Open Research Online

Top Downloads from last month ORO-downloads-Apr-2012  – thanks for adding full text where possible.

There have been so many announcements from various organisations around Open Access it’s been hard to keep up with them. 

This morning I read that Harvard library has issued a memo on Open Access to it’s staff.  It’s fascinating reading and exciting times for everyone involved in Open Access.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/apr/24/harvard-university-journal-publishers-prices

Top 15 downloads for March:  ORO-downloads-Mar-2012

Please see the Top 15 downloads for February.  Our focus has been on getting items in ORO over the last few months – we’ve had little time to reflect on the downloads or request a copies.  Looking at the figures we see a little more usage than we had in January. 

ORO-downloads-Feb-2012

One thing to bear in mind is that these figures are for unique downloads – if we were counting total downloads the figures would be over double what we currently report on.

Chris

Here we have the Top 15 request for copy & Top 15 downloads for 2011. 

Thanks to everyone who deposited papers or made them available via request for copy in ORO.

It’s interesting to compare the numbers.  The top download item had over 200 downloads whilst the top request a  copy had 24.  But, I think it’s fair to say where someone took the trouble to request a copy from the author it’s more likely they read the item! 

There is also value in the connections between peers that might be made in the request a copy process – we estimate 40% of ORO visitors to be active researchers (other visitors comprise 30% postgrads, 20% undergrads & 10% other).  So we hope, in a small way, ORO supports the connections made between researchers.

The request for copy process may also provide evidence for research impact.  So if there are any impact narratives that have been supported, and can be evidenced, by ORO – please get in touch. 

Chris

lib-ORO-team@open.ac.uk

Please check the top 15 downloads for the month of January.  ORO-downloads-Jan-2012

We will publish figures for 2011 top 15 downloads & 2011 top 15 request-a-copy later in the week.

Chris

We have a substantial backlog of items due to the Mock REF.  We are doing our best to get through these items as quickly as possible, but it is taking us longer than usual to process deposits.  Apologies for the delay. 

If you have any specific queries contact us at lib-oro-team@open.ac.uk.  Thanks for your patience, Chris.

Most downloaded full text papers for the month of December are here ORO-downloads-December-2011.

I hope to post most downloaded for the whole of 2011 as well as some statistics from the request a copy process later in the month… Mock REF work permitting!

CORE is a JISC funded project based in KMi to “create an innovative new search facility which searches not just the abstract but the full text of the article.”
 
Full text items in 142 UK Open Access repositories have been data mined to establish “is similar to” links to other items in the same set. 

CORE is embedded in ORO so the retrieval of a full text item in ORO will offer a series of “similar” titles sourced from across the 142 OA repositories.  Clicking on one of these items will link through to the CORE site where the full text of the similar items is stored.
 
CORE is not the only cross repository search, but it is the only one that attempts to create semantic links between full text items thereby providing similar items to the repository user.

Take a look at a couple of records in ORO where CORE offers ‘is similar to’ items: http://oro.open.ac.uk/19037/ & http://oro.open.ac.uk/23850/.  Let us know what you think.

 November top downloads available from the link ORO-downloads-November-2011.  Over half of this month’s top downloads are from Social Sciences. I’m not sure if there is a trend or if Social Sciences has always been prominent in the list.  Some analysis of downloads by discipline / faculty might be interesting… time permitting!