Cadmore media player playing video Counter 5-1 - WYN2K Presentation
Video Player
Accessibility
Using forms mode, you can utilize keyboard shortcuts to make usability more efficient.
Space bar will play and pause the video. Pressing escape will close all displays and pressing it again will jump to the end of the player.
You can press A to open the Keyboard Shortcut Dialog which also provides an audio description of the player and all of its features.
Language
1x
Play Speed
Adjust Volume
Transcript
Search
Result Count
of
Click to jump to result
Search
Re-center
Segments
Result Count
of
Click to jump to result
Search
Name:
Counter 5-1 - WYN2K Presentation
Description:
Counter 5-1 - WYN2K Presentation
Thumbnail URL:
https://cadmoremediastorage.blob.core.windows.net/2e7652ea-79a9-4922-a18f-86f6368e8eb8/videoscrubberimages/Scrubber_2.jpg?sv=2019-02-02&sr=c&sig=wKeqDdad%2FLyswbcTCD4Yxxt%2FGxZbnonU5idBtqCuilE%3D&st=2024-12-25T07%3A00%3A34Z&se=2024-12-25T11%3A05%3A34Z&sp=r
Duration:
T01H00M41S
Embed URL:
https://stream.cadmore.media/player/2e7652ea-79a9-4922-a18f-86f6368e8eb8
Content URL:
https://cadmoreoriginalmedia.blob.core.windows.net/2e7652ea-79a9-4922-a18f-86f6368e8eb8/Counter 5-1 - WYN2K Presentation.mp4?sv=2019-02-02&sr=c&sig=LWGJ%2FxPcK342V1Q0f4AsF%2FIl5yxw8qvbjFgpA2%2BKICA%3D&st=2024-12-25T07%3A00%3A36Z&se=2024-12-25T09%3A05%3A36Z&sp=r
Upload Date:
2023-11-27T00:00:00.0000000
Transcript:
Language: EN.
Segment:1 Introduction.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Welcome, everybody to this webinar on COUNTER Release 5.1. As you probably have noticed, this is being recorded. We will be making a copy of this video available on the COUNTER Media Library probably next week. Please do drop questions into the chat box at any point. If I don't spot them immediately, I will be picking up all of the questions at the end of the presentation.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We do have quite a few people registered today, so I hope we will have time for all of the questions, but if I don't get to yours, please do send me an email after the meeting, and I will get back to you at that point. So today, we are going to cover what has changed from Release 5 to Release 5.1 of the COUNTER Code of Practice and why that change was made.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We will go into a little bit of the detail of what report providers and report consumers will need to do to work with Release 5.1 of the Code of Practice. And as we go through this, you will see how Release 5.1 is optimized for Open Access and our diverse publishing environment. There are lots of questions that came through in the document ahead of time.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I have tried to address them in the flow of the presentation, but there are some that I have popped at the end because they don't fit precisely anywhere else. As I said, please do stick your questions in the chat at any point. Oh, and I should introduce myself. Hi, I am Tasha Mellins-Cohen. I am COUNTER's project director. So any questions, send them to me.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Let's move on. As I hope you are all aware, COUNTER is a not-for-profit membership organization. That means we are funded by our membership fees to bring the whole knowledge community together to agree and adopt the global standard for measuring and reporting content usage through normalized metrics. We were founded in 2003 by a collaborative group of libraries, consortia, publishers, technology providers, aggregators, all parts of the knowledge community.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And since then, more than 280 platforms from dozens and dozens of publishers have adopted the COUNTER Code of Practice covering almost every form of digital content, whether that's the usual books and journals, if it's news, multimedia, interactive tools, and more. Now, clearly, since 2003, the environment that we operate in has changed significantly. And the code has had to change and evolve to meet the needs of librarians, consortia, publishers, and so on who rely on COUNTER metrics.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: One of the things that I get asked fairly frequently is how often does the COUNTER Code of Practice change? And on average, it's every five years. So there are some small clarifications that may be released in the interim, but significant changes to the Code of Practice only happen on average every five years. Each of those significant releases has been informed by feedback from the community, and Release 5.1, which is the latest iteration, is no exception to that rule.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We all know that measuring the impact of scholarship is essential for evaluating return on investments in research and publishing, in understanding the research landscape, and in making informed decisions about future purchases, funding, research, and editorial strategies. We see usage as forming a part of a suite of metrics, which can complement holistic research assessment. But citations are well-understood.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Altmetrics, maybe slightly less well understood but still fairly consistent. To get the best from usage as a measure of impact, we need to be sure that we are comparing like with like. Usage metrics have to be based on standardized criteria for tracking and reporting activity. And we believe that that should be driven by an open standard controlled by the community and subject to audit, rather than generated by opaque commercial tools.
Segment:2 Drivers and Development Approach.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In our increasingly open environment, that has become more important than ever. So as you can guess, Release 5.1 was developed in response to a number of factors with a particular focus on open content and bibliodiversity. To accommodate the needs of Open Access, the Code has had to adapt in several ways-- the granularity of reporting clearer definitions of pay-walled versus open and so on.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We will come to that momentarily. There's been a significant increase in the number and variety of digital resources offered by publishers, and that was a second major driver in the move to Release 5.1. We require publishers to classify content types using a restricted list of data types, which historically did not effectively cover newer resources, like interactive databases.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: While making the changes to address OA and bibliodiversity, our fantastic team of volunteers put a lot of effort into rationalizing and simplifying things that were causing confusion, and also the automated SUSHI Harvesting Protocol and the JSON schema associated with it. You'll see on the left of this slide a summary timeline of the work that happened to get Release 5.1 out of the door.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Changes to the Code create a lot of work for everybody. So we do, as I say, make a real effort to keep our releases as infrequent as possible. This particular Release, 5.1, we started working on it in September of 2021. Over the summer of 2022, we went out for an extensive community consultation, and we had a lot of feedback, which was fantastic. But that meant that we didn't publish Release 5.1 until May of 2023, so that's well over 18 months of development time from initiation to publication.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And it's then another more than 18 months before publishers are required to be compliant in January of 2025. There will probably be some-- well, in fact, they will definitely be a small fix release addressing some clarifications that have been requested by the community at some point before January of 2025, but nothing in there will be different from what is in the current Code of Practice.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: It really will just be fixing typographic errors, very tiny things like that. So on to the meat of our subject, key changes in Release 5.1. I've mentioned Open Access already, and it will come up again and again. It is one of the major objectives of Release 5.1 to drive more reporting of Open Access usage.
Segment:3 Item as Unit of Reporting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: That requires that we report at the level of the item rather than the title, by which I mean the chapter rather than the book or the article rather than the journal. Now, for the vast majority of content types, COUNTER only offers item-level metrics. So if you're looking at a title report for a journal, you are still seeing item-level metrics. You're seeing the usage of articles.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: However, books in COUNTER have historically been treated as a special case with special rules that meant we didn't track usage at the level of the item, the chapter. For Release 5.1, the item-level metrics for books have been brought in line with all other content types. And that's best illustrated with the scenario in the table on the right of your slide.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In this particular case, our scenario posits that a publisher platform allows books to be downloaded on a chapter by chapter basis, but the user has decided to download the whole 10-chapter book in one go. In Release 5, there was no mechanism for a publisher to report the usage of those 10 chapters independently. So libraries, users would only see one metric, one item investigation, one item request, one title investigation for all 10 chapters.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In Release 5.1, the publisher can now accurately report usage of chapters, while at the same time not inflating the book level title usage metrics. So you'll still see only one title request or investigation, but you will get a separate metric for each chapter. Two things that came in as questions about this particular piece of Release 5.1, the first of those is what about books that do not have chapters or other sub-units?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Where those books are only available as a single file, and the report provider has no mechanism to identify book segments, the book should be counted as a single item, just as it was in Release 5. So you can't guess at how many chapters are in a book. If you know there are 15, you can report 15. If you're not sure, you can only report one. The second thing that came up actually through our consultation and has subsequently come up as a question for this webinar is how this will impact on major reference works, such as encyclopedias, with hundreds or even thousands of book segments?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And we actually introduced a new data type called reference work so that it will be more straightforward to compare usage for those very large – well, reference works – rather than books in our terminology without skewing the metrics, which does rather take me on to my next slide, data types.
Segment:4 Data Types.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We had 14 data types in Release 5 of the Code of Practice. And those data types-- well, some of those data types were associated with something called a section type. Section types were only required because of the strange way that we counted books. So we don't need section types in Release 5.1. And in fact, many publishers never implemented section types because they didn't do item reporting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So section types are gone. And as part of that, we have expanded the list of data types from 14 to 28, so that's quite a large expanded list. So some of those data types are-- and previously were-- associated with something called a parent data type. So data type article is and was associated with parent data type journal.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: You can see those data types with parents at the far left of your screen. There are six data types explicitly associated with a parent data type. All of the rest of them are independent. So there are some multimedia-specific data types. That would be things like audiovisual or image. There are some database-specific data types. Again, multimedia would be one of those, or database full item.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: There's a whole collection of other data types that don't fit neatly into a specific classification. And we have some data types specifically for searches. Those are unchanged from Release 5. One final thing of note about data types for Release 5.1 is that they are now a mandatory part of the four COUNTER reports. That's the platform report, the database report, the title report, and the item report.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We're not changing the metrics in those four reports. We're not changing how those things are measured, but we are making sure that you can see the data types in those reports without having to make an explicit request for them. That should make it easier to report properly granular usage information and to compare that usage across publishers and over time.
Segment:5 Access Types and OA.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Another aspect of the Code that has been amended specifically to facilitate Open Access reporting are the COUNTER Access Types, which help to define whether usage was of Subscription, Open, or Free Content. Given that Delta Think recently reported that 50% of 2022 journal articles were published under an Open Access license, we believe this to be very timely.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I am going to start here by saying that there is no perfect solution to Open Access reporting. Our Access Type definitions were debated for months before Release 5. They were debated for months, again, before we went out for consultation for Release 5.1, and then, again, after the consultation for Release 5.1. We know they are not perfect, but these are the best principles and definitions that we have been able to achieve.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So the principles which lay out where COUNTER Access Types apply. First, the Access Type in a COUNTER report relates only to the platform producing the report. So if you are looking at a report from a database that is only available to subscribers, the usage will all be reported as controlled, even where that database includes content that was originally published under an open license.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The second principle is that an item must have only one Access Type. Using the simplest example, where journal articles have freely available metadata but they restrict the full text for subscribers, usage of the metadata must be reported as controlled the same way as the full text is. With those principles in place, the technical advisory group was able to rationalize and review the Release 5 list of Access Types.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Access Type Controlled was not changed. And that says that at the time of the request or investigation the content item was restricted to authorized users. For example, it was behind a paywall on this platform. And that includes free content that is only available to registered users. The really difficult one was what we used to call OA Gold under Release 5.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We revised that to reflect concerns about COUNTER using any description of Open Access that referenced a particular business model or a particular type of Open Access license, as we have no mechanism for auditing this information. Our definition for open is, therefore, at the time of the request or investigation the content item was available to all users on this platform regardless of authorization status under an Open Access model.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: This applies where the report provider asserts that the content item is open, irrespective of the license associated with it. Open items may be in a hybrid or fully Open Access publication and may have been open from the day of publication or after expiry of an embargo, but they will not return to controlled status. Now, very conveniently, while it did take us 18 months to reach that definition, it obviated the need for the old Access Type OA Delayed, which was created for Release 5 but never implemented.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And our third Access Type used to be known as Other Free to Read. And it was historically restricted for repositories. Many publishers had requested that this Access Type be made available to them so that they could report on usage of materials they had made freely available, for example, COVID collections during 2020. That was universally agreed to be a valuable amendment to the Code, so Free to Read means that at the time of usage the content item was available to everybody regardless of authorization status but was not open.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: It may have been controlled in the past. It may or may not return to controlled status in the future. Two key questions that came up ahead of this webinar were about the TR_B1 and TR_J1 standard views of the title report. These historically excluded only book or journal articles classified as OA Gold.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In release 5.1, they will exclude both Open and Free to Read book content and journal articles. At this point, I am going to give my standard plug for "please use the comprehensive and easily filtered title report instead of the standard views". You have so much more information at your disposal when you do so. The second question that came up relates to Bronze or Delayed Open Access.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So this is where publishers make content freely available after an embargo period. We cannot force all publishers to report this the same way because some of them make it freely available for a short period of time, in which case, it will be Free to Read for five years, 10 years, however long that might be. Others make that content openly available to everybody permanently. In which case, it will be reported as Open.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN:
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I think that answers the question that came through. It was a little vague. Moving on from Access Type definitions, we get into the more technical pieces. So Release 5.1 included several upgrades for the COUNTER API, the harvesting API, which is known as SUSHI.
Segment:6 JSON and Harvesting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: This series of updates was designed to increase the robustness and usefulness of the API. And that included overhauling the JSON schema – that is the structure of the reports that you can pull from SUSHI. So the biggest change there is that our JSON schema is now open API 3.1 compliant, which makes the report files easier to produce, to validate, and to use.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The JSON is also significantly simpler. We've removed a lot of the duplicated fields. So for example, we don't have duplicate item and parent metadata anymore. And we've also removed some of the fields-- or removed the fields from the JSON reports that only appeared in the JSON reports and did not show up in the tabular Excel or TSV files.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Moving back to SUSHI, more specifically, one issue that was raised regularly before we started our work on Release 5.1 was the fragility of IP-based authentication. Given current security moves by browsers to stop supporting IP-based authentication, we felt that this was a high priority. So IP authentication is no longer an option for SUSHI in Release 5.1. Now, please don't be afraid.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: This does not mean that publishers no longer support IP authentication of users for access to content. Though, that is a whole separate project that I suspect everybody should be looking at very closely. This change simply means that you will not be able to use IP as an authentication mechanism for collecting your JSON COUNTER reports through the SUSHI protocol.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I hope that's as clear as mud for everybody. It took me about 17 attempts to understand that the first time out. Those report providers who want to replace IP authentication may choose to implement API key as a more robust alternative. Some other things that we have done under release 5.1 are to do with the SUSHI endpoints. So the status endpoint must not require authentication.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: That is, it has to be public allowing everybody to quickly know whether a SUSHI service is live or not. A second endpoint change is to do with the reports endpoint, which has been expanded to show information about the first and last months for which usage data are available. And we've also introduced additional parameters to cover the common extensions to COUNTER reports.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: All of those changes together meant that we had to move the API documentation from our old service to one called Stoplight.io. As with all of the COUNTER materials, the SUSHI API details are completely freely available. They are linked from the COUNTER Code of Practice. And they're very easy to get hold of and read. So please do, if you're interested in those details, go and have a look at that.
Segment:7 Smaller changes.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: There are, of course, many, many smaller changes and clarifications in Release 5.1, including a complete copy edit. So starting with some smaller pieces, components, which were only required for item reports, are no longer mandatory.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The feedback from libraries was that only three were actually requesting components in their item reports, and all others just found the sheer volume of information that was provided in the item report when components were included overwhelming. From publishers, the requirement for components was making an item report a ridiculously heavy technical lift. So we're hoping that by making these optional, more people will be able to produce and use the item report.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We have made a small change to the header of the COUNTER reports. Historically, we've only required 12 pieces of information, and they were consistent across the JSON and the tabular reports. We've added a 13th piece of information to that report header, and that is a link to the platforms record on the COUNTER Registry of Compliant Content Providers.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We did this because we were-- I was-- frequently being asked to clarify whether a particular publisher was compliant or not. By clicking on the registry link you will be able, as a user, to very quickly check the compliance status of the report provider that you're looking at.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We introduced some changes to the report nomenclature. This was in response to some specific requests to stop using the terminology "master reports". So you will, from now on, hear me refer to the COUNTER reports as COUNTER reports. So that's the platform report, the title report, the database report, and the item report. And you will hear me refer to "the standard views of the COUNTER reports", specifically, to clarify that the standard views are not standalone things.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: They are snippets or summaries of the COUNTER reports themselves.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We clarified our versioning for the COUNTER Code of Practice as well. So we now have a four-part versioning system. So Release 5 is the actual release name. Release 5.1 indicates that this is a breaking release of the COUNTER Code of Practice. That is, it is not backwards compatible, but it is still very directly related to the original Release 5 and will be comparable.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Should we do a Release 5.1.1, that would indicate that we have added new features, which are backwards compatible with Release 5.1. They will probably be optional in order to make them backwards compatible. And then, let's see if I get this right, a release 5.1.0.1, so the fourth digit, would indicate a fix release. So that would be things like typographical errors or bug fixes would be covered in a fix release.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN:
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Two bigger but not terrifying changes that we have made are the introduction of global item reports and audit changes. As I've already said, Open Access has really centered the need to understand usage at granular item level rather than relying on title level information. That usage equally needs to be global, by which I mean it is inclusive of all user activity rather than being restricted to activity from a particular institution as in a traditional COUNTER-report.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In Release 5.1, we have, therefore, included a recommendation but not a requirement that all report providers, and in particular those offering any open content, should deliver what is known as the global item report. That means a standard COUNTER item report not broken down by institution, total global usage. The rationale for this push is the claim that Open Access drives increased usage.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Without using the same metrics measured in the same way, it is very difficult to validate that claim. So when publishers start offering the global item report, the community will finally have a like for like usage comparison of pay-walled versus open content.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And then, lastly, audit changes. Those of you who are publishers are already intimately familiar with the COUNTER audit process. Those of you who are librarians are aware that COUNTER has an audit process. For Release 5.1, we worked with our audit experts, so the auditors themselves, informed by the questions and requests that appear most frequently during audits to develop much more comprehensive documentation about the audit process and the timelines for audit.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And we also revised the audit scripts to test the COUNTER reports first rather than the standard views first and to be much more reflective of actual usage patterns.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So that's been quite a heavy lift to make those changes. I have already been in touch with the auditors about timelines for when they can start doing Release 5.1 audits and when they must stop doing Release 5 audits. And that information is going to be coming to each publisher as we go through the next year worth of audit cycles.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So every publisher will be reminded as they come into their next audit that they really need to be pushing towards Release 5.1 for January of 2025. And before any libraries panic, I have already been in touch with all of our report providers and reminded them of this earlier in this year. And they will be hearing from me frequently, but there will be custom information associated with each audit.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So preparing for Release 5.1. Just as a reminder before we get into this section, please do drop your questions into the chat box at any point. I can't see any in there at the moment, but I have baked in plenty of time for Q&A in this session. The basics.
Segment:8 Preparing for R5.1.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: As with any technical change or standards change, the recommendation that I have for you is please review the documentation before you do anything else.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: On the COUNTER Media Library, we have eight friendly guides about Release 5.1 of the Code of Practice, including a guide specifically about changes from Release 5 to Release 5.1. Each of those friendly guides is accompanied by a video and a one-page printable describing the content of that guide. Hands up, I am not a graphic designer. I did my best.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We are working with some incredible volunteers and some translators and some sponsors to get all of those guides translated into multiple languages. From memory, we have German and Japanese up at the moment. I'm not sure if the Chinese guides are up yet, but I have sent them to the media library provider. We've got Spanish and French on the way. And if anybody would like to sponsor other translations, please do let me know.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I would love to get these into Portuguese at least. As well as the guides, you know what I'm going to say, please do go and read the Code of Practice itself. It is very comprehensive. It is very detailed. There is lots and lots of information in there. Once you have done that review, please go and have a look at your current inside systems, so the things that you are using either to generate COUNTER reports or to ingest and work with COUNTER reports.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And work out where those systems match or deviate from Release 5.1. Once you have identified those gaps or those changes, you can do the development work and check to see whether that will actually allow you to do all of the things that are associated with 5.1. Unfortunately, I cannot be more precise than that because I do not know the inside workings of every single group's systems.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I am very, very happy, if you want some assistance, to jump on a call with you at any point over the coming year. Oh, good, I can see some questions coming in, and I will come back to those momentarily. Though actually, Aaron, I think yours is very relevant now. Aaron's question is whether we expect publishers to start providing Release 5.1 from January of 2024. And no, we don't.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The compliance date for Release 5.1 is January of 2025. However, I know that there are many publishers working towards delivering those reports much earlier than January of 2025. I am aware of at least half a dozen publishers intending to be live with Release 5.1 in the middle of next year. So they will still be providing Release 5 reports until March of 2025 as they are required to do, but I would expect to start seeing Release 5.1 from mid-2024, certainly not January.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: If anyone can do January, awesome. I just don't expect it. Moving back to preparation. Having gone very granular-- sorry, having gone very general, I can go a little bit beyond the basics. Report consumers, I have mentioned harvesting and ingestion.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The SUSHI services are changing, so please do take a look at your SUSHI setup and your ingestion protocols and take a look at whether you will still be able to pull in your COUNTER reports from all of your publishers as you do at the moment. The other thing that I would very much recommend that report consumers do-- and by the way, report consumers means libraries and consortia-- evaluate the metrics that you are using to assess return on investment.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I know that historically, for example, we have said that for books, you should always use the unique title metrics to look at return on investment. In Release 5.1, we recommend that you should use the unique item metrics for books just as you do for all the other different content types. If that doesn't work for you, totally fine to carry on using unique title, but we have made some changes to the recommendations.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So please take a look at those metrics to evaluate what you should be using or what you would like to start using. For report providers, publishers, tech bodies, aggregators, I've mentioned audit. It is important we do want to continue to validate that you are compliant with the COUNTER Code of Practice. There will be changes to your audit.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: It is potentially going to be challenging on the basis of previous history. The first audit on a new Code of Practice is always challenging. Please plan for that. And please, please make use of the validation tool for Release 5.1 when it is updated before you launch into an audit. The second piece that I would strongly suggest for all report providers is considering your communication with your customers about your launch process for Release 5.1 reports, and how you will be managing the period of overlap when you are required to provide both 5 and 5.1 reports.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So I am on time. We're 40 minutes in, and I'm at the point where I can say, if in doubt, please contact me. My email is tasha.mellins-cohen@counterusage.org. I may not get to everything the day it arrives, but I really do try to clear all of my question emails at least once a week. And I'm always happy to jump on a call or to answer a question.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Please do ask me and don't suffer in silence.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So on to the Q&A bit. And I'm going to start with those that have already landed in the chat. So there's one here about re-clarifying the definition of Free to Read.
Segment:9 Q&A.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So on the slide-- yes, on the slide, I mentioned that Free to Read requires an end date. The definition of Free to Read does not require a specific end date, just the intention that the content will return behind a paywall at some point.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So for example, in my previous life, I worked for the Microbiology Society, and we made all of our COVID content back to the very first coronavirus paper in the 1960s freely available from January of 2020. We didn't have a specific end date at which the COVID content would be closed again, but we didn't have a commitment that it would stay open. That would have clarified itself.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Excuse me. That would have been classified as Free to Read rather than Open. I hope that answers the question.
SPEAKER 1: If I may jump in right here because I asked the question. It's Erika from DeGruyte I understand your example. We have, for example, like forwards, table of contents in books, which are free to read, and there's no intention to put that back into-- --anytime with an end date.
SPEAKER 1: So would that classify then as Open?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Those would be Open. If you do not intend for them to become controlled at any point in the future, those would be Open.
SPEAKER 1: OK. Great. Thank you.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: You're welcome. Next question in the chat box is should global reports include individual and anonymous usage or just a roll up of all of the institutional usage for the publisher? Global reports should include everything, whether that can be attributed to an institution, or it is individual usage or anonymous usage. It is everything. There is a friendly guide to COUNTER for Open Access in the Media Library.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And that has a nice picture about how to put everything into a global report, which I could probably find if everybody wanted to see it but might take me a while.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Next question. When will the validation tool be available for Release 5.1? So the validation tool is built and maintained by one of our absolutely wonderful volunteers. I know that they are working on the updates, but it is not this individual's sole job, so I cannot give you a committed date beyond we are working on it. I will absolutely be sending out messages to everybody when it becomes available.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Next question. Can book segments within a single book have different access types? Yes, absolutely. It is very possible for one book segment to be open and a second book segment to be controlled within a single book. And this is why or one of the reasons why we felt it was so important to start measuring books at the level of the item.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN:
SPEAKER 1: What I'm-- sorry, me, again, Erika. May I directly ask a question here? For us, it's very difficult to then provide the metrics for a full book download in the correct way because we would basically have to say at the time of the download how many segments in that book are Free to Read or Open in that case, and how many may be restricted?
SPEAKER 1: Because that's the information that would be needed at that point, right?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: Oui. That's gonna be tricky.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Yes. If this is something that you would like to discuss in more detail--
SPEAKER 1: I think we should.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: --I would very much like to have that conversation. We absolutely need to do that.
SPEAKER 1: OK. Great. Thank you.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Sure.
SPEAKER 2: Along the same lines with that question-- this is Kirsten from Silverchair-- so how do we report at the book level then the Access Type? So on the TR report, if all of the chapters under that book have different Access Types, what would we report for the whole book?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Just as you do with a journal, where you have the journal in the title report with Access Type Controlled and Access Type Open, you would have two lines for the book-- one for the Access Type Controlled and one for the Access Type Open.
SPEAKER 2: OK. Thank you.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Again, Kristen, if you want to have a more detailed conversation, totally happy to do that at any point. I will take a note that this needs to be addressed in the FAQ that I am building for Release 5.1.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Next question. How is multimedia usage affected? Is there a difference between unique and total multimedia requests? Multimedia is treated in the same way as any other content types. So if a user lands on a video and sees a video thumbnail, that would be an investigation. If they then clicked Play, that would be a request.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: But it's still one unique investigation. I'm not quite sure what the question goes into. So if you would like to clarify in the chat, that would be great. If you would like to just say it, that would also be fantastic. Right.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Next question while we're waiting for clarification on multimedia. Can I clarify when Access Type is reported from? For example, if an item has usage in the date period where the item was Free to Read but it's now reverted to Controlled, and there's also usage from the Controlled Access Type, how is that going to be reported out? Will the item appear twice on the report? Yes. So the way that reporting works is you will see reports month by month.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: You can just have the reporting period total, which is a very good way of making your reports smaller. But if the item was classed as Free to Read and is now classed as Controlled, you should see repeat information-- well, a repeated line. So you will see the item twice-- once under Free to Read and once under Controlled-- with the relevant metrics reported for that time period.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Cool. I think I'm up to date on all of the questions in the chat. I can-- I'm going to skip on to my next slide and go through the pre-submitted questions that I haven't already replied to in the content.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: But I can go back to more questions in the chat if everybody would like. So the previously submitted questions. The first of these was how should we measure database usage? There are A&I databases and full text databases and different metrics are meaningful in different places. For example, downloading items and creating an item request is a more meaningful piece of usage in a full text database.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Do we have to separate different types of databases to determine which metric to use? OK. My recommendation when it comes to databases is always to look at your search metrics first. These provide an indication of interest in the database as a whole. From there, you can differentiate by database type. Aggregated full content databases are those which contain lots of content items that roll up into a journal, so a whole journal or content items that roll up into a book.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: For aggregated full content, you can use the title report and see the request metrics for each journal or each book.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Sorry. Bear with me just a second. Excuse me. Sorry.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Aggregated full content databases will, therefore, appear both in the database report and the title report. In the title report, the requests are shown at the level of the journal or the book, whereas in the database report, the requests are aggregated at the level of the database. You should use one or the other. If you sum up the requests from the title report and the database report, then you're double counting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So use one or the other for aggregated full content databases. Abstracting and indexing databases. I would recommend using search and then investigations. There is no full content, so there should not be requests. An investigation will show you that a user is interested in specific pieces of content within the A&I database.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And then the third type of database is the full content database, which has materials like data sets or software, or any repository is going to be a full content database. Again, you can use requests for measuring real interest in the repository content, but you can only do that through the database report. There won't be a title report for a full content database. I hope I have replied to the quite complicated, which metrics should we use for databases question.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The second question that I haven't addressed yet relates back to COUNTER 4. So I'm just going to say right now Release 4 of the Code of Practice stopped being supported at the end of 2018 when Release 5 became the default in January of 2019. So if you are still using Release 4 reports, I know that there are some publishers who are still offering Release 4.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We have not had a mechanism to audit and validate those reports since the end of 2018. Use that information at your own discretion.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So this question was actually, rather than Release 4 specific, was about working with Excel and when one downloads a TSV file, a tabular COUNTER-report or indeed an Excel file, the information opens in your spreadsheet as UTF-8 encoding, which means all of the fields are plain text.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And you cannot run calculations on plain text fields. You have to convert the data in the reporting period total column or any of the columns that you want to do calculations on from text to number. The question that this particular individual had is, is there a way to not do this extra work? And unfortunately, the answer is no because if we were to start requiring that things are delivered formatted as numbers, they would likely break in any software that wasn't Excel.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So this is deliberately designed to make it possible for you, as consumers, to work with COUNTER reports in any spreadsheet software. I would suggest, however, you could try and make your lives a little bit easier by not using formulas, like subtotals, but instead using pivot tables for data manipulation. You will be able to get a lot more information from that than you would with simple subtotals.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: If you really want just very high-level information, and for example, the total count of unique title requests for a whole platform, using the Release 5 or Release 5.1 platform report will give you that information by data type, so you will be able to see all of the unique title requests for books on any of the Silverchair platforms, for example. OK.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I think there are three more. So you still have time to get some more questions into the chat. The third question on here is about report queuing. So I know that there is a note on the JSTOR and ARTSTOR records in the COUNTER registry about having implemented queuing for reports so that you need to re-request the report to return data.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So my understanding from Ithaka, who support JSTOR and ARTSTOR, is that this is specifically where a user, a report consumer has asked for a report that is too big. So for example, we require that two years of data be made available. But if you ask for older information, you might need to make a second request. I have asked for clarification on that.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: But that is my understanding of these report constraints. We do have quite a lot of rules about report delivery via SUSHI in particular in Section 8 of the COUNTER Code of Practice. So if you want to see the rules that will allow vendors or report providers to stop you from requesting something, Section 8 of the Code of Practice is where you will find all of those rules.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Moving on. Mapping between releases. We actually have a graphic in the old friendly guides for Release 5 that show how to map from Release 4 to Release 5. I haven't produced anything similar for Release 5 to Release 5.1 because the metrics and the reports haven't changed.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: However, I have got this on my list as something that I would like to address as a topic during 2024. And if anybody would like to work with me to create materials to help libraries understand the mapping or publishers understand the mapping from older releases of COUNTER to Release 5.1, I would love to hear from you.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And then the last question that came to me was addressed very politely, and I shall read it precisely. To bring up that old chestnut once more, are there any plans to reintroduce consortia reporting? So we have three flavors of consortia reporting in Release 5 and Release 5.1. Two of them are required. That's the summary reports, which aggregate all usage into a single report with no breakdown by institution, and then the institutional reports, which are the standard institutional COUNTER reports separate for each institution and available to consortia managers through COUNTER harvesting tools.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: What I suspect this individual is asking about are the detailed reports, which are optional in Release 5 and Release 5.1. The detailed reports are very large. They break down consortia usage by institution in a single report. So they're kind of the institutional reports gathered up into one place.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The requirements for consortia reporting, and for detailed reporting in particular, were a very high barrier to compliance for a lot of smaller publishers in particular. And by making the summary reports required and making it much easier for consortia managers to pick up their institutional reports through harvesting tools, we believe we have found the best compromise on consortia reporting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And I would, at this point, say my favorite definition of compromise is that everybody is equally unhappy with the solution. The best we can do, I'm afraid. There is, of course, a friendly guide, a video, and a one-pager about COUNTER for Consortia on the Media Library. So please do go and take a look at that if you have further questions on it.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And at that, I believe I am at the end of my pre-canned questions. Everything is available from projectcounter.org. That's the code itself, the media library, the registry. And of course, please do contact me with any questions you might have. In the meantime, are there any other questions in the chat? I can't see any.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I will leave it open for another moment, otherwise, I'm going to say to everybody thank you very much for attending and for listening to me witter on about Release 5.1 of the Code of Practice for a full hour. You're very patient. And I will speak to all of you again soon.
Segment:1 Introduction.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Welcome, everybody to this webinar on COUNTER Release 5.1. As you probably have noticed, this is being recorded. We will be making a copy of this video available on the COUNTER Media Library probably next week. Please do drop questions into the chat box at any point. If I don't spot them immediately, I will be picking up all of the questions at the end of the presentation.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We do have quite a few people registered today, so I hope we will have time for all of the questions, but if I don't get to yours, please do send me an email after the meeting, and I will get back to you at that point. So today, we are going to cover what has changed from Release 5 to Release 5.1 of the COUNTER Code of Practice and why that change was made.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We will go into a little bit of the detail of what report providers and report consumers will need to do to work with Release 5.1 of the Code of Practice. And as we go through this, you will see how Release 5.1 is optimized for Open Access and our diverse publishing environment. There are lots of questions that came through in the document ahead of time.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I have tried to address them in the flow of the presentation, but there are some that I have popped at the end because they don't fit precisely anywhere else. As I said, please do stick your questions in the chat at any point. Oh, and I should introduce myself. Hi, I am Tasha Mellins-Cohen. I am COUNTER's project director. So any questions, send them to me.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Let's move on. As I hope you are all aware, COUNTER is a not-for-profit membership organization. That means we are funded by our membership fees to bring the whole knowledge community together to agree and adopt the global standard for measuring and reporting content usage through normalized metrics. We were founded in 2003 by a collaborative group of libraries, consortia, publishers, technology providers, aggregators, all parts of the knowledge community.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And since then, more than 280 platforms from dozens and dozens of publishers have adopted the COUNTER Code of Practice covering almost every form of digital content, whether that's the usual books and journals, if it's news, multimedia, interactive tools, and more. Now, clearly, since 2003, the environment that we operate in has changed significantly. And the code has had to change and evolve to meet the needs of librarians, consortia, publishers, and so on who rely on COUNTER metrics.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: One of the things that I get asked fairly frequently is how often does the COUNTER Code of Practice change? And on average, it's every five years. So there are some small clarifications that may be released in the interim, but significant changes to the Code of Practice only happen on average every five years. Each of those significant releases has been informed by feedback from the community, and Release 5.1, which is the latest iteration, is no exception to that rule.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We all know that measuring the impact of scholarship is essential for evaluating return on investments in research and publishing, in understanding the research landscape, and in making informed decisions about future purchases, funding, research, and editorial strategies. We see usage as forming a part of a suite of metrics, which can complement holistic research assessment. But citations are well-understood.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Altmetrics, maybe slightly less well understood but still fairly consistent. To get the best from usage as a measure of impact, we need to be sure that we are comparing like with like. Usage metrics have to be based on standardized criteria for tracking and reporting activity. And we believe that that should be driven by an open standard controlled by the community and subject to audit, rather than generated by opaque commercial tools.
Segment:2 Drivers and Development Approach.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In our increasingly open environment, that has become more important than ever. So as you can guess, Release 5.1 was developed in response to a number of factors with a particular focus on open content and bibliodiversity. To accommodate the needs of Open Access, the Code has had to adapt in several ways-- the granularity of reporting clearer definitions of pay-walled versus open and so on.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We will come to that momentarily. There's been a significant increase in the number and variety of digital resources offered by publishers, and that was a second major driver in the move to Release 5.1. We require publishers to classify content types using a restricted list of data types, which historically did not effectively cover newer resources, like interactive databases.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: While making the changes to address OA and bibliodiversity, our fantastic team of volunteers put a lot of effort into rationalizing and simplifying things that were causing confusion, and also the automated SUSHI Harvesting Protocol and the JSON schema associated with it. You'll see on the left of this slide a summary timeline of the work that happened to get Release 5.1 out of the door.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Changes to the Code create a lot of work for everybody. So we do, as I say, make a real effort to keep our releases as infrequent as possible. This particular Release, 5.1, we started working on it in September of 2021. Over the summer of 2022, we went out for an extensive community consultation, and we had a lot of feedback, which was fantastic. But that meant that we didn't publish Release 5.1 until May of 2023, so that's well over 18 months of development time from initiation to publication.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And it's then another more than 18 months before publishers are required to be compliant in January of 2025. There will probably be some-- well, in fact, they will definitely be a small fix release addressing some clarifications that have been requested by the community at some point before January of 2025, but nothing in there will be different from what is in the current Code of Practice.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: It really will just be fixing typographic errors, very tiny things like that. So on to the meat of our subject, key changes in Release 5.1. I've mentioned Open Access already, and it will come up again and again. It is one of the major objectives of Release 5.1 to drive more reporting of Open Access usage.
Segment:3 Item as Unit of Reporting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: That requires that we report at the level of the item rather than the title, by which I mean the chapter rather than the book or the article rather than the journal. Now, for the vast majority of content types, COUNTER only offers item-level metrics. So if you're looking at a title report for a journal, you are still seeing item-level metrics. You're seeing the usage of articles.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: However, books in COUNTER have historically been treated as a special case with special rules that meant we didn't track usage at the level of the item, the chapter. For Release 5.1, the item-level metrics for books have been brought in line with all other content types. And that's best illustrated with the scenario in the table on the right of your slide.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In this particular case, our scenario posits that a publisher platform allows books to be downloaded on a chapter by chapter basis, but the user has decided to download the whole 10-chapter book in one go. In Release 5, there was no mechanism for a publisher to report the usage of those 10 chapters independently. So libraries, users would only see one metric, one item investigation, one item request, one title investigation for all 10 chapters.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In Release 5.1, the publisher can now accurately report usage of chapters, while at the same time not inflating the book level title usage metrics. So you'll still see only one title request or investigation, but you will get a separate metric for each chapter. Two things that came in as questions about this particular piece of Release 5.1, the first of those is what about books that do not have chapters or other sub-units?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Where those books are only available as a single file, and the report provider has no mechanism to identify book segments, the book should be counted as a single item, just as it was in Release 5. So you can't guess at how many chapters are in a book. If you know there are 15, you can report 15. If you're not sure, you can only report one. The second thing that came up actually through our consultation and has subsequently come up as a question for this webinar is how this will impact on major reference works, such as encyclopedias, with hundreds or even thousands of book segments?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And we actually introduced a new data type called reference work so that it will be more straightforward to compare usage for those very large – well, reference works – rather than books in our terminology without skewing the metrics, which does rather take me on to my next slide, data types.
Segment:4 Data Types.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We had 14 data types in Release 5 of the Code of Practice. And those data types-- well, some of those data types were associated with something called a section type. Section types were only required because of the strange way that we counted books. So we don't need section types in Release 5.1. And in fact, many publishers never implemented section types because they didn't do item reporting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So section types are gone. And as part of that, we have expanded the list of data types from 14 to 28, so that's quite a large expanded list. So some of those data types are-- and previously were-- associated with something called a parent data type. So data type article is and was associated with parent data type journal.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: You can see those data types with parents at the far left of your screen. There are six data types explicitly associated with a parent data type. All of the rest of them are independent. So there are some multimedia-specific data types. That would be things like audiovisual or image. There are some database-specific data types. Again, multimedia would be one of those, or database full item.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: There's a whole collection of other data types that don't fit neatly into a specific classification. And we have some data types specifically for searches. Those are unchanged from Release 5. One final thing of note about data types for Release 5.1 is that they are now a mandatory part of the four COUNTER reports. That's the platform report, the database report, the title report, and the item report.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We're not changing the metrics in those four reports. We're not changing how those things are measured, but we are making sure that you can see the data types in those reports without having to make an explicit request for them. That should make it easier to report properly granular usage information and to compare that usage across publishers and over time.
Segment:5 Access Types and OA.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Another aspect of the Code that has been amended specifically to facilitate Open Access reporting are the COUNTER Access Types, which help to define whether usage was of Subscription, Open, or Free Content. Given that Delta Think recently reported that 50% of 2022 journal articles were published under an Open Access license, we believe this to be very timely.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I am going to start here by saying that there is no perfect solution to Open Access reporting. Our Access Type definitions were debated for months before Release 5. They were debated for months, again, before we went out for consultation for Release 5.1, and then, again, after the consultation for Release 5.1. We know they are not perfect, but these are the best principles and definitions that we have been able to achieve.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So the principles which lay out where COUNTER Access Types apply. First, the Access Type in a COUNTER report relates only to the platform producing the report. So if you are looking at a report from a database that is only available to subscribers, the usage will all be reported as controlled, even where that database includes content that was originally published under an open license.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The second principle is that an item must have only one Access Type. Using the simplest example, where journal articles have freely available metadata but they restrict the full text for subscribers, usage of the metadata must be reported as controlled the same way as the full text is. With those principles in place, the technical advisory group was able to rationalize and review the Release 5 list of Access Types.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Access Type Controlled was not changed. And that says that at the time of the request or investigation the content item was restricted to authorized users. For example, it was behind a paywall on this platform. And that includes free content that is only available to registered users. The really difficult one was what we used to call OA Gold under Release 5.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We revised that to reflect concerns about COUNTER using any description of Open Access that referenced a particular business model or a particular type of Open Access license, as we have no mechanism for auditing this information. Our definition for open is, therefore, at the time of the request or investigation the content item was available to all users on this platform regardless of authorization status under an Open Access model.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: This applies where the report provider asserts that the content item is open, irrespective of the license associated with it. Open items may be in a hybrid or fully Open Access publication and may have been open from the day of publication or after expiry of an embargo, but they will not return to controlled status. Now, very conveniently, while it did take us 18 months to reach that definition, it obviated the need for the old Access Type OA Delayed, which was created for Release 5 but never implemented.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And our third Access Type used to be known as Other Free to Read. And it was historically restricted for repositories. Many publishers had requested that this Access Type be made available to them so that they could report on usage of materials they had made freely available, for example, COVID collections during 2020. That was universally agreed to be a valuable amendment to the Code, so Free to Read means that at the time of usage the content item was available to everybody regardless of authorization status but was not open.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: It may have been controlled in the past. It may or may not return to controlled status in the future. Two key questions that came up ahead of this webinar were about the TR_B1 and TR_J1 standard views of the title report. These historically excluded only book or journal articles classified as OA Gold.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In release 5.1, they will exclude both Open and Free to Read book content and journal articles. At this point, I am going to give my standard plug for "please use the comprehensive and easily filtered title report instead of the standard views". You have so much more information at your disposal when you do so. The second question that came up relates to Bronze or Delayed Open Access.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So this is where publishers make content freely available after an embargo period. We cannot force all publishers to report this the same way because some of them make it freely available for a short period of time, in which case, it will be Free to Read for five years, 10 years, however long that might be. Others make that content openly available to everybody permanently. In which case, it will be reported as Open.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN:
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I think that answers the question that came through. It was a little vague. Moving on from Access Type definitions, we get into the more technical pieces. So Release 5.1 included several upgrades for the COUNTER API, the harvesting API, which is known as SUSHI.
Segment:6 JSON and Harvesting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: This series of updates was designed to increase the robustness and usefulness of the API. And that included overhauling the JSON schema – that is the structure of the reports that you can pull from SUSHI. So the biggest change there is that our JSON schema is now open API 3.1 compliant, which makes the report files easier to produce, to validate, and to use.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The JSON is also significantly simpler. We've removed a lot of the duplicated fields. So for example, we don't have duplicate item and parent metadata anymore. And we've also removed some of the fields-- or removed the fields from the JSON reports that only appeared in the JSON reports and did not show up in the tabular Excel or TSV files.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Moving back to SUSHI, more specifically, one issue that was raised regularly before we started our work on Release 5.1 was the fragility of IP-based authentication. Given current security moves by browsers to stop supporting IP-based authentication, we felt that this was a high priority. So IP authentication is no longer an option for SUSHI in Release 5.1. Now, please don't be afraid.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: This does not mean that publishers no longer support IP authentication of users for access to content. Though, that is a whole separate project that I suspect everybody should be looking at very closely. This change simply means that you will not be able to use IP as an authentication mechanism for collecting your JSON COUNTER reports through the SUSHI protocol.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I hope that's as clear as mud for everybody. It took me about 17 attempts to understand that the first time out. Those report providers who want to replace IP authentication may choose to implement API key as a more robust alternative. Some other things that we have done under release 5.1 are to do with the SUSHI endpoints. So the status endpoint must not require authentication.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: That is, it has to be public allowing everybody to quickly know whether a SUSHI service is live or not. A second endpoint change is to do with the reports endpoint, which has been expanded to show information about the first and last months for which usage data are available. And we've also introduced additional parameters to cover the common extensions to COUNTER reports.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: All of those changes together meant that we had to move the API documentation from our old service to one called Stoplight.io. As with all of the COUNTER materials, the SUSHI API details are completely freely available. They are linked from the COUNTER Code of Practice. And they're very easy to get hold of and read. So please do, if you're interested in those details, go and have a look at that.
Segment:7 Smaller changes.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: There are, of course, many, many smaller changes and clarifications in Release 5.1, including a complete copy edit. So starting with some smaller pieces, components, which were only required for item reports, are no longer mandatory.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The feedback from libraries was that only three were actually requesting components in their item reports, and all others just found the sheer volume of information that was provided in the item report when components were included overwhelming. From publishers, the requirement for components was making an item report a ridiculously heavy technical lift. So we're hoping that by making these optional, more people will be able to produce and use the item report.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We have made a small change to the header of the COUNTER reports. Historically, we've only required 12 pieces of information, and they were consistent across the JSON and the tabular reports. We've added a 13th piece of information to that report header, and that is a link to the platforms record on the COUNTER Registry of Compliant Content Providers.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We did this because we were-- I was-- frequently being asked to clarify whether a particular publisher was compliant or not. By clicking on the registry link you will be able, as a user, to very quickly check the compliance status of the report provider that you're looking at.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We introduced some changes to the report nomenclature. This was in response to some specific requests to stop using the terminology "master reports". So you will, from now on, hear me refer to the COUNTER reports as COUNTER reports. So that's the platform report, the title report, the database report, and the item report. And you will hear me refer to "the standard views of the COUNTER reports", specifically, to clarify that the standard views are not standalone things.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: They are snippets or summaries of the COUNTER reports themselves.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We clarified our versioning for the COUNTER Code of Practice as well. So we now have a four-part versioning system. So Release 5 is the actual release name. Release 5.1 indicates that this is a breaking release of the COUNTER Code of Practice. That is, it is not backwards compatible, but it is still very directly related to the original Release 5 and will be comparable.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Should we do a Release 5.1.1, that would indicate that we have added new features, which are backwards compatible with Release 5.1. They will probably be optional in order to make them backwards compatible. And then, let's see if I get this right, a release 5.1.0.1, so the fourth digit, would indicate a fix release. So that would be things like typographical errors or bug fixes would be covered in a fix release.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN:
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Two bigger but not terrifying changes that we have made are the introduction of global item reports and audit changes. As I've already said, Open Access has really centered the need to understand usage at granular item level rather than relying on title level information. That usage equally needs to be global, by which I mean it is inclusive of all user activity rather than being restricted to activity from a particular institution as in a traditional COUNTER-report.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: In Release 5.1, we have, therefore, included a recommendation but not a requirement that all report providers, and in particular those offering any open content, should deliver what is known as the global item report. That means a standard COUNTER item report not broken down by institution, total global usage. The rationale for this push is the claim that Open Access drives increased usage.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Without using the same metrics measured in the same way, it is very difficult to validate that claim. So when publishers start offering the global item report, the community will finally have a like for like usage comparison of pay-walled versus open content.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And then, lastly, audit changes. Those of you who are publishers are already intimately familiar with the COUNTER audit process. Those of you who are librarians are aware that COUNTER has an audit process. For Release 5.1, we worked with our audit experts, so the auditors themselves, informed by the questions and requests that appear most frequently during audits to develop much more comprehensive documentation about the audit process and the timelines for audit.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And we also revised the audit scripts to test the COUNTER reports first rather than the standard views first and to be much more reflective of actual usage patterns.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So that's been quite a heavy lift to make those changes. I have already been in touch with the auditors about timelines for when they can start doing Release 5.1 audits and when they must stop doing Release 5 audits. And that information is going to be coming to each publisher as we go through the next year worth of audit cycles.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So every publisher will be reminded as they come into their next audit that they really need to be pushing towards Release 5.1 for January of 2025. And before any libraries panic, I have already been in touch with all of our report providers and reminded them of this earlier in this year. And they will be hearing from me frequently, but there will be custom information associated with each audit.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So preparing for Release 5.1. Just as a reminder before we get into this section, please do drop your questions into the chat box at any point. I can't see any in there at the moment, but I have baked in plenty of time for Q&A in this session. The basics.
Segment:8 Preparing for R5.1.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: As with any technical change or standards change, the recommendation that I have for you is please review the documentation before you do anything else.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: On the COUNTER Media Library, we have eight friendly guides about Release 5.1 of the Code of Practice, including a guide specifically about changes from Release 5 to Release 5.1. Each of those friendly guides is accompanied by a video and a one-page printable describing the content of that guide. Hands up, I am not a graphic designer. I did my best.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We are working with some incredible volunteers and some translators and some sponsors to get all of those guides translated into multiple languages. From memory, we have German and Japanese up at the moment. I'm not sure if the Chinese guides are up yet, but I have sent them to the media library provider. We've got Spanish and French on the way. And if anybody would like to sponsor other translations, please do let me know.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I would love to get these into Portuguese at least. As well as the guides, you know what I'm going to say, please do go and read the Code of Practice itself. It is very comprehensive. It is very detailed. There is lots and lots of information in there. Once you have done that review, please go and have a look at your current inside systems, so the things that you are using either to generate COUNTER reports or to ingest and work with COUNTER reports.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And work out where those systems match or deviate from Release 5.1. Once you have identified those gaps or those changes, you can do the development work and check to see whether that will actually allow you to do all of the things that are associated with 5.1. Unfortunately, I cannot be more precise than that because I do not know the inside workings of every single group's systems.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I am very, very happy, if you want some assistance, to jump on a call with you at any point over the coming year. Oh, good, I can see some questions coming in, and I will come back to those momentarily. Though actually, Aaron, I think yours is very relevant now. Aaron's question is whether we expect publishers to start providing Release 5.1 from January of 2024. And no, we don't.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The compliance date for Release 5.1 is January of 2025. However, I know that there are many publishers working towards delivering those reports much earlier than January of 2025. I am aware of at least half a dozen publishers intending to be live with Release 5.1 in the middle of next year. So they will still be providing Release 5 reports until March of 2025 as they are required to do, but I would expect to start seeing Release 5.1 from mid-2024, certainly not January.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: If anyone can do January, awesome. I just don't expect it. Moving back to preparation. Having gone very granular-- sorry, having gone very general, I can go a little bit beyond the basics. Report consumers, I have mentioned harvesting and ingestion.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The SUSHI services are changing, so please do take a look at your SUSHI setup and your ingestion protocols and take a look at whether you will still be able to pull in your COUNTER reports from all of your publishers as you do at the moment. The other thing that I would very much recommend that report consumers do-- and by the way, report consumers means libraries and consortia-- evaluate the metrics that you are using to assess return on investment.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I know that historically, for example, we have said that for books, you should always use the unique title metrics to look at return on investment. In Release 5.1, we recommend that you should use the unique item metrics for books just as you do for all the other different content types. If that doesn't work for you, totally fine to carry on using unique title, but we have made some changes to the recommendations.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So please take a look at those metrics to evaluate what you should be using or what you would like to start using. For report providers, publishers, tech bodies, aggregators, I've mentioned audit. It is important we do want to continue to validate that you are compliant with the COUNTER Code of Practice. There will be changes to your audit.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: It is potentially going to be challenging on the basis of previous history. The first audit on a new Code of Practice is always challenging. Please plan for that. And please, please make use of the validation tool for Release 5.1 when it is updated before you launch into an audit. The second piece that I would strongly suggest for all report providers is considering your communication with your customers about your launch process for Release 5.1 reports, and how you will be managing the period of overlap when you are required to provide both 5 and 5.1 reports.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So I am on time. We're 40 minutes in, and I'm at the point where I can say, if in doubt, please contact me. My email is tasha.mellins-cohen@counterusage.org. I may not get to everything the day it arrives, but I really do try to clear all of my question emails at least once a week. And I'm always happy to jump on a call or to answer a question.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Please do ask me and don't suffer in silence.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So on to the Q&A bit. And I'm going to start with those that have already landed in the chat. So there's one here about re-clarifying the definition of Free to Read.
Segment:9 Q&A.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So on the slide-- yes, on the slide, I mentioned that Free to Read requires an end date. The definition of Free to Read does not require a specific end date, just the intention that the content will return behind a paywall at some point.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So for example, in my previous life, I worked for the Microbiology Society, and we made all of our COVID content back to the very first coronavirus paper in the 1960s freely available from January of 2020. We didn't have a specific end date at which the COVID content would be closed again, but we didn't have a commitment that it would stay open. That would have clarified itself.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Excuse me. That would have been classified as Free to Read rather than Open. I hope that answers the question.
SPEAKER 1: If I may jump in right here because I asked the question. It's Erika from DeGruyte I understand your example. We have, for example, like forwards, table of contents in books, which are free to read, and there's no intention to put that back into-- --anytime with an end date.
SPEAKER 1: So would that classify then as Open?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Those would be Open. If you do not intend for them to become controlled at any point in the future, those would be Open.
SPEAKER 1: OK. Great. Thank you.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: You're welcome. Next question in the chat box is should global reports include individual and anonymous usage or just a roll up of all of the institutional usage for the publisher? Global reports should include everything, whether that can be attributed to an institution, or it is individual usage or anonymous usage. It is everything. There is a friendly guide to COUNTER for Open Access in the Media Library.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And that has a nice picture about how to put everything into a global report, which I could probably find if everybody wanted to see it but might take me a while.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Next question. When will the validation tool be available for Release 5.1? So the validation tool is built and maintained by one of our absolutely wonderful volunteers. I know that they are working on the updates, but it is not this individual's sole job, so I cannot give you a committed date beyond we are working on it. I will absolutely be sending out messages to everybody when it becomes available.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Next question. Can book segments within a single book have different access types? Yes, absolutely. It is very possible for one book segment to be open and a second book segment to be controlled within a single book. And this is why or one of the reasons why we felt it was so important to start measuring books at the level of the item.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN:
SPEAKER 1: What I'm-- sorry, me, again, Erika. May I directly ask a question here? For us, it's very difficult to then provide the metrics for a full book download in the correct way because we would basically have to say at the time of the download how many segments in that book are Free to Read or Open in that case, and how many may be restricted?
SPEAKER 1: Because that's the information that would be needed at that point, right?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Yes.
SPEAKER 1: Oui. That's gonna be tricky.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Yes. If this is something that you would like to discuss in more detail--
SPEAKER 1: I think we should.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: --I would very much like to have that conversation. We absolutely need to do that.
SPEAKER 1: OK. Great. Thank you.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Sure.
SPEAKER 2: Along the same lines with that question-- this is Kirsten from Silverchair-- so how do we report at the book level then the Access Type? So on the TR report, if all of the chapters under that book have different Access Types, what would we report for the whole book?
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Just as you do with a journal, where you have the journal in the title report with Access Type Controlled and Access Type Open, you would have two lines for the book-- one for the Access Type Controlled and one for the Access Type Open.
SPEAKER 2: OK. Thank you.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Again, Kristen, if you want to have a more detailed conversation, totally happy to do that at any point. I will take a note that this needs to be addressed in the FAQ that I am building for Release 5.1.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Next question. How is multimedia usage affected? Is there a difference between unique and total multimedia requests? Multimedia is treated in the same way as any other content types. So if a user lands on a video and sees a video thumbnail, that would be an investigation. If they then clicked Play, that would be a request.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: But it's still one unique investigation. I'm not quite sure what the question goes into. So if you would like to clarify in the chat, that would be great. If you would like to just say it, that would also be fantastic. Right.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Next question while we're waiting for clarification on multimedia. Can I clarify when Access Type is reported from? For example, if an item has usage in the date period where the item was Free to Read but it's now reverted to Controlled, and there's also usage from the Controlled Access Type, how is that going to be reported out? Will the item appear twice on the report? Yes. So the way that reporting works is you will see reports month by month.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: You can just have the reporting period total, which is a very good way of making your reports smaller. But if the item was classed as Free to Read and is now classed as Controlled, you should see repeat information-- well, a repeated line. So you will see the item twice-- once under Free to Read and once under Controlled-- with the relevant metrics reported for that time period.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Cool. I think I'm up to date on all of the questions in the chat. I can-- I'm going to skip on to my next slide and go through the pre-submitted questions that I haven't already replied to in the content.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: But I can go back to more questions in the chat if everybody would like. So the previously submitted questions. The first of these was how should we measure database usage? There are A&I databases and full text databases and different metrics are meaningful in different places. For example, downloading items and creating an item request is a more meaningful piece of usage in a full text database.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Do we have to separate different types of databases to determine which metric to use? OK. My recommendation when it comes to databases is always to look at your search metrics first. These provide an indication of interest in the database as a whole. From there, you can differentiate by database type. Aggregated full content databases are those which contain lots of content items that roll up into a journal, so a whole journal or content items that roll up into a book.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: For aggregated full content, you can use the title report and see the request metrics for each journal or each book.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Sorry. Bear with me just a second. Excuse me. Sorry.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Aggregated full content databases will, therefore, appear both in the database report and the title report. In the title report, the requests are shown at the level of the journal or the book, whereas in the database report, the requests are aggregated at the level of the database. You should use one or the other. If you sum up the requests from the title report and the database report, then you're double counting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So use one or the other for aggregated full content databases. Abstracting and indexing databases. I would recommend using search and then investigations. There is no full content, so there should not be requests. An investigation will show you that a user is interested in specific pieces of content within the A&I database.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And then the third type of database is the full content database, which has materials like data sets or software, or any repository is going to be a full content database. Again, you can use requests for measuring real interest in the repository content, but you can only do that through the database report. There won't be a title report for a full content database. I hope I have replied to the quite complicated, which metrics should we use for databases question.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The second question that I haven't addressed yet relates back to COUNTER 4. So I'm just going to say right now Release 4 of the Code of Practice stopped being supported at the end of 2018 when Release 5 became the default in January of 2019. So if you are still using Release 4 reports, I know that there are some publishers who are still offering Release 4.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: We have not had a mechanism to audit and validate those reports since the end of 2018. Use that information at your own discretion.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So this question was actually, rather than Release 4 specific, was about working with Excel and when one downloads a TSV file, a tabular COUNTER-report or indeed an Excel file, the information opens in your spreadsheet as UTF-8 encoding, which means all of the fields are plain text.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And you cannot run calculations on plain text fields. You have to convert the data in the reporting period total column or any of the columns that you want to do calculations on from text to number. The question that this particular individual had is, is there a way to not do this extra work? And unfortunately, the answer is no because if we were to start requiring that things are delivered formatted as numbers, they would likely break in any software that wasn't Excel.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So this is deliberately designed to make it possible for you, as consumers, to work with COUNTER reports in any spreadsheet software. I would suggest, however, you could try and make your lives a little bit easier by not using formulas, like subtotals, but instead using pivot tables for data manipulation. You will be able to get a lot more information from that than you would with simple subtotals.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: If you really want just very high-level information, and for example, the total count of unique title requests for a whole platform, using the Release 5 or Release 5.1 platform report will give you that information by data type, so you will be able to see all of the unique title requests for books on any of the Silverchair platforms, for example. OK.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I think there are three more. So you still have time to get some more questions into the chat. The third question on here is about report queuing. So I know that there is a note on the JSTOR and ARTSTOR records in the COUNTER registry about having implemented queuing for reports so that you need to re-request the report to return data.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: So my understanding from Ithaka, who support JSTOR and ARTSTOR, is that this is specifically where a user, a report consumer has asked for a report that is too big. So for example, we require that two years of data be made available. But if you ask for older information, you might need to make a second request. I have asked for clarification on that.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: But that is my understanding of these report constraints. We do have quite a lot of rules about report delivery via SUSHI in particular in Section 8 of the COUNTER Code of Practice. So if you want to see the rules that will allow vendors or report providers to stop you from requesting something, Section 8 of the Code of Practice is where you will find all of those rules.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: Moving on. Mapping between releases. We actually have a graphic in the old friendly guides for Release 5 that show how to map from Release 4 to Release 5. I haven't produced anything similar for Release 5 to Release 5.1 because the metrics and the reports haven't changed.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: However, I have got this on my list as something that I would like to address as a topic during 2024. And if anybody would like to work with me to create materials to help libraries understand the mapping or publishers understand the mapping from older releases of COUNTER to Release 5.1, I would love to hear from you.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And then the last question that came to me was addressed very politely, and I shall read it precisely. To bring up that old chestnut once more, are there any plans to reintroduce consortia reporting? So we have three flavors of consortia reporting in Release 5 and Release 5.1. Two of them are required. That's the summary reports, which aggregate all usage into a single report with no breakdown by institution, and then the institutional reports, which are the standard institutional COUNTER reports separate for each institution and available to consortia managers through COUNTER harvesting tools.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: What I suspect this individual is asking about are the detailed reports, which are optional in Release 5 and Release 5.1. The detailed reports are very large. They break down consortia usage by institution in a single report. So they're kind of the institutional reports gathered up into one place.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: The requirements for consortia reporting, and for detailed reporting in particular, were a very high barrier to compliance for a lot of smaller publishers in particular. And by making the summary reports required and making it much easier for consortia managers to pick up their institutional reports through harvesting tools, we believe we have found the best compromise on consortia reporting.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And I would, at this point, say my favorite definition of compromise is that everybody is equally unhappy with the solution. The best we can do, I'm afraid. There is, of course, a friendly guide, a video, and a one-pager about COUNTER for Consortia on the Media Library. So please do go and take a look at that if you have further questions on it.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: And at that, I believe I am at the end of my pre-canned questions. Everything is available from projectcounter.org. That's the code itself, the media library, the registry. And of course, please do contact me with any questions you might have. In the meantime, are there any other questions in the chat? I can't see any.
TASHA MELLINS-COHEN: I will leave it open for another moment, otherwise, I'm going to say to everybody thank you very much for attending and for listening to me witter on about Release 5.1 of the Code of Practice for a full hour. You're very patient. And I will speak to all of you again soon.
Form Title Download
Transcript
Form Title Bookmark
Entire Media
Segment(s)
Custom Clip
Start At:
End At:
Form Title Share
Entire Media
Segment(s)
Custom Clip
Start At:
End At:
Form Title Accessibility and Keyboard Shortcuts
The cadmore media player is a professional video and audio player experience designed to deliver media as well as relevant transcript, segmentation, and metadata. On the screen is a traditional html video player with buttons such as play, pause, forward, captioning, language and play speed selection and more. Adjacent to the video player are generally tabs, one of which shows a scrolling transcript of the video and the other shows any segmentation of the media, sometimes referred to as chapters. At the top of the video is a menu bar containing an Explore button and Tools button. The Explore button allows you to dig deeper into the video by opening up an explore dialog which contains tabs for a visual navigation of the video using thumbnails, an about tab which contains rich metadata about the media, a segments tab which contains further information about the video, and a related tab which contains links to other media related to this media. The tools button opens a menu with options for sharing the media on social media, creating bookmarking links, creating embed codes for your website, generating citations, and more.
Keyboard Shortcuts
Keyboard shortcuts only work while you are in forms mode. By entering forms mode, you will be able to quickly access portions of the media player with single key commands.
Spacebar: Play/Pause Toggle
I: Info Menu,
O: Tools Menu
T: Transcript Tab,
S: Segments Tab
F: Forward 15,
R: Rewind 15
L: Languages,
P: Playspeed
M: Mute Toggle,
V: Volume Bar
N: Video Only Toggle,
B: Full Screen Toggle
C: Captions Toggle
Escape: Closes dialogs and menus / Exits Player
Z: Next Transcript Chapter
X: Previous Transcript Chapter
Q: Next Transcript Paragraph
W: Previous Transcript Paragraph
Entire Media
Segment(s)
Custom Clip
Start At:
End At:
Embed Size
-
You Size - Responsive
-
We Size - Responsive
-
Picture Overlay Popup
-
400 x 225
-
512 x 288
-
400 x 700
-
768 x 1024
-
1024 x 512
-
1280 x 608
Form Title Cite
No citation provided.
Info
Segments
Related
Thumbnails
Exit Clip Mode
You have requested to see a portion of the video outside of the clip.
Click OK to switch to the full video or click if you would like to stay inside the clip. You can always go back to the clip with Tools and Clip Mode