IdeaScale : Lets think outside the box....

Lets think outside the box....

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 00:00:00 PDT

This is focused on the researcher world, but the arguments hold for other fields

Q: What is the primary factor for ranking researchers?
A: Citations.
Surely the aim, therefor, of the researcher is to market her work as widely as possible, to maximise the potential for citation.
Given that we are now in the Information Age, where The Internet is the primary source of answers (backed up by reading what has been found, on paper), then the sensible solution is to place enough of the research results on the Internet such that they can be found and assesed, and followed up.
Where, in the Internet, this material is placed is almost moot: the Internet has no location per sae - Search Engine index everything, everywhere.

Q: What is the primary factor for ranking Institutions?
A: The amount of research performed by researchers of standing (see above)
Surely the aim, therefor, of the Institution is to market the work of their researchers, with sufficient "corporate identity" attached, as widely as possible, to maximise the readership of that work.

THEREFORE
I think we can say that researchers need publicity, and Institutions want to be the ones to do it.

The question I see is:
"How can we make it easist for the researcher to publicise their work, and how can we help the Institution capitalise on that individual publicity?"

"Institutional Repositories" are the current solution - are they the right one?

Comments (2)Category/Tags : Miscellaneous (2) Mark as duplicate

Comment by aalakos

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 00:00:00 PDT

"institutional repositories" will go away - they are mostly an extension of the "local perspective" - we need to invest in consortial, state or global repositories and leverafe the "network" for malking items findable and delivered through robust supply chain solutions

Comment by ian.stuart

Thu, 21 Aug 2008 00:00:00 PDT

I agree and disagree, at the same time:
Yes, the current librarian-/cataloguer-/archivist-centric application will disappear
Yes, moving to a network-/cloud-centric solution (*shock* call it "web 2.0") will enhance the "Descovery" and "Delivery" that people bang on about.

HOWEVER!!!

I think the marketing opportunities will mean that *some* form of "Look at our Research Output" system will be at every main-stream academic-research organisation - even if it's just a re-working of the RAE/REF/WWD submissions.