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Weekly News Digest
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January 26, 2012 — 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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ebrary Ships New Mobile App; Integrates with Baker & Taylor’s Title Source 3
ebrary, a ProQuest business, announced it launched a new app for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch. Available on the App Store, the free new app gives researchers an optimized way to experience authoritative content—both online and offline—from multiple sources. With ebrary’s new app, researchers can access content on the ebrary platform, including ebooks that their librarians acquire from leading publishers and documents uploaded and integrated by librarians with DASH! (Data Sharing, Fast). Additionally, researchers can import their own personal research—outside of the ebrary platform—through the app itself.To make it easier to use ebrary—with or without the app—ebrary also announced the ability for researchers to sign-in with their Facebook usernames and passwords. ebrary’s parent company ProQuest also announced the upcoming launch in the first half of 2012 of a mobile interface for its platform. Mobile initiatives are also in place or in development at Bowker, RefWorks, and Serials Solutions, all part of the ProQuest family. ebrary announced that a selection of more than 268,000 ebooks is now integrated with Title Source 3, Baker & Taylor’s ordering platform used by academic, school, and public libraries worldwide. Librarians who order books through Title Source 3 now have the option of choosing digital versions on the ebrary platform, which provides both online and offline access. Source: ebrary
Gale Signs Agreement for National Geographic Magazine Archive
Gale, part of Cengage Learning, signed an agreement with the National Geographic Society to archive more than 100 years of National Geographic Magazine. Available to libraries this spring, National Geographic Magazine Archive, 1888-1994 will include all issues of the magazine in a fully searchable and intuitive interface.National Geographic Magazine has long been a leading global publication in empowering people to better understand the world in which we live, providing authoritative, unbiased content that addresses today's complex issues, while uncovering the wonders of our time. From the discovery of fossils of human ancestors by Richard Leakey in Kenya to polar exploration, archaeological finds of Maya and Inca cultures and Robert Ballard’s discovery of the wreckage of the <em>Titanic</em>, National Geographic Magazine Archive, 1888-1994 is an essential resource for scholars as well as a fascinating collection for general readers. Also included in the more than 100,000-page archive will be every photograph published in the magazine through 1994. Among the first to use color photography, National Geographic Magazine is widely known to contain the highest quality photojournalism in the world, with each lifelike, authentic photograph allowing readers to visually explore the new worlds they are learning about. In addition to each page and photograph, the archive will include the detailed maps published by the magazine throughout its history. The maps help to provide context and reference for readers who are learning about unknown and often remote regions and cultures for the first time. For more information on the National Geographic Magazine Archive, 1888-1994, please visit http://gdc.gale.com/. Source: Gale
Deep Web Technologies Releases WorldWideScience.org Application for SciVerse Hub
Deep Web Technologies, a provider of federated search technologies, announced that working in close cooperation with OSTI, the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Scientific and Technical Information and the operating agent for WorldWideScience.org (WWS), and Elsevier, it released a WWS application for SciVerse Applications. Elsevier's Application Marketplace & Developer Network features a marketplace that allows researchers to select and create applications that enhance research and search results obtained from the new SciVerse Hub.“The WWS application for the SciVerse Hub allows researchers to seamlessly search WWS content within SciVerse Hub,” said Rafael Sidi, vice president, Application Marketplace and Developer Network at Elsevier. “Our collaboration with DWT benefits researchers by increasing accessibility to WWS content and enhancing research productivity.” The WWS application provides a new way of accessing WWS resources. It can be found in the SciVerse Applications and used in conjunction with SciVerse Hub. By entering search terms in the Hub query box, users can search WWS in parallel with SciVerse Hub content, thereby exposing researchers to high-value content from around the world that they might not otherwise discover. Using the SciVerse Hub search query, the WWS application displays relevance-ranked search results in a parallel frame. Clicking on any of the links in the application will take the researcher to the publisher of the article or web page. Opening the application in the larger (Canvas) view will show the WWS site directly within SciVerse Hub. The WWS application is available for free to all registered SciVerse users. Source: Deep Web Technologies
EBSCO News From ALA Midwinter
EBSCO Discovery Service (EDS) is set to benefit from the formal merging of EBSCO A-to-Z and LinkSource into EBSCO’s overall discovery solution. The two resources, which are relied upon by thousands of universities and other institutions around the globe, will become an integrated part of EDS.While EDS is currently able to leverage the EBSCO A-to-Z knowledgebase to facilitate quality linking and limiting for a customer’s holdings, regardless of which resource listing product a customer subscribes to, this change will allow EDS customers to gain unique functionality in EDS. Complete browsing of a library’s e-resources will be possible within the same experience in which users conduct their keyword discovery searches. EBSCO A-to-Z and EDS customers will also reap the benefits of a unified administrative tool (under EBSCOadmin) that will allow for streamlined management process for all products.
EBSCO Publishing has announced the release of the fifth and final series from the American Antiquarian Society (AAS) Historical Periodicals Collection. Series 5 includes more than 2,500 titles dating from 1866-1877. The themes presented in American Antiquarian Society (AAS) Historical Periodicals Collection: Series 5 reflect a nation that persevered through a most difficult set of circumstances: a bloody civil war that claimed hundreds of thousands of lives; the incorporation of the recently-freed African Americans into American life; a population that rapidly expanded into the Western territories. Broad subject areas covered in the collection reach into every facet of American life, including science, literature, medicine, agriculture, fashion, family life, politics, and religion. American Antiquarian Society (AAS) Historical Periodical Collection: Series 5 is available through the state-of-the art EBSCOhost Content Viewer, specifically designed to meet the needs of scholars and researchers by enabling them to navigate historical content in new ways. Source: EBSCO
Gale Outlines First Archives for Nineteenth Century Collections Online
Gale, part of Cengage Learning, announced the source libraries, collections, and plans for the first four modules of Nineteenth Century Collections Online, its global digitization and publishing program that brings together rare 19th-century primary source content. The company says that most of the content has never before been digitized, and a great deal of the content has never been captured for microfilm or been otherwise made available outside the source institution. Currently still in development, the modules will be available this spring.Nineteenth Century Collections Online is an ongoing publishing program with content and partner libraries being added continuously. The British Library, The National Archives (U.S.), The National Archives at Kew, U.K., the Bodleian Library–University of Oxford, and Castle Corvey in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany have all provided primary source content to be digitized and included in the archive. About 150 collections from these institutions—as well as from many other libraries and archives—will be included in modules this year. The first modules include the following: - British Politics and Society
- Asia and the West: Diplomacy and Cultural Exchange
- British Theatre, Music, and Literature: High and Popular Culture
- Corvey Collection of European Literature: 1790-1840
For more information on Nineteenth Century Collections Online, visit http://gdc.gale.com/products/nineteenth-century-collections-online/ or download Nineteenth Century Collections Online Museum, the free iOS application available in the iTunes app store (search: nineteenth century). It provides free content and the opportunity to interact with materials (including manuscripts, sheet music, photos, and more) in the context that is most relevant to the user. The application also enables researchers to receive information regarding events, enhancements, and research tips, as well as the opportunity to provide feedback and drive development of the program. Source: Gale
Internet2 Partners With McGraw Hill and Courseload to Test eText Program
Internet2, McGraw-Hill, and Courseload announced implementation of an eText Pilot Trial Pack to students and faculty at five universities for the Spring 2012 semester. The five institutions, also Internet2 members, include the following: University of California, Berkeley; Cornell University; University of Minnesota; University of Virginia; and the University of Wisconsin.The pilot, which is based on Indiana University’s eText model, provides a timely and simple way for universities to quickly assess a new model for digital course materials. While an increasing number of etexts are already available at retail prices, eTexts can cost less when institutions negotiate attractive volume price deals to dramatically reduce costs to students while efficiently paying authors and publishers fairly for each use of their digital work. Participating universities in the pilot get McGraw-Hill eTexts, the Courseload reader and annotation platform integrated with their Learning Management System, and can be part of a joint research study of etext use and perceptions. Through the Courseload software, students can print, use social annotation with classmates and instructors, and access their etexts on any HTML5-capable tablet, smartphone, or computer. Students will receive their etexts at no cost as the institutions are subsidizing the study, and students who prefer a full hard-copy book may optionally order a print-on-demand version of the etext for a $28 fee. Faculty interest at the pilot institutions has been very strong. Internet2 is a not-for-profit advanced networking consortium comprising (as of June 2011) 221 U.S. universities, in cooperation with 45 leading corporations, 66 government agencies, laboratories, and other institutions of higher learning, 35 regional and state research and education networks and more than 100 national research and education networking organizations representing over 50 countries. Internet2 NET+ Services and program aggregate the IT needs of university members and efficiently contract with leading commercial firms for services tailored to that community. Recent NET+ opportunities for Internet2 members include cloud storage services from Box.Com, and cloud computing from Hewlett Packard and SHI. Source: Internet2
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Brandi Scardilli
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