Open Bibliographic Data Guide: JISC study on the business cases for Open Bibliographic Data

http://obd.jisc.ac.uk/

links to the _The Guide to Open Bibliographic Data_ that JISC developed on behalf of its partners in the Resource Discovery Task Force. It is about the business cases for Open Bibliographic Data – releasing some or all of a library’s catalog records for open use and re-use by others. The Guide uses 17 use cases to explore
* How to license the data
* Legal issues to be considered
* Potential costs and savings
* Practical implications in terms of processes, effort and skills
* Data formats and other technical options

The assumed rationale is about discoverability and is gaining in credibility the more our resources are discovered from ‘out there’ (through such as Google) and not from ‘in here’ (through the local OPAC). --most of the above quoted or modified slightly from the Guide.

A PDF version of the use cases is at http://obd.jisc.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Open-Bibliographic-Data-The-Use-Cases.pdf

On a quick review, the case studies seem useful: specific, brief, comprehensive. Each use case includes sections on description, motivation, benefits, consequences, rights & licensing, practicalities and costs.

A table of use cases and examples is at http://obd.jisc.ac.uk/examples

An example for use case 1 (publish data for unspecified use) is Open Library http://openlibrary.org and another is Cambridge U. Library http://openbiblio.net/2010/10/05/jisc-openbibliography-cul-data-release/

An example for use case 2 (publish open Linked Data for unspecified use) is Libris, the joint catalogue of the Swedish academic and research libraries http://libris.kb.se/

Digital information seeker--a report on OCLC, RIN, and JISC projects

The Digital Information Seeker: Report of findings from selected OCLC, RIN and JISC user behaviour projects is out. http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/publications/reports/2010/digitalinformationseekerreport.pdf

It was produced for JISC by Lynn Silipigni Connaway, PhD and Timothy J Dickey, PhD, OCLC Research. Dated Feb. 15, 2010.

This report gives a really nice look at the landscape of user studies. Its 61 pages are a succinct review of a selected sample of studies.

The report was not intended to be definitive. It provides a synthesis. The report makes it easier for librarians and other information professionals to better understand the information-seeking behaviors of libraries’ intended users. It also makes it easier to review the issues associated with developing information services and systems to best meet users’ needs.

The 12 studies included in this report:

Perceptions of libraries and information resources (OCLC, December 2005),
http://www.oclc.org/us/en/reports/2005perceptions.htm

College students’ perceptions of libraries and information resources (OCLC, April 2006),
http://www.oclc.org/us/en/reports/perceptionscollege.htm

Sense-making the information confluence: The whys and hows of college and university user satisficing of information needs (IMLS/Ohio State University/OCLC, July 2006),
http://www.oclc.org/research/projects/imls/default.htm

Researchers and discovery services: Behaviour, perceptions and needs (RIN, November 2006),
http://www.rin.ac.uk/our-work/using-and-accessing-information-resources/researchers-and-discoveryservices-behaviour-perc

Researchers’ use of academic libraries and their services (RIN/CURL, April 2007),
http://www.rin.ac.uk/our-work/using-and-accessing-information-resources/researchers-use-academiclibraries-and-their-serv

Information behaviour of the researcher of the future (CIBER/UCL, commissioned by BL and JISC, January 2008),
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/programmemes/reppres/gg_final_keynote_11012008.pdf

Seeking synchronicity: Evaluating virtual reference services from user, non-user and librarian perspectives (OCLC/ IMLS/ Rutgers, June 2008),
http://www.oclc.org/research/projects/synchronicity/default.htm

Online catalogs: What users and librarians want (OCLC. March 2009),
http://www.oclc.org/us/en/reports/onlinecatalogs/default.htm

E-journals: Their use, value and impact (RIN, April 2009),
http://www.rin.ac.uk/our-work/communicatingand-disseminating-research/e-journals-their-use-value-and-impact

JISC national e-books observatory project: Key findings and recommendations (JISC/UCL, November 2009),
http://www.jiscebooksproject.org/

Students’ use of research content in teaching and learning (JISC, November 2009),
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/aboutus/workinggroups/studentsuseresearchcontent.pdf

User behaviour in resource discovery (JISC, November 2009),
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/inf11/userbehaviourbusandecon.aspx

Implications for libraries:

• Each library serves many constituencies with different needs and behaviors.
• Each library must do better at providing seamless access to resources.
• Each library must recognize that more digital resources of all kinds are better for users.
• Each library must prepare for changing user behaviors.
• Each library's access tools need to look and function more like search engines and Web services since these are familiar to users and they are comfortable and confident in using them.
• Each library must value high-quality metadata for its resources since metadata is vital for discovery.
• Each library must better promote its brand, its value, and its resources within its community.

Google Book deal explained

The folks at JISC and eFoundations have been commenting on the Google book deal. This link goes to a brief with some links. http://efoundations.typepad.com/efoundations/2009/09/the-google-book-settlement.html