It’s Academic – Scholarly Journals are Big Business – May 2014 M&A Activity
Digital content platforms attracted financial and strategic buyers last month, as increasingly sophisticated online systems drive information to centralised providers that automate the design, hosting and distribution of content. That content may or may not be printed, and often will be printed only on-demand as the final consumer sees fit… Read More
Understanding science: Peer review
The peer review system is in place not only to ensure that the scientific papers being published are of a high standard, but also to limit the effect of the darker side of human nature on what is and isn’t published. Contrary to the popular view of science, peer review… Read More
The value of open data in academic science
Open science is one way today to deliver science to societies around the world. And, it can include open education, open research, open source, and open culture. At TU Delft, they are one of the many academic institutions joining a force of dedicated groups of people making significant contributions to… Read More
Open publishing can improve access to knowledge
There have been increasing demands for more transparency in the reporting of research findings, which has built up pressure on all those involved in making and testing potential new drugs, biologics and medical devices. The lack of systematic reporting of both positive and negative results and the resulting 'publication bias'… Read More
The Future of Book Publishing – some predictions
The rate of change means that the future remains highly uncertain, but then, as the cyberpunk writer William Gibson commented, ‘The future is already here, it’s just not evenly distributed.’ Gibson’s point is well made. The trends that will determine the future are here today. Making predictions about that future… Read More
Academics Anonymous: scientific publishing is a licence to print money, not the truth
For scientists, a publication in the big three is basically a licence to print money. Easily impressed by journals' respectability, the funding bodies throw cash after the big name authors, mistaking their talent for storytelling for great science. In the end, science publishers, combined with eminence- and applicability-obsessed funding agencies,… Read More
Incentivizing Peer Review: The Last Obstacle for Open Access Science
The alternative vision – of “open science” – has two key properties: the uninhibited sharing of research findings, and a new peer review system that incorporates the best of the scientific community’s feedback. Several groups have made progress on the former, but the latter has proven particularly difficult given the… Read More
When Patients Fear EHR
In healthcare, the fear of new technology and an ever-increasing awareness of security and privacy concerns are driving patients away from electronic health records (EHRs). However, this doesn't have to be the case. In a column for InformationWeek, CIO Mansur Hasib shows why patients should embrace EHRs. Read More
Why Journal Impact Factor is hurting science
In order to improve something, we need to be able to measure its quality. This is true in public policy, in commercial industries, and also in science. Like other fields, science has a growing need for quantitative evaluation of its products: scientific studies. However, the dominant metric used for this… Read More
Growing Usage at Academic Institutions
The development of online journals and books has now made it possible for librarians and publishers to gather information on how often a piece of content is used at an academic institution. For publishers, this can be an important tool in editorial development. For libraries, it is often factored in… Read More
