stephen rhind-tutt, president,
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Stephen Rhind-Tutt, President, “Where are we? Where are we going? A survey of the electronic publishing landscape” SSP November, 2007. Overview. About us Aggregation and discovery Adding value Web 2.0. About us. About Alexander Street Press. Founded in July 2000 - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
Stephen Rhind-Tutt, President,
“Where are we? Where are we going? A survey of the electronic publishing landscape” SSP
November, 2007
1. About us
2. Aggregation and discovery
3. Adding value
4. Web 2.0
Overview
About us
• Founded in July 2000• Scholarly, electronic publisher in the Humanities• Based in Alexandria, Virginia• 70 employees• 1000+ licensing partners, including Warner Bros.,
Penguin Putnam, Faber & Faber, Macmillan, University Presses, etc…
• Special collection partners include AAS, Library of Congress, NYPL, Wisconsin State Historical Society, South Hadley Historical Society, and many more.
• Sell to libraries around the world
About Alexander Street Press
The Portfolio
Performing Arts, Drama, and Film
World Literature
Women’s History
Religion
PsychotherapyMusic
Social and Cultural History
Sociology
Black Studies
American Civil War
To craft electronic products of exceptional utility and quality,
using the skills of librarianship
and traditional publishing
“To give voice to those who would otherwise be silent”
Our Mission
• Surrendering control• Loss of proprietary gateways to content• Expensive, new technologies• Most content not created by publishers• Large new players with enormous network advantages• Mission statements that are the same as publishers/librarians
Aggregation and Discovery
What stage is the web at?
1913
1985 1995
1931 1954
2018
?
Car in 1904
• ‘Quadricycles’, ‘Phaetons’, ‘Horseless Carriages’, ‘Autocars’, ‘Motor cars’ ?
• Horsepower to weight ratio - Electric, Hydrogen or Gasoline ?• Materials – Wood, Steel, or combination ?• Production line – Custom or mass produced ? • Starting Systems – Manual or electric ?• Legal – UK law restricting speed to 5 mph• Education – Would population be able to master the machines ?• Costs – Typically in excess of $2,000
(Source: Various Articles in The Living Age, 1904)
Car in 1920
• Motor cars• Horsepower to weight ratio - Gasoline and clearly going to
improve in future• Materials – Steel• Production line – Mass produced• Starting Systems – Electric • Legal– Building of highways• Education – No longer an issue• Costs – Model T cost $400
Electronic Journals vs. books…Electronic Journals
Books E-Books
Cost/item/person > 0.002 ¢ > $20 -
Size Unlimited 100-1000 Pages
-
Accessibility Site Person at a time
(+)
Organization Integrated Isolated (+)
Searchability 20 entry points 2 entry points (+)
Division Atomic + Linear Linear -
Currency Daily updates > Quarterly -
Delivery speed Instant > Day ? Instant
Interaction ? None -
Process integration
? None -
Portals make most use of the medium...
Electronic Journals Portals
Cost/item/person 0.002 ¢ Free
Size Unlimited Unlimited
Accessibility Site Universal
Organization Integrated Integrated
Searchability 20 entry points Multiple entry points
Division Atomic + Linear Atomic
Currency Daily updates Daily updates
Delivery speed Instant Instant
Interaction ? Multiple
Process integration
? Multiple
Value in the electronic world is about...
Understanding electronic products
“The manner in which or the efficiency with which something reacts or fulfills its intended purpose”
Webster’s Unabridged
Aggregation and Discovery
Remixability
•No one site will contain all information
•Effective publication is a function of delivering the right content, in the right way to the right people.
•To do this we will need high quality access to content across different publishers, libraries and websites.
Discoverability – Aggregation – Value added
Nature of electronic publications
• Atomic• Interconnected • Interdependent• Connection vs. the object
• Pliable• Constantly evolving• Without place • Practically unlimited in size
Page Page Page
Page
Page Page Page
Page Page
It’s about the links…
•Links document intellectual pathways through data
•Indexing links adds value substantially
•Links
• Prevent duplication of indexing, content and commentary
• Links are expensive to create and maintain
• Versioning is critical to scholarship.
• Some links confer authority
• ‘Links are intrinsically bidirectional’ (Ted Nelson)
Option A: Link to resource
- Low cost- Lower utility- Changing URLs
prevents access.
Loss of control issues
Option B: License resource
- High cost (royalties)- Loading cost- High functionality- Permanence in
collection
“We won’t license…it’s on our site already and we don’t want to lose the usage…”
Integration is unavoidable
Loosely Held Tightly Held
Free Websites
Loosely integrated
Tightlyintegrated
Refuse to License
License widely
License widelyand be a Licensor
Building the network…
Unhelpful
•Legal warnings not to link
•Changing links constantly
•Disabling links
•No permanent URLs
•No crawling
•Randomly changing URLs
•Insisting on one interface and one access point
•Unattached pages
Helpful
•Citations visible to the outside world
•Permanent URLs
•RSS feeds
•OpenURL
•Design for multiple interfaces
•Open to crawling
•Published APIs
•Welcome linking
•Ask others to do the same
No silos!
Search via ASP interface
Search via library catalog(direct or federated)
OpenURL links
directly to ASP
content
OpenURL links
directly toother
databasesSearch the web
Search the library catalog
e.g. RILM,Grove Music
Online
Result of an external search
Unlock the value…
Books
Search Tool
Discipline Tool
Personal Work Bench
Music
Newspapers
Films
Images
Grant’s Memoirs
Place:Alexandria,
Virginia
www.inthefirstperson.com
• Free index to first-person narratives
• The most comprehensive archive of social history yet created
• Perform in-depth field and keyword searches across scholarly materials that are freely available on the Web
• Also indexes for fee letters, diaries, oral histories, memoirs, and autobiographies within Alexander Street Press databases
• Access thousands of personal narratives from the English-speaking world, in a single search
OPAC or Google
Students of the Sixties
Hogan Jazz Archive
Free: Public Web collections, semantically indexed by Alexander
Street($) Alexander Street collections
containing first-person materials
Free: Materials submitted by the user community
www.inthefirstperson.com
Context and selection
Search Power
Organized Results
Adding value
• Not just reproducing paper…
• Electronic versions are often deliberately changed to improve performance
• Reduced color and clarity for faster display
• Change size for improved screen display
• Transcriptions for increased searchability
• Citations for improved searching
• Mark-up interspersed with text itself
• The connection is more important than the object
Electronic publishing…
Digital Surrogates…
Black & White
Grayscale
24 bit color
48 bit color
100 dpi
600 dpi
JPG
TIFF
Citation
MARC Record
Dirty OCR
99.995% rekeying
Semantic Indexing
Thumbnails
100 dpi
Page
Collection
Letter
Facsimiles
Transcriptions
EAD Finding Aid
Repository
Mobile Web
TCP-IP
Printed Reference:Xitztum JL, Galinski W: Are microbiological mechanismsrelevant for the development of atherosclerosis?Clin Immunol 90 153-156, 1999
Example 1:<reference_data id=“r0173159” rnum=“159”>Xitztum JL, Galinski W: Are microbiological mechanisms relevantfor the development of atherosclerosis?<emph type=“ital”> Clin Immunol </emph><emph type=“bold”> 90 </emph>:153–156, 1999</refdata>
Example 2:<artref id=“i0012” anum=“159”><authors><author><surname>Xitztum</surname><finitials> JL</finitials></auther><author><surname>Galinski</surname><finitials>W</finitials></author></authors><title>Are microbiological mechanisms relevant for the development of atherosclerosis?</title><journal>Clin Immunol</journal><volume>90</volume><pagerange><spage>153</spage><epage>156</epage></pagerange><pubyear>1999</pubyear></artref>
Mixing text and mark-up…
Evaluating different formats
0
Native Format
2 - 6 per page
2 – 8per page
2 - 5 per page
.50 - 3 per
page
.25 - .75 per
page
Relative Cost
Interchange
Enforce Standards
Component Reuse
Searching
Re-purposing
Distributing Page Images
XMLSGMLHTMLPDFTIFFUseFormat
ExcellentVery GoodGoodLimitedNone
Source: Don Bridges, 48th Annual STC Conference, Presentation, May 2002. www.dclabs.com
Functionality vs. Preservation
Low High
TIFF
VRML
Flash
JPG
High
Functionalit
y
Level of Mark-up
ASCII
XML
8 cents/page
$1.50/page
$10/image
‘Semantic’ Indexing
Collection
Series
Book or Volume
Chapter
Page
Word
Where ?
When ?
What ?
Who ?Traditio
nal indexing >
‘Semantic’ indexing >
The ‘real’ world
Play
Author
Production Stills
Playbills
ProductionVenueDirector
Lighting Set Designers
Theater
PerformanceLocation
Production Company
Producer
Texts
Criticism
Cast List
Performers
Posters
Ephemera
Scenes
ActsCharacters
Dramatis Personae
The virtual world…
Author
Birth dateDeath dateBirth PlaceDeath PlaceNationalityOccupationAwards(38 fields)
Theater
DistrictLocationCapacityStyleEtc…(18 fields)
Company
NameProductionsPerformersEtc…(14 fields)
Production
DirectorTheaterCast# of Perfs.LightingCostumesEtc…(47 fields)
Characters
PlaysAgeAuthorPerformerEtc…(30 fields)
Scenes
WhereWhenSettingSubjectEtc…(41 fields)
Resources
PlayDirectorTheaterProduction Co.CharacterSceneEtc…(45 fields)
Texts
KeywordAuthorDate WrittenDate PublishedProduction(67 fields)
The virtual world…
Author
Birth dateDeath dateBirth PlaceDeath PlaceNationalityOccupationAwards(38 fields)
Theater
DistrictLocationCapacityStyleEtc…(18 fields)
Company
NameProductionsPerformersEtc…(14 fields)
Production
DirectorTheaterCast# of Perfs.LightingCostumesEtc…(47 fields)
Characters
PlaysAgeAuthorPerformerEtc…(30 fields)
Scenes
WhereWhenSettingSubjectEtc…(41 fields)
Resources
PlayDirectorTheaterProduction Co.CharacterSceneEtc…(45 fields)
Texts
KeywordAuthorDate WrittenDate PublishedProduction(67 fields)
Traditional vs. Semantic Indexing
Traditional Indexing Semantic Indexing
General History Drama Religion
What? Article, Book Event Scene Passage
Who? Author ParticipantsCharacte
rs Author
Where?
Where published
Where occurred
Where set -
When?
When published
When it happened
When set
When written• Give me articles from journal xxx prior to 1990
• Give me documents that discuss battles where more than 100 people were killed?
• Give me all scenes set before 1850 that portray lynching?
• Which authors cite Genesis most frequently?
• Identify and divide texts into content elements (e.g. letter, diary entry…)
• Identify key concepts for these elements(e.g. authors, sources, battles, encounters…)
• Index both elements and associated concepts• Integrate to form a cohesive whole
• Unique ways of browsing through concepts • Unique ways to ask questions
‘Semantic’ Indexing
Tables of Contents
Search functionality
Web 2.0 – what relevance?
Participation
•Playlists on ASP’s music products – 19,000 users
•Over 100,000 playlists created so far
• 800 created by ASP
• 38,000 user created
• 70,000 derivative playlists
Playlists
Playlists
Fading Growing
Typesetting Printing
Print monograph Print directory
Public domain reprintsSimple, one database search
Rare and unpublished material
Linking
Licensing
Free materials
Semantic indexing
Process integration
Unified search software
Workflow tools
Warehousing
Community buildingAsset management
Commissioning?
Editorial?
Quality?Selection?
Interactions?
Never ending value…
www.alexanderstreet.com