »

URL : http://informationr.net/ir/17-1/paper507.html

Héloïse un site sur les politiques des éditeurs…

Héloïse : un site sur les politiques des éditeurs scientifiques en matière de libre accès aux articles de revues :

« Afin de mieux communiquer auprès des chercheurs sur les autorisations en matière de dépôt, a été mise en place la plateforme d’information Héloïse à l’adresse : http://heloise.ccsd.cnrs.fr/. Elle résulte d’un partenariat entre le CCSD (Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe), une unité du CNRS dédiée à la réalisation d’archives ouvertes, le SPCS (Syndicat de la Presse Culturelle et Scientifique) et le SNE (Syndicat National de l’Edition). Elle fait suite à plusieurs années de réflexion menée par le groupe de travail sur le libre accès du GFII (Groupement Français de l’Industrie de l’Information).

Cette plateforme est la réponse aux attentes des auteurs en matière de transparence des règles fixées par les éditeurs français en matière de dépôt des articles de revues. En effet, d’autres plateformes existent dans le monde anglo-saxon (SHERPA-RoMEO) ou hispanophone (Dulcinea), mais ne permettent pas de renseigner les informations de manière aussi fine et fiable, d’autant qu’elles ne sont pas forcément alimentées par les éditeurs eux-mêmes.

Nous invitons vivement les éditeurs à s’inscrire et à enregistrer leurs politiques sur Héloïse et à en informer leurs comités de rédaction. »

URL : http://www.sne.fr/img/pdf/Dossiers/Droits_dauteur/Presentationheloise.pdf

Inter institutional scientific collaboration an approach from social…

Inter-institutional scientific collaboration: an approach from social network :

« This paper presents a tool that can be used to characterize, analyze and interpret the patterns of collaboration among institutions by means of the visual display of scientific information. These graphic representations allow for a combined analysis of a given institution in the system of relations (network), and of the particular attributes of that institution (indicators). The tool affords the possibility of regenerating the network to make any number of aggregates appear or disappear, thus allowing one to focus on institutional sectors, geographic regions, etc. It also allows for analysis of sectorial interaction, institutional backing of research, and the influence of geographic proximity, linguistic affinity, or regional politics. This is indeed a versatile analytical tool, and it is bound to prove its potential for evaluating patterns of collaborative research, development and innovation. »

URL : http://hdl.handle.net/10760/16704

Open Access and Scholarly Publishing Opportunities and Challenges…

Open Access and Scholarly Publishing: Opportunities and Challenges to Nigerian Researchers :

« The study examined the extent of researchers’ appreciation of open access scholarly publishing. It discussed the opportunities and the benefits of open access to scholars worldwide. Challenges of OA were discussed and solutions suggested. Four research questions were raised. The population of this study was 140 lecturers from the University of Benin, Nigeria. The study revealed that the respondents had cited open access journals articles and that the major benefit derived from using open access journals is that it provides free online access to the literature necessary for research. »

URL : http://www.white-clouds.com/iclc/cliej/cl33IO.pdf