Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Running With The Amazons, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

WHY HAVEN'T LIBRARY SYSTEM and information database designers included as many user-friendly features as Amazon and Google? This question, posed at the recent annual meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology (ASIST), was answered by UCLA professor Marcia Bates, who said that from 20 years of research we know what should be included, but we've never had the money to implement fancy search features. Now, we have a lot of catching up to do.

Swan Song And Issues Unresolved., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Abundance Of Information., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Consider the impact of abundance, coupled with connections, on newspapers. The ability to deal with large amounts of digital text and graphics, reaching millions of people quickly, and the low cost of providing digital access have diminished the appeal of traditional newspapers. Readers and advertisers alike can now look to scores of alternative competitors.

E-Access Changes Everything., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

According to several of the plenary speakers, this reconception must involve essential local services built around ever-growing collections of e-resources. Research and pizza Kevin Guthrie, president of Ithaka, believes that the digital delivery of knowledge changes everything: "books in electronic form will change our world." (Burke's company, ProQuest/Serials Solutions, produces Summon, which puts into action many of her suggestions, but her talk was not a sales pitch-she also mentioned competitors' products and did not dwell on any one in particular.) Listen to the first-years Discovery solutions, including federated search, local discovery system software (such as Primo, Enterprise, Encore, VuFind, or …

Hidden Conference Gems., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Summer is the time for professional conferences. Every librarian knows about the biggest ones--held by the Special Libraries Association (SLA), American Library Association, and International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA)--which attract thousands. For those interested in e-content, however, some alternatives provide an opportunity to learn and share in a more intimate environment.

The Value Gap., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

It is more important than ever, suggested several companies in the annual Database Marketplace Survey, to measure collection use fully and better evaluate the value of the library to its constituencies. Strategies range from focusing on usage statistics to guide collection development to measuring (and improving) users' perceptions of the library.

A Rough Road Ahead., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

As libraries and the institutions that fund them prepare their 2010 budgets, things look grim. Both the Association of Research Libraries and the International Coalition of Library Consortia have issued statements calling on scholarly publishers to work with libraries to find common ground on materials pricing in a prolonged period of economic downturn. In response, database companies that sell mostly to libraries are preparing a variety of strategies to cope with their customers' budget pressures.

Back To The Scriptorium: Amid Budget Woes, Vendors And Librarians Find A Common Purpose, Carol Tenopir, Gayle Baker, Jill E. Grogg

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Picture medieval monks hunched over their desks in the scriptorium as they labor to copy manuscripts. A 21st-century version of this activity is being repeated daily in the world's libraries and publishing houses as major digitization projects seek to preserve millions of printed books and documents. The work of medieval scribes ensured that the classics were available when the invention of movable type and the printing press made books accessible to the masses, transforming the world. Today's laborers are hunched over digitization equipment, but their goal is the same: copying and preserving resources so they are available now and into …

Information On The Go., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Libraries and publishers are busy redesigning and formatting content while introducing new services to make the best use of handhelds. Nowhere was this more apparent than at the 2009 Association of College and Research Libraries recent meeting.

Reaching The Net Gen., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Socioeconomic skewing Opening keynote speaker John Palfrey (faculty codirector, Berkman Institute for Internet and Society; professor, Harvard Law School; and coauthor of Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives ) warned that "one [wrong] perception...is that all young people use technology in the same way and that adults don't use technology." The information tap Within the young, tech-aware group, Palfrey pointed out certain concrete and distinct patterns of information-seeking behavior that signal real change. Because members of this group see their digital identity as merged with their total identity in a "converged environment," they can toggle easily between …

Visualize The Perfect Search., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

The lifetime work of Ben Shneiderman, founder of the Human-Computer Interaction Lab (HCIL) at the University of Maryland, suggests that combining visualization with interactivity allows researchers to discover, not just retrieve. Visualization approaches use the content of the database or digital library to guide interface choices.

A New-Old Role For Libraries., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Tenopir discusses the the Nov 2008 annual Charleston Conference: Issues in Book and Serial Acquisition--"The Best of Times, the Worst of Times." The discussions at Charleston focused on preserving born-digital materials, not just digitizing old analog or print items.

Scenes From A Database., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

H.W. Wilson's new Cinema Image Gallery (CIG), along with some other excellent resources, will help searchers find all kinds of information about the motion picture industry.

Are Electronic Journals Good For Science?, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Most people accept the notion that e-journals, through library subscriptions or open access, are good for science. They save readers time in tracking down articles and help them identify relevant materials from a wide range of journal titles. However, the academic world was buzzing recently over a study that challenged this notion.

Science Information Without Borders., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Online resources are critical to the concept of "libraries without borders," the theme of the 2008 World Library and Information Congress at the 74th International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) general conference, held in August in Québec City.

Dialog Finds A New Home., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

THE BIGGEST INDUSTRY NEWS this summer was the announcement that proQuest had acquired Dialog from Thomson Reuters. Dialog was beginning to look like an unwelcome stepchild as new strategies by Thomson Reuters were moving the firm away from traditional databases and library markets. ProQuest, by contrast, has a solid foundation in both areas and has been aggressively building with new acquisitions and products.

Still, the news came as a surprise to most of us, as the change happened remarkably fast--rarely is a major acquisition rumored, announced, and completed all within a month.

Dialog, the grandfather of online database systems that …

The Past Catches Up., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

IF YOU WERE IN LIBRARY SCHOOL anytime during the last 40 years, you are probably familiar with F.W. Lancaster and his books on indexing, online searching, or paperless information systems. I recently reread the first online searching textbook ever written, while preparing a Library Trends article (Spring/Summer 2008) in tribute to Lancaster. The book, Information Retrieval On-Line (Melville), by Lancaster and Emily Fayen, appeared in 1973 when only a few librarians and subject specialists were tackling the new world of online databases.

Seru: A Licensing Advance., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

SERU (Shared E-Resources Understanding) is a document of understanding between libraries and publishers that avoids the time, effort, and expense of license negotiation, relying instead on a purchase order and copyright law.

Information With A Twist: Vendors Keep The Party Going With Web 2.0, Carol Tenopir, Gayle Baker, Jill E. Grogg

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Social networking and other Web 2.0 technologies led the social whirl of the information industry. Publishers and librarians tried to keep their products and services relevant by mixing authoritative content with user involvement, but that wasn't enough. Enhancing interfaces, adding new forms of content, and making strategic acquisitions--all are necessary to ensure that the information industry party continues.

New Order, New Thinking., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Digital users identify the ideas that they think are important. Because we cannot tell what will be interesting in the future, he advised the audience to include everything and let users "slice through it all." [...]he said, it "costs more to exclude than to include." Today's users feel they have a right to participate, including adding tags and notes to historical photo collections and comments and book reviews in the library catalog, providing user-generated photos or captions/descriptions to digital libraries, and employing the multiple style templates available to users to customize the look of library database interfaces (also known as …

Web Widgets Help Searchers., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Widgets are interactive, single-purpose applications for displaying and/or updating information. Libraries and others in a subscribing institution can now build custom ProQuest search widgets from a template and incorporate them directly into any web page.

A Global Information World., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

The users who create and edit topical Wikipedia articles (e.g., "Miss Piggy") or subject-focused Wikia articles (e.g., all things Muppets related) form stronger community bonds than those who are just readers. While major search engines offer video search, Kassel cited some new to me, including TeacherTube ("geared toward teachers and students for community sharing for instructional videos") and Vidipedia ("structured like Wikipedia but with video content"). David Ball, university librarian, Bournemouth University, UK, said academic libraries face obstacles when virtual learning environments (VLEs) become "the primary means of interaction between students and universities."

Ebooks Arrive., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

The programs at two recent conferences (the Charleston Conference and London Online) confirm that ebooks have established themselves in libraries. While the trade and consumer book markets still struggle to find an affordable and compelling ebook reader, library users have embraced the ebooks connected to the library e-collection and accessible via the PC or laptop they typically use.

Web 2.0: Our Cultural Downfall?, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Librarians, including American Library Association president Loriene Roy, are finding new ways to reach their constituents with social networking (see "Living the Virtual Library Life," LJ 10/1/07, p. 24). [...]after I heard Keen's keynote presentation at the recent International Association of STM Publishers in Frankfurt, Germany, and read his book on the long flight home, I recognized a kernel of truth in his arguments, which resonate with librarians' continued challenge to help users find accurate, reliable information. Keen might see this as one of the most pervasive dangers of social networking-the seductive power that leads even those professionals tasked with …

Celebrating A&I Longevity., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Continual pressures-including competition from free web search engines, the escalating costs of keeping up with human-based indexing of proliferating journal articles, and customer desires for online system interconnections and bells and whistles-have arguably made this past ten years more challenging than the 90 before. Matthew J. Toussant, CAS senior VP of editorial operations, notes that "patents are now the leading source of new substance information in the CAS REGISTRY database and accounted for 63 percent of new substance records by CAS in 2006."

Living The Virtual Library Life., Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

Sites such as Facebook, YouTube, MySpace, and Second Life provide a personal, but virtual, library presence to link librarians and library patrons. Many think that Second Life, peopled by avatars and created by Linden Research Inc, could be a way for librarians to reach each other and maintain social connections, as well as serve continuing education.

Measuring Impact And Quality, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

For many decades it was the only major commercial system to use citation measures. Since 2004, Elsevier's Scopus and Google Scholar have also provided various citation measures, including impact factor and number of cited references. Authors may cite something they disagree with, rather than believe is of high quality; an author who publishes a lot may accumulate the same number of citations as an author with one seminal and highly cited paper. Because citing patterns vary by subject discipline, journal impact factors should not be used across disciplines nor to measure quality of individual authors.

Billions And Billions, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

The Reuters brand is associated with its international multimedia news services, but a larger part of its business is in financial services, including online trading and financial information. Dunn is a familiar face in the information industry, as former president of the Information Industry Association and CEO of Thomson Learning's Academic and International group. Products like ISI Web of Knowledge, Dialog, DataStar, and Westlaw, all major offerings in academic, law, and other corporate libraries, will become part of Thomson-Reuters Professional.

Remaining Relevant Online, Carol Tenopir

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

For Library Journal's annual database marketplace survey, vendior were asked what major trends will most affect the future of online products and services. Worries about declining library budgets topped the list in 2002 and 2004. Budgets are still up there, but even bigger issues dominate in 2007.

Not Your Family Farm: The Information Industry Added Value With Unique Content And Custom Tools As Large Search Engines Entered The Market, Carol Tenopir, Gayle Baker, Jill E. Grogg

School of Information Sciences -- Faculty Publications and Other Works

The information industry continues to consolidate, just as agribusiness has consolidated and now dominates farming. Both the family farm and the small information company still exist but are becoming rarer in an age of mergers, acquisitions, and increased economies of scale. Small companies distinguish themselves by high quality, special themes, or useful tools to keep and build their customer base.

The database marketplace this year was dominated by the news of several large acquisitions. Wiley's purchase of Blackwell Publishing Ltd. drew concerns from members of the Information Access Alliance (IAA), made up of representatives from SLA, the American Library Association, …