Michael Jubb at the Research Information Network blogs about the new journal version standards released by the NISO/ALPSP JAV Technical Working Group (seriously?). I'm all for standards, even if they appear a bit late, and slightly anachronistic.
I'm not sure how long we, as a society, will continue saying something is finished, especially items like "journal" articles. The standards presume a publication date, even if they've changed the terminology:
"Journal articles record the 'minutes of science' and are intended as a fixed record
of a body of work at a moment in time chosen by the scholar. This leads us to the Version of Record as a useful definition for formalizing academic achievement."
I'm disappointed to see that they dropped concepts, such as "siblings" (related papers on the same subject, probably using the same research), which could have made some review much easier. I also think it has limited the long-term use of the terms given the relatively rapid pace at which the means of dissemination of knowledge is changing, esp. compared to the length of time it took them to come up with the standards.
The report definitely deserves more than the quick reading I've given it. The current version is less than 27 pages, and still manages to introduce the terms, their definitions, and includes some of the formal discussions that took place during the process.
Showing posts with label electronic publishing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label electronic publishing. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
New Release to Watch from OUP
Cheryl Laguardia, a blogger at LibraryJournal.com, has taken a look at a new collection of digitized 19th-century materials from Oxford called "Electronic Enlightenment." Cheryl writes,
"They present this as a community resource, and are inviting researchers to contribute to the file by adding information about previously unknown correspondents and materials from the period."
It’s heavily gated, and doesn’t appear to have a teaser/free side without registration. I don't really like registering for items that I won't use (I really don't even like registering most of the time when I will use them). So, I'll be watching for user responses and commentary. I'm interested to see how it will compare with the Labyrinth, a "free" resourse on Medieval studies that has been around since the mid-1990s. Several years ago I used it on a research project for a local museum. It functioned more like a cross between an academic Wiki and a host for classroom lectures, etc. The Labyrinth has "recently" (since last I used it) added a tree/search structure, but otherwise looks the same.V ery useful, if not as pretty as OUP's product.
"They present this as a community resource, and are inviting researchers to contribute to the file by adding information about previously unknown correspondents and materials from the period."
It’s heavily gated, and doesn’t appear to have a teaser/free side without registration. I don't really like registering for items that I won't use (I really don't even like registering most of the time when I will use them). So, I'll be watching for user responses and commentary. I'm interested to see how it will compare with the Labyrinth, a "free" resourse on Medieval studies that has been around since the mid-1990s. Several years ago I used it on a research project for a local museum. It functioned more like a cross between an academic Wiki and a host for classroom lectures, etc. The Labyrinth has "recently" (since last I used it) added a tree/search structure, but otherwise looks the same.V ery useful, if not as pretty as OUP's product.
Monday, June 30, 2008
DELOS (The Digital Library Association of the EU)
Seven months after its inception (the group it is based on is ten years old) this association already has 59 members, http://www.diglib.org/. It looks comparable to the Digital Library Federation of the U.S., http://www.diglib.org/.
The program for the Spring Forum for the DLF has some papers that look good, especially Asset Actions Next Steps: Atom/OAI-ORE and Zotero, as well as presentations that cover open access mandates, propose social science data networks, user-centered design, ARTstor, and this presentationon UIScholarWords at Indiana University.
The program for the Spring Forum for the DLF has some papers that look good, especially Asset Actions Next Steps: Atom/OAI-ORE and Zotero, as well as presentations that cover open access mandates, propose social science data networks, user-centered design, ARTstor, and this presentationon UIScholarWords at Indiana University.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
The Future of DRM
Will audiobooks show paper books "The Way?" Today's LJ features coverage of BEA and the Audio Publishers Association Conference on DRM and audiobooks. Apparently industry studies have confirmed everyone's suspicion that DRM is a "speedbump," and that many people will go ahead and purchase (or lease) an audiobook without illegally ripping it.
That's not exactly what UIP's experience in making books available as webpages showed. Instead, making the digital copies available on our website seemed to erase demand of the paper copies. Of course, people were just linking and reading those books, not making their own copies. That might be the point on which the GSU e-reserve result hinges (discussed in a post earlier today). If libraries are making copies to post on their in-house webpages, it is most likely a clear violation of copyright. If they are creating pages of links to materials that they own in digital format, I can't see how that is a violation. We'll see.
That's not exactly what UIP's experience in making books available as webpages showed. Instead, making the digital copies available on our website seemed to erase demand of the paper copies. Of course, people were just linking and reading those books, not making their own copies. That might be the point on which the GSU e-reserve result hinges (discussed in a post earlier today). If libraries are making copies to post on their in-house webpages, it is most likely a clear violation of copyright. If they are creating pages of links to materials that they own in digital format, I can't see how that is a violation. We'll see.
Monday, June 9, 2008
Guttenberg-e went Open Access
I don't remember seeing this announcement back in February.
The titles are pretty standard low-print-run monographs. It sounds as though they're going ahead with new titles, even though the original Gutenberg-e funding has dropped off, and the press release states that the open-access model is not sustainable without outside funding.
It always surprises me when other professionals are surprised when professional publishing (not these bloggy things) costs real money. Computers, buildings, personnel (no matter how little we work for) are not free. That said, good on them for freeing the books for other scholars and readers to use.
The titles are pretty standard low-print-run monographs. It sounds as though they're going ahead with new titles, even though the original Gutenberg-e funding has dropped off, and the press release states that the open-access model is not sustainable without outside funding.
It always surprises me when other professionals are surprised when professional publishing (not these bloggy things) costs real money. Computers, buildings, personnel (no matter how little we work for) are not free. That said, good on them for freeing the books for other scholars and readers to use.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
LJ @ IDPF
Library Journal has a short item today on the International Digital Publishing Forum meeting last week.
I blogged about the announcement last month about Digital Book 2008 (the name of the conference). It turns out that the .epub is XML based, to support page-readers, but will reformat depending upon the reader. (Obviously we'll have to give up page numbers as a reference point.)
Today Wendy Davis blogged on MediaPost's OnlineExaminer that Napster is opening a DRM-free music store.
I still hold with my earlier comments that most publishers need to jump in to the eBook with little or no DRM. I think us small fishes could end up shelling out money for scalable walls that should go towards creating better, viable online content.
I blogged about the announcement last month about Digital Book 2008 (the name of the conference). It turns out that the .epub is XML based, to support page-readers, but will reformat depending upon the reader. (Obviously we'll have to give up page numbers as a reference point.)
Today Wendy Davis blogged on MediaPost's OnlineExaminer that Napster is opening a DRM-free music store.
I still hold with my earlier comments that most publishers need to jump in to the eBook with little or no DRM. I think us small fishes could end up shelling out money for scalable walls that should go towards creating better, viable online content.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Must remember . . .
It's impossible to read everything I feel that I need to, let alone everything I want to. Add blogging, or writing, or otherwise keeping track of the reading and my thoughts about what I've read and . . . I really admire people who can do it regularly.
More things I haven't kept up with, but think are important:
--Charles W. Bailey has updated his Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography, as posted to COLLDV-L (a collection development listserv) . A well-developed list of more things that I should read! Actually, I've probably read about a third of it. Okay, maybe a quarter.
--With possibly the worst "well, duh," headline ever, the New York Times declared, Tech's Late Adopters Prefer the Tried and True." Since the article appeared in the same week that I finally broke down and replaced my perfectly good seven-year-old Compaq with a new computer, it managed to make me feel less guilty about holding on to the old machine for so long (because it still works!), and about finally abandoning it due to the uncomfortable work-arounds necessary to actually use it. It's one thing to keep a TRS-80 as a perfectly good word processor--as a customer actually did in the mid-90s when I was working at Radio Shack. It's another to try to use an orphan program on a networked computer. Good-bye, Netscape (which I deleted a few weeks ago) .
--And this Inside Higher Ed piece is likely to be revisited at a later date: Abandoning Print, Not Peer Review. This is an article about Indiana Library's new online-only journal, Museum Anthropology Review. With a super-organized editor at the helm, it sounds like it's doing well. What the article doesn't mention is the structure and the organization, not just copyeditors and graphic designers, that a University Press or other publisher brings to the table. There is an entire department at UIP that has several people who spend a good portion of every day tracking articles, making sure that changes are made, drafts are turned in, and that everything is organized by arbitrary deadlines that ensure that Indiana University and other libraries, organizations, and individuals receive their online or print scholarship in a timely and coherent manner. Like most people in publishing I love academia, and have great respect for academics, but I have no illusions about the quality or timeliness of the writing that will frequently be the result when publishers are taken out of the equation. More power to Jason Baird Jackson, the intrepid editor.
More things I haven't kept up with, but think are important:
--Charles W. Bailey has updated his Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography, as posted to COLLDV-L (a collection development listserv) . A well-developed list of more things that I should read! Actually, I've probably read about a third of it. Okay, maybe a quarter.
--With possibly the worst "well, duh," headline ever, the New York Times declared, Tech's Late Adopters Prefer the Tried and True." Since the article appeared in the same week that I finally broke down and replaced my perfectly good seven-year-old Compaq with a new computer, it managed to make me feel less guilty about holding on to the old machine for so long (because it still works!), and about finally abandoning it due to the uncomfortable work-arounds necessary to actually use it. It's one thing to keep a TRS-80 as a perfectly good word processor--as a customer actually did in the mid-90s when I was working at Radio Shack. It's another to try to use an orphan program on a networked computer. Good-bye, Netscape (which I deleted a few weeks ago) .
--And this Inside Higher Ed piece is likely to be revisited at a later date: Abandoning Print, Not Peer Review. This is an article about Indiana Library's new online-only journal, Museum Anthropology Review. With a super-organized editor at the helm, it sounds like it's doing well. What the article doesn't mention is the structure and the organization, not just copyeditors and graphic designers, that a University Press or other publisher brings to the table. There is an entire department at UIP that has several people who spend a good portion of every day tracking articles, making sure that changes are made, drafts are turned in, and that everything is organized by arbitrary deadlines that ensure that Indiana University and other libraries, organizations, and individuals receive their online or print scholarship in a timely and coherent manner. Like most people in publishing I love academia, and have great respect for academics, but I have no illusions about the quality or timeliness of the writing that will frequently be the result when publishers are taken out of the equation. More power to Jason Baird Jackson, the intrepid editor.
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