(27 Aug 2023) Requests to ban books at US public schools and libraries surged to a 21-year record in 2022, according to data from the American Library Association. Last year, the ALA recorded 1,050 requests to censor library books in 2022, a 70% increase over the 619 requests in 2021. There were 13 book titles…
(15 Sep 2023) ACS and Elsevier, members of the Coalition for Responsible Sharing, have agreed to a legal settlement with ResearchGate that ensures copyright-compliant sharing of research articles published with ACS or Elsevier on the ResearchGate site. The lawsuits pending against ResearchGate in Germany and the United States are now resolved. The specific terms of…
(20 Sep 2023) cOAlition S commissioned Information Power to explore how a globally fair pricing framework for academic publishing could be devised and implemented. The key objective of this project was to identify ways in which readers and producers of scholarly publications or their proxies – research funders and universities – can financially contribute to supporting…
(19 Sep 2023) The Association of University Presses (AUPresses) and Ithaka S+R today publish “Print Revenue and Open Access Monographs: A University Press Study.” This report is the result of research funded by a Level I Digital Humanities Advancement Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) to investigate the effect of open digital editions on the…
(28 Sep 2023) In this blog post, Aaron Tay shares a non-comprehensive list of academic search engines that use generative AI (almost always Large language models) to generate direct answers on top of list of relevant results, typically using Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) Techniques. Find out more here.
(27 Sep 2023) OpenAI’s ChatGPT has been an undoubtedly powerful and interesting tool since its release in November 2022, but it has been limited with the domain of its knowledge — which only included information up to September 2021. But that changes today. OpenAI just announced on X (formerly Twitter) that ChatGPT “can now browse…
(19 Sep 2023) [University of Leeds] has published a significant research report examining the transformational potential of artificial intelligence (AI) in libraries. “Looking towards a brighter future: the potentiality of AI and digital transformations to library spaces” aims to better understand the potential and the practical implications of AI in libraries. The report explores…
(27 Sep 2023) Since its launch Retraction Watch has done much to highlight the value of research integrity and publishing standards. Discussing the recent acquisition by Crossref of Retraction Watch’s database of retracted articles, Ivan Oransky and Rachael Lammey highlight the value of this data and the difficulties of making it openly and sustainably accessible. …
By Ruth A Pagell* (27 Sep 2023) Ruth’s Ranking 56 Part 1 raised concerns over existing rankings and showed how THE Impact was addressing some of them. Part 2 continues the discussion. QS 2024 World Rankings changed metrics and weightings, causing controversy over changes in countries’ performance. Nature added a new subject, Health Sciences and…
(5 Sep 2023) Two years ago Auckland Libraries removed its fines for late returns. Since then, more than a million items have been returned after their due date, meaning millions of dollars of potential fines going unclaimed. But despite the loss of revenue, librarians say it has been an overwhelmingly positive change. Read…