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Weekly News Digest
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December 3, 2015 — In addition to this week's NewsBreaks article and the monthly NewsLink Spotlight, Information Today, Inc. (ITI) offers Weekly News Digests that feature recent product news and company announcements. Watch for additional coverage to appear in the next print issue of Information Today.
CLICK HERE to view more Weekly News Digest items.
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Deep Web Technologies Expands Product Reach to Europe
Deep Web Technologies partnered with PTFS Europe to bring Explorit Everywhere! to European libraries and organizations. With this federated search solution, users can search all subscription resources, library catalogs, and public websites, thus increasing discoverability of library content. Explorit Everywhere! will complement PTFS Europe’s full range of products.For more information, read the press release.
NFAIS Conference Adds Keynote Speakers
The National Federation of Advanced Information Services (NFAIS) announced the lineup of keynote speakers for its 2016 annual conference (Feb. 21–23). All speaking on topics related to the conference’s theme of Data Sparks Discovery of Tomorrow’s Global Knowledge, they are Steven Miller (IBM Analytics Group), Simon Inger (Simon Inger Consulting), and Stephane Bura (Weave.ai).“Each of these thought leaders is expert in how data is creating whole new paradigms for information services and what it means for the advancement of credible, quality information. They also understand this evolving dynamic in the context of the rapid globalization of scholarly research and discovery,” says Marcie Granahan, NFAIS’ executive director. For more information, read the press release.
CHORUS Helps NSF Disseminate Its Research Results
CHORUS signed an agreement with the National Science Foundation (NSF) to help expand the agency’s public access to its research results in accordance with its public access plan from early 2015. CHORUS will build on open standards, distributed networks, and established infrastructure to help NSF index articles using its funded research, make them publicly available, and preserve them for the future.For more information, read the press release.
Altmetric Adds ORCID Functionality
Altmetric added an ORCID filter to the Altmetric Explorer family of apps, including Explorer for publishers and for libraries, as well as Altmetric for Institutions. Users can enter an ORCID identifier to search for Altmetric attention data for all of the research outputs associated with the searched ORCID profile. The results will show any of the research outputs with mentions.For more information, read the blog post.
LexisNexis Acquires Legal Analytics Provider
LexisNexis Legal & Professional acquired Lex Machina, whose Legal Analytics Platform helps lawyers predict strategic outcomes by mining, tagging, categorizing, and enhancing federal court documents. It also offers competitive intelligence on opposing parties and counsel as well as records and key decisions by judges. Lex Machina will operate as a standalone entity within LexisNexis’ North American Research Solutions group.The acquisition puts LexisNexis in a good position to become a leader in analytic decision tools by combining its own technology with Lex Machina’s. The company plans to build next-generation legal analytics solutions across a variety of practice areas and integrate analytics into existing LexisNexis solutions such as Lexis Advance. For more information, read the press release.
Gale Provides Online Access to Early Arabic Texts
Gale launched the first module of Early Arabic Printed Books From the British Library, the first major text-searchable online archive of Arabic books printed before the 20th century. The module’s content covers Islamic literature, law, and other religious topics. More than 400 years’ worth of texts include books such as the Quran in Arabic as well as its translations into European and Asian languages.The second and third modules, which will focus on science, history, and geography, among other topics, will launch in 2016. For more information, read the press release.
Companies Sign American Business Act on Climate Pledge
The White House announced that 73 additional companies signed the American Business Act on Climate Pledge, bringing the total to 154. The pledge demonstrates support for taking action regarding climate change and agreeing to take steps toward a low-carbon, sustainable future. Company-specific goals include reducing emissions by as much as 50%, reducing water usage by as much as 80%, and purchasing 100% renewable energy.For more information, read the press release.
EFF Brings Awareness to Google Privacy Practices
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) against Google for collecting and mining students’ personal data, such as their internet searches. EFF launched the Spying on Students: School-Issued Devices and Student Privacy campaign to raise awareness about the privacy risks involved with school-supplied electronic devices and software such as Google’s Chromebooks. For example, EFF found that Chrome’s Sync feature is enabled by default on Chromebooks, which allows Google to track, store, and mine information for non-advertising purposes.“Despite publicly promising not to, Google mines students’ browsing data and other information, and uses it for the company’s own purposes. Making such promises and failing to live up to them is a violation of FTC rules against unfair and deceptive business practices,” says Nate Cardozo, a staff attorney at EFF. “Minors shouldn’t be tracked or used as guinea pigs, with their data treated as a profit center. If Google wants to use students’ data to ‘improve Google products,’ then it needs to get express consent from parents.” For more information, read the press release.
DPLA Helps Make Audiovisual Collections Searchable
The Digital Public Library of America (DPLA) partnered with Pop Up Archive to offer discounts that help the DPLA hubs and their partners use Pop Up Archive to make their audiovisual collections searchable. Pop Up Archive will automatically transcribe, time-stamp, and create keywords for the participating collections.“Our goal is to connect the widest audience with the greatest amount of openly available materials in our nation’s cultural heritage institutions, and audiovisual material has been both critical to our growing collection and less searchable than other forms,” says Dan Cohen, DPLA’s executive director. For more information, read the blog post.
FIZ Karlsruhe and Thomson Reuters Introduce Updated Patent Resource
FIZ Karlsruhe and the Intellectual Property & Science business of Thomson Reuters added the Derwent Markush Resource to the STN International service for research and patent information. This integration gives patent information professionals a comprehensive view of the patentability of a chemical structure from within the collection of the Derwent World Patents Index.“Markush searching is a challenging task mainly performed by patent information experts. FIZ Karlsruhe has developed a search environment for the Derwent Markush Resource to ensure complete and efficient searching of chemical patent information for the patent community,” says Sabine Brünger-Weilandt, FIZ Karlsruhe’s president and CEO. For more information, read the press release.
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Brandi Scardilli
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