1.One Time-Saving Strategy for Managing Print Journals
Even though much of the serials world has gone electronic, thousands of libraries worldwide still purchase some print journals for their collections. This post from the EBSCOpost Blog discusses how many librarians handle the tasks associated with the delivery of print issues, such as check in, claiming and reporting.
The blog post says (quote): When EBSCO customers use JETS for their print journal subscriptions, journals are ready for the shelves when they arrive at the library. With the JETS service, journals are checked in, packed securely and shipped at the frequency chosen by the customer. Deliveries can be made weekly, biweekly or monthly from one of the 10 locations worldwide (including locations in Europe, Asia, Australia and other countries). They arrive intact weeks sooner than they would have, had they been processed through normal publisher distribution methods. JETS also works with various integrated library systems (ILS). Delivery details can be viewed via EBSCONET Subscription Management………(unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
2.Guest Post: When Authors Get Caught in the Predatory (Illegitimate Publishing) Net
Are we losing good articles to predatory journals, with little recourse for unsuspecting authors? Or are authors becoming increasingly complicit and symbiotic in their relationships with illegitimate publishing entities with disregard for the greater good? Phaedra Cress, in her guest post in the Scholarly Kitchen Blog, explores what can happen when an author accidentally falls into the predatory journal rabbit hole.
The blog post says (quote): Are universities then complicit if they knowingly turn a blind eye and allow faculty to publish in illegitimate journals versus holding them to higher standards? Derek Pyne sounded off about just that when he observed the phenomenon at Thompson Rivers University in British Columbia, Canada. Editors in Chief have blacklisted authors who commit ethical offenses. Should universities and journals create author blacklists to affirm a zero tolerance policy for those who willingly choose to publish in predatory journals? Unethical publishers are doing unsavory such as manipulating authors and using their names without permission on editorial boards and websites to imply legitimacy toward their operations. Why isn't the information that's available enough to prevent authors from making devastating mistakes?………(unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
3.Where are the rising stars of research working? Towards a momentum-based look at research excellence
Traditional university rankings and leaderboards are largely an indicator of past performance of academic staff, some of whom conducted the research for which they are most famous elsewhere. In his post in the LSE Impact of Social Sciences Blog, Paul X. McCarthy discusses how the use of new data and metrics can shed light on the up-to-date performance of researchers and institutions.
The blog post says (quote): Looking at the 2008 Research Assessment Exercise results and those of the more recent Research Excellence Framework (the 2014 national research evaluation exercise), each of the Russell Group universities that appears in the momentum index's top output/impact quadrant either improved or maintained its ranking, with Exeter, King's College London, Southampton and Queen's University Belfast among the biggest winners. The positions also align with other data, including the League of Scholars index of the location of many of tomorrow's research stars. Using data analytics and its own Whole-of-Web (WoW) index - a ranking of scholars in more than 15,000 research topics, with the aim to predict their potential future research impact in those areas - it aims not only to discover who the present research leaders are but also to identify early-career researchers with high potential for the future, many of whom will become tomorrow's research leaders. University of Exeter, in particular, has a much higher ratio of "future" stars than the UK university average………(unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
4.Scientific peer review: an ineffective and unworthy institution
Peer review of scientific reports is not only without documented value in advancing the scientific enterprise but, in a manner that few care to acknowledge openly, primarily serves ends that are less than noble. In their post in the Times Higher Education Blog, Les Hatton and Gregory Warr give their two-pronged solution to the problems of peer review.
The blog post says (quote): A prime example of the failure of peer review is the tainting of a significant segment of the biomedical literature by the use of misidentified and contaminated cell lines pointing, at best, to a culture of carelessness in cell biology research and the clear failure of peer review to discover and correct erroneous research. There are many reasons why scientific peer review is ineffective. An important factor is the inadequacy of almost all scientific reporting; publications should contain sufficient information that all aspects of the work can be understood, permitting a published result to be reproduced from the original data, as well as independent replication of the study by others wishing to do this. If these minimal standards are not met then critical information is missing and the reader has no way of assessing if the published research is correct or false in its claims and conclusions – even exact replication of a study is precluded………(unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
5.Citation metrics are making headlines, but what does citation really mean?
It would probably come as a surprise to most researchers, working with assumption that citation counts as the one true measure of research excellence, that there is no accepted theory of what it is we are doing when we reference a work. In his post in the JISC Blog, Cameron Neylon looks at the competing theories to try to find out what we do – and don't – know about the motivation behind the practice of referencing.
The blog post says (quote): A more recent strand of work on referencing and citations focuses on the question of meaning. This is what led Paul Wouters to analyse the differences between authors' acts of referencing and an index's creation of a citation database. This new strand of theory can help to understand both where meaning is stripped away, but also where it is being constructed. It also offers understanding of how stages in processing citation data add or remove meaning. Perhaps most importantly, these discussions give a rigorous way of examining how individuals are exchanging signs and meaning with the community. That is, what is the exchange process by which an author is seeking identity with a community and how does the community create a culture of social norms?………(unquote)
The full entry can be read Here.
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