JUSP welcomes Springer adoption of COUNTER Release 4 to improve journal usage data

The JUSP (Journal Usage Statistics Portal) welcomes the adoption of Release 4 of the COUNTER standard by international publisher Springer Science+Business Media.

The implementation ensures that the journal usage data Springer is providing to higher education libraries are now compliant with the standard, ensuring comparable, standard-based measurement.

The COUNTER Code of Practice for e-Resources provides an agreed international set of standards and protocols governing the recording and exchange of online usage data. Springer is the first of the 59 JUSP participating publishers to implement the new Release 4 standard, setting a precedent for other publishers to follow suit by 31 December 2013. This will ensure that data provided by JUSP continues to be of the highest quality.

JUSP, funded by Jisc, is the first system of its kind internationally that automates the process of gathering journal usage data from publishers and provides a single point of access to this data for higher education libraries.

The COUNTER standard forms the basis of JUSP, enabling access to consistent and comparable journal usage statistics. Graham Stone, information resources manager at the University of Huddersfield says:

“We see COUNTER as essential in helping us to understand usage of our resources in order to show value for money in times of increased pressure on library budgets. The better the information we have at our fingertips, the more informed our decisions will be. We strongly encourage all publishers and intermediaries to adopt this latest standard.”

Jo Lambert, JUSP project manager, said:

“The COUNTER standard is integral to JUSP, facilitating delivery of an efficient and cost-effective service. Release 4 of the standard provides a number of new features and opportunities; for instance, the new Journal Report 1 GOA provides usage data on gold open access articles. Working with Springer and our knowledgeable and committed user community will enable us to explore the potential for this new report and reflect their ideas and feedback within the JUSP portal. We applaud Springer for adopting this latest standard and encourage other publishers to follow suit.”

Rone Robbetze, vice president, sales at Springer Science+Business Media, says:

“Giving libraries access to usage data in this way will allow librarians to assess value for money in journal agreements. Springer believes that in implementing the COUNTER standard, we are supporting JUSP to help provide a crucial service for higher education libraries.”

The benefits of JUSP include immediate access to data that is verified to be COUNTER compliant, and access to the system provides economies of scale to save institutions time and money, enabling organisations to concentrate on the important task of data analysis rather than data collation. A shared approach also ensures a better quality of data than was previously achievable. Lastly, the automated usage statistics portal helps libraries to assess the value for money they are deriving from participating in NESLi2 journal agreements and other licence agreements with scholarly publishers.