Project COUNTER Trends in Statistical Standards for E- Resource Management March 2005 Oliver Pesch Chief Strategist, E-Resources EBSCO Information Services.

Project COUNTER

Trends in Statistical Standards for E-Resource Management

March 2005

Oliver PeschChief Strategist, E-ResourcesEBSCO Information Services

opesch@ebsco.com

Overview COUNTER now and future

The COUNTER basics Release 2 Auditing vendor reports E-Reference

Beyond COUNTER Where A&I usage fits Other important metrics

Things to ponder Activity captured – is it meaningful? Effect of metasearch on usage Capturing the data

COUNTER

Member supported Members include:

Libraries Publishers Aggregators

Goal: Allow credible and consistent usage

measurement between vendors

http://www.projectcounter.orghttp://www.projectcounter.org

Code of PracticeCode of Practice

Compliant VendorsCompliant Vendors

Rules for complianceRules for compliance

Upcoming releasesUpcoming releases

COUNTER Code of Practice

Addresses: Terminology Layout and format of reports Processing of usage data Categories Delivery of reports

Terminology

Ensure consistent use of terminology Rely on existing standards for definitions NISO Z39.7 (Usage Statistics)

COUNTER Usage Reports

Journal Report 1: Full Text Article Requests by Month and Journal

Journal Report 2: Turnaways by Month and Journal

Database Report 1: Total Searches and Sessions by Month and Database

Database Report 2: Turnaways by Month and Database

Database Report 3: Searches and Sessions by Month and Service

Journal Report 1: Full Text Article Requests by Journal

Journal Report 2: Turnaways by Journal

Database report 1: Searches and Sessions by Database

Database report 2: Turnaways by Database

Database report 3: Searches and Sessions by Service

COUNTER: Data Processing

Only count valid requests For progressive PDF retrieval, only count the

first request Filter out multiple successive clicks (“double

clicks”) of same link by same user 10 seconds for HTML 30 seconds for PDF

COUNTER basics

Q: Who gets to count full text requests? Publisher? Aggregator? E-Journal gateway? Link Resolver?

A: The party that delivers the actual text to the user

Linking

A&I Database

A&I Database

Link Resolver

Link Resolver

E-Journal GatewayE-Journal Gateway

Publisher site

Publisher site

User finds citation of interest in an A&I

database. An OpenURL link

providedCitation

Link menu

Abstractor TOC

Full Text

Link-Out Link-Out Link-Out Full text

Linking

A&I Database

A&I Database

Link Resolver

Link Resolver

E-Journal GatewayE-Journal Gateway

Publisher site

Publisher site

User finds citation of interest in an A&I

database. An OpenURL link

providedCitation

Link menu

Abstractor TOC

Full Text

Link-Out Link-Out Full text

Delivery

CSV, Excel or file that can be imported into Excel

XML version being tested On password controlled web site Scheduled alert or delivery of report Provide monthly Available within 2 weeks of end of month Current and previous year’s data

Compliant vendors/products

Compliant vendors/products

COUNTER basics

Any questions on current COUNTER

Code Of Practice?

COUNTER Release 2

Minor fixes and improvements New report (Journal report 1a) Level 2 report eliminated in favor of “optional”

reports

Release 2: minor fixes Added header rows to identify, report, criteria and

run date

Release 2: minor fixesInclude Publisher field

Release 2: minor fixes More forgiving date representation for Excel.

Jan-2004 instead of Jan-04

Release 2: minor fixes

“Calendar YTD” now “Total”

Release 2: Journal Report 1a

“Page Type” column added

to breakout activity by full text format.

Release 2: Journal Report 1a

Two rows per title

COUNTER: Audit

Passing audit will be required in 2005 Conducted by auditor certified by COUNTER At vendor expense

COUNTER: Audit Audit will check each product and report for:

Layout Right rows and columns Header rows Column headings

Formats CSV or Excel

Delivery of report Email notification of availability Access from password controlled web site

Accuracy of data Conduct series of tests for each report Current tolerance is -8% to +2%

COUNTER: E-Reference

The next initiative? Focus to-date have been on journals E-Reference includes:

e-books Dictionaries Encyclopedias almanacs, etc.

E-Reference materials becoming increasingly more important.

COUNTER: E-Reference

Unit of access may include: Entire book Chapter Entry (dictionary or encyclopedia) Page Paragraph

Challenge is what constitutes a countable “access”

COUNTER: E-Reference

Access depends on interface and organization of content. Entire reference work may be in one PDF (1

access and user reads all of the book) Each chapter may have own PDF (1 access per

chapter read) Reference may organized by topic or section with

user linking from topic to topic within a chapter (many access within one chapter)

Discussions continue…

Looking ahead(future releases?)

Where A&I Statistics fit

Metrics for product purchase and usage patterns

Journal-level use metrics help with collection development

COUNTER represents only in optional report

COUNTER optional report

Other important metrics

Link activity Where the users came from Where the users go By target By type of target

Example of link activity

Linking

A&I Database

A&I Database

Link Resolver

Link Resolver

E-Journal GatewayE-Journal Gateway

Publisher site

Publisher site

User finds citation of interest in an A&I

database. An OpenURL link

providedCitation

Link menu

Abstractor TOC

Full Text

Link-Out Link-Out Link-Out Full text

Link-out activity

Record each time user links from an item to full text or other service

For each, track: Source information

Database Journal/Book Year published

Target information Category (full text, ILL, etc.) Target service (domain)

Year of publication

Record with each full text retrieval Summarize retrieval activity by journal by

year of publication Analyze importance of back files Analyze who using back files Make archival decisions

Type of material

Journal article, book, book chapter, video, sound track, encyclopedia, dictionary…

COUNTER moving towards E-Resource code of practice

Record with each TOC, citation, abstract or full text request

Summarize retrieval activity by type of material

Make decisions on value of non-journal information in hybrid collections

Article level data?

Volume versus value Minimum data to store? Is roll-up possible to achieve goals?

Section Subject (journal level?) Author

What transactions need this level of detail? Full text requests Abstract views? TOC views?

Other things to ponder

Metasearch

Also known as: Federated search Broadcast search

User presented with a single search interface Searches multiple information sources at

same time Eliminates (or assists with) resource selection Retrieve, consolidates and ranks results A new challenge for statistics

Metasearch: a new challenge

What can be affected Session counts Search counts

Why? “Search all” option or automatic selection/search

of many resources Perform simultaneous activities Optimization techniques

Searching without Metasearch

EBSCO OCLC ProQuest OVID

user

Resources

-Product 1-Product 2-Product 3…

Visits = 1Sessions = 2Searches = 2

Visits = 1Sessions = 2Searches = 2

With Metasearch engine

EBSCO OCLC ProQuest OVID

user

Metasearch

-Search All -Business-Medicine…

Visits = 1Sessions = 20Searches = 20

Visits = 1Sessions = 20Searches = 20

Visits = 1Sessions = 20Searches = 20

Visits = 1Sessions = 20Searches = 20

With Metasearch engine

EBSCO OCLC ProQuest OVID

user

Metasearch

-Search All -Business-Medicine…

Visits = 1Sessions = 28Searches = 28

Visits = 1Sessions = 28Searches = 28

Metasearch lessons

Libraries should want to isolate metasearch sessions and searches Capture source of activity Isolate metasearch IP address Have metasearch access through separate

account Support metasearch standardization activities

through NISO We need to be able to recognize a metasearch

session

Summary of COUNTER

Collaboration of vendors and libraries More than just a standards document A code of practice Enforcement and registration compliance Setting reasonable expectations Benefits extend to all parties COUNTER is very active and forward-looking

Thank you

Oliver Peschopesch@ebsco.com