COUNTER Code of Practice - an introduction to Release 4 Peter Shepherd COUNTER May 2011

Release 4 - objectives A single, unified Code covering all e-resources, including journals, databases, books, reference works, multimedia content, etc. Improve the application of XML and SUSHI in the design of the usage reports Take into account the outcomes of the Journal Usage Factor and PIRUS projects

Release 4: timetable and development process April 2011: announcement of objectives, process and timetable for the development of Release 4; open invitation to submit suggestions April-June 2011: evaluation of submitted suggestions by COUNTER Executive June 2011- September 2011: development of Draft Release 4 October 2011: publication of Draft Release 4 October 2011- January 2012: comments received on Draft Release 4 March 2012: publication of Release 4 December 2013: deadline for implementation by vendors of Release 4

SUSHI Standardized Usage Statistics Harvesting Initiative (SUSHI) No mechanism existed for automatically retrieving, combining, and storing COUNTER usage data from different sources NISO-sponsored XML-based SUSHI provides a means to do just this, via a standard model for machine to machine automation of statistics harvesting. COUNTER and NISO have worked together to develop the SUSHI protocol. More details of SUSHI can be found at:- http://www.niso.org/committees/SUSHI/SUSHI_comm.html

COUNTER and SUSHI For libraries and publishers Usage statistics are being used to inform decisions They need to be consistent, credible and comparable = And, easy to obtain = SUSHI

COUNTER and SUSHI COUNTER provides the consistency and credibility ERM Systems/Usage Consolidation service provide the tools for more effective consolidation and reporting of usage data SUSHI acts as an enabling technology by allowing Usage Consolidation modules to automate the harvesting of COUNTER reports Release 3 of COUNTER Codes of Practice, has turned the theory and promise of these systems into reality by making make SUSHI support a requirement for compliance. Release 4 will take this further.

Journal Usage Factor: overview ISI's Impact Factor compensates for the fact that larger journals will tend to be cited more than smaller ones Can we do something similar for usage? In other words, should we seek to develop a “Usage Factor” as an additional measure of journal quality/value?

Journal Usage Factor: overview Journal Usage Factor (JUF)= Total usage over period ‘x’ of articles published during period ‘y’ Total articles published during period ‘y’

Journal Usage Factor: overview A useful counterweight to Impact Factors Especially helpful for journals and fields not covered by ISI Especially helpful for journals with high undergraduate or practitioner use Especially helpful for journals publishing relatively few articles Data available potentially sooner than with Impact Factors Further information: http://www.uksg.org/usagefactors

Journal Usage Factor: some initial results

PIRUS: why now? Increasing interest in article-level usage More journal articles hosted by Institutional and other Repositories Authors and funding agencies are increasingly interested in a reliable, global overview of usage of individual articles Online usage becoming an alternative, accepted measure of article and journal value Knowledge Exchange report recommends developing standards for usage reporting at the individual article level Usage-based metrics being considered as a tool for use in the UK Research Excellence Framework and elsewhere.

PIRUS: why now? Article-level usage metrics now more practical Implementation by COUNTER of XML-based usage reports makes more granular reporting of usage a practical proposition Implementation by COUNTER of the SUSHI protocol facilitates the automated consolidation of usage data from different sources.

PIRUS: the challenge An article may be available from:- The main journal web site Ovid ProQuest PubMed Central Authors’ local Institutional Repositories If we want to assess article impact by counting usage, how can we maximise the actual usage that we capture?

PIRUS: mission and project aims To develop a global standard to enable the recording, reporting and consolidation of online usage statistics for individual journal articles hosted by Institutional Repositories, Publishers and other entities Project aims Develop COUNTER-compliant usage reports at the individual article level Create guidelines which, if implemented, would enable any entity that hosts online journal articles to produce these reports Propose ways in which these reports might be consolidated at a global level in a standard way.

PIRUS: benefits Reliable usage data will be available for journal articles, wherever they are held Repositories will have access to new functionality from open source software that will allow them to produce standardised usage reports from their data Digital repository systems will be more integral to research and closely aligned to research workflows and environments The authoritative status of PIRUS2 usage statistics will enhance the status of repository data and content The standard can be extended to cover other categories of content stored by repositories

PIRUS: outcomes Further information: Technical: a workable technical model for the collection, processing and consolidation of individual article usage statistics has been developed. Organizational: an organizational model for a Central Clearing House that would be responsible for the collection, processing and consolidation of usage statistic has been proposed. Economic: the costs for repositories and publishers of generating the required usage reports, as well as the costs of any central clearing house/houses have been calculated and a model for recovering these costs has been proposed Political: the broad support of all the major stakeholder groups (repositories, publishers, authors, etc) is being sought. Further information: http://www.cranfieldlibrary.cranfield.ac.uk/pirus2/tiki-index.php

Release 4: requested changes Publisher interfaces: Mitigating the effects of forcing users to access PDF via html Open Access articles: count separately Librarians do not want to pay for OA content in ‘hybrid’ journals Journal title DOI: ISSN an inadequate identifier A unique, permanent identifier needed Extend scope of ‘turnaways’ to cover other categories of ‘access denied’ New database report that counts ‘search clicks’ searches and sessions reports inadequate

Release 4: requested changes Policy on automated and semi-automated downloading of articles Which should be counted? Identify and count usage on mobile devices Smart phones, tablet computers, etc Apply time filters to requests for different formats of the same article Guidelines for flagging abnormal spikes in usage Report the number of unique articles by session More granular reports by organization- or user-category COUNTER and KBART Dialogue on linkage

Caveat: usage statistics are only part of a toolkit for understanding online usage