In a changing academic environment, discoverability of scholarly content demands cooperative efforts across the communications supply chain. A new SAGE white paper, titled ‘Collaborative Improvements in the Discoverability of Scholarly Content: Accomplishments, Aspirations, and Opportunities’ summarises the current discovery landscape for scholarly communications, advocates for cooperative efforts across the industry, and proposes specific recommendations for discoverability improvement for librarians, publishers, and service providers.
Authors Dr. Mary Somerville and Lettie Conrad propose actionable recommendations for all involved in scholarly communications in order to achieve collaborative improvement of discoverability. The recommendations are based on four themes- Standards: All sectors should participate in ratified standards to ensure that cooperation is part of business-as-usual routines; Transparency: Standards compliance is critical for successful discovery, and the development, implementation, and enforcement of these standards require open relationships across the industry; Metadata: Quality metadata, observing ratified standards, enables successful discovery of scholarly content, products, and services; and Partnerships: Opportunities exist for new discovery innovations across the industry, such as linked open data and cross-publisher discovery tools.
This new white paper is SAGE’s second white paper on discoverability of academic work. An update to the first study, the paper addresses recent accomplishments and new opportunities for reinventing conventions and relationships among libraries, publishers, and service providers. A presentation of the findings will be made next week at the 2014 ALA Midwinter Meeting.
The full white paper is available online at: http://www.sagepub.com/repository/binaries/pdf/improvementsindiscoverability.pdf
