Usability

This category contains 296 posts

Locks, Keys, and Firewalls — Why Internet Security Requires Digital, Analog . . . and Diligent Humans

Internet security seems to be crumbling before our eyes, and our media and leaders are not immune and lack a crucial understanding of how vulnerable a totally digital world can be. The answer may lie with analog technologies. Continue reading

Life on the Launch Pad — The Ups and Downs of Product Development, and Why It’s Hard to Achieve Orbit

Product development has surged back into the fore, in both incremental and paradigm-shifting ways. Yet, some cultures still struggle with it, and the need for the right teams and approaches — especially marketing and sales — remains high. Continue reading

Rethinking Authentication, Revamping the Business

IP authentication is the most important mechanism for authorizing access to licensed e-resources resources. Substantial business and policy issues for libraries and publishers alike connect up to IP authentication. Today, there is substantial interest in eliminating IP authentication, so it is timely to examine the implications if we were soon to see its end. Continue reading

Publishing, Politics and Reason

Robert Harington grapples with the lack of understanding by the publishing elites on all sides of shifting ideologies of an individual’s relationship to information on the web. Continue reading

Elsevier Acquires SSRN

Today, Elsevier is announcing that it has acquired SSRN, the preprint and publishing community that focuses on social sciences and law. Among other things, the SSRN acquisition is another step in Elsevier’s path towards data and analytics. In a number of ways, Mendeley is the linchpin for this acquisition. More generally, this acquisition plainly indicates Elsevier’s interest in the open access repository space. Finally, universities, their libraries, and other publishers, should have on their minds some of the policy and governance issues around the data that Elsevier is accumulating and the uses to which they may be put. Continue reading

Accessing Publisher Resources via a Mobile Device: A User’s Journey

How do users access content on mobile devices? While many surveys have been done on mobile usage, documenting the user’s experience via “journey mapping” provides a picture of the challenges that remain in using IP authentication in the institutional setting. Continue reading

Three Things Scholarly Publishers Should Know About Researchers

We’ve looked recently at things publishers want researchers to understand better. Are there things researchers in turn want publishers to understand better? Charlie Rapple opens a discussion. Continue reading

The New(ish) Kids on the Block – Touring the Megajournals

A tour of four major “megajournals” and some of their neighbors finds a few common approaches and a few distinguishing features, but the entire category may need to be rethought given the lack of “mega” generally among the set. Continue reading

Will the Monograph Experience a Transition to E-Only? Latest Findings.

Although journals, other serials, and reference have made a large scale transition away from print, we must not assume that the same path will inevitably be pursued for other components of collections. A combination of business models, reading practices, and other user needs will play the biggest role in determining the prospects for the printed monograph. Today, it seems that a dual-format environment may remain before us for some time, and there will be advantages for the libraries, publishers, and intermediaries that can develop models for monographs that work best in such an environment. Continue reading

Why Is ClinicalTrials.gov Still Struggling?

With no clear benefits to researchers, a frustrating user experience, and no penalties for non-compliance, ClinicalTrials.gov is becoming increasingly irrelevant to clinical researchers and the world at large with each passing day. What does this mean for public access to research results? Is an obligation to patients putting themselves at risk in trials being breached? Why has it failed to live up to its potential? Continue reading

Co-opting “Official” Channels through Infrastructures for Openness

Last week, the news broke about a new service called DOAI that is designed to support open access. It is not a publishing model or a repository but rather a type of infrastructure. When a user inputs a DOI, DOAI connects the user to a freely available copy of the publication. This is the latest of … Continue reading

Guest Post: Kent Anderson UPDATED — 96 Things Publishers Do (2016 Edition)

Kent Anderson returns to update his essential list of just what it is that publishers do. Continue reading

Improving Privacy by Rethinking Architecture

Today, we grapple with privacy issues as consumers, as citizens, and as voters. As an industry, we should be thinking about how to draw not only on policy but also on technical architecture to balance privacy and innovation. When the stars align, an entirely different architecture for the control of user data is possible. What would such a shift mean for scholarly publishing and academic libraries? Continue reading

Another Big Win for Google Books (and for Researchers)

Google wins in court (again) as the Second Circuit of Appeals rules that its mass book digitization program qualifies as fair use. But Google is a commercial entity! And their files might get hacked! And their library partners are even more susceptible to copyright pirates than Google is! Yes, said the court, but. . . Continue reading

Transitioning to a More Unified Platform

Combining most if not all of a publisher’s scholarly content on a single publisher platform has not always been the norm. Oxford University Press’s transition to a new platform represents not just a one-to-one platform shift but in fact a consolidation from more to fewer platforms. This is a trend worth understanding and watching. Continue reading

Library Publishing Redux: An Unprecedented Example of a Scholar/Library/Publisher Partnership

A collaborative venture between Oxford University Press and the University of Utah’s J. Willard Marriott Library exemplifies a new approach to library publishing, one that could be replicated elsewhere with relative ease and that offers potentially huge benefits to scholarship. Continue reading

A Single User Account

Academics’ expectations for user experience are set not by reference to improvements relative to the past but increasingly in comparison with their experiences on consumer internet services and mobile devices. The best solution for research, teaching, and learning would be a single account for each user, controlled by that individual, and accepted portably across services and platforms. Continue reading

Block that PC! Forcing Your Organization to Engage the Mobile User Experience

Publishers and libraries do not completely understand how changing information consumption patterns, especially in the transition to mobile, should affect their product, infrastructure, and acquisitions strategies. Consider enticing or forcing your organization to engage more deeply with the mobile user experience. Continue reading

Grab and Go and the Gravitational Pull of Discovery

A look at Facebook’s Instant Article initiative and what it means for discovery and for publishers. Continue reading

Maintaining Relationships with Readers as They Cross Affiliations

Researchers’ multiple and changing institutional affiliations create tangible challenges, both for the researchers themselves and for scholarly publishers as well. Continue reading

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The mission of the Society for Scholarly Publishing (SSP) is "[t]o advance scholarly publishing and communication, and the professional development of its members through education, collaboration, and networking." SSP established The Scholarly Kitchen blog in February 2008 to keep SSP members and interested parties aware of new developments in publishing.
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The Scholarly Kitchen is a moderated and independent blog. Opinions on The Scholarly Kitchen are those of the authors. They are not necessarily those held by the Society for Scholarly Publishing nor by their respective employers.
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