Tuesday 31 July 2012

Businesss Information publishers feature on Top 50 list


Business Information publishers feature strongly on the latest list of the world's top 50 digital content companies, as compiled by PaidContent.

Bloomberg appear in 4th place, followed by  Reed Elsevier (5th), Thomson Reuters (8th), Pearson (13th), Dun & Bradstreet (23rd), Wolters Kluwer (29th) and Informa (47th).  Axel Springer appears on the list in 33rd place.

The top 10 in full:
·         Google
·         China Mobile
·         Bloomberg
·         Reed Elsevier
·         Apple
·         Yahoo
·         Thomson Reuters
·         WPP
·         Tencent
·         Microsoft

Friday 20 July 2012

The importance of demonstrating value

The concluding conference of the DReAM project last week showcased just how much had been achieved in promoting LIS practitioner research and in fostering the take up of new techniques from other disciplines in the last two years. The audience was held spellbound by Ben Goldacre – demonstrating the importance of robust research and lateral thinking beforehand on how to realise the full potential from data.  You can see and hear all the presentations from: http://lisresearch.org/event-5-presentations/

BIR joint editor, Sandra Ward contributed to the One Minute Madness session – see:

Sandra’s message was:  Because you’re worth it – the importance of demonstrating value!

*  As joint editor of Business Information Review, I believe strongly in the value of effective information management to business and other sectors.
*  As a consultant, I am appalled that few information functions have processes in place to calculate and demonstrate value.  As a result, we lose credibility, opportunities –and jobs! 
*  I am convinced that research techniques can be used to design value into services. 
We must apply them to:
·       Identify, with our organisations, where information skills will contribute most value;
·       Focus services on business critical activity;
·       Recognise it’s our customers that reap the value from services;
·       Partner with them to assess the real business benefit
And, where you can – I ask you to share good practice through publication!  Because you’re worth it!

Wednesday 18 July 2012

Police blogger gets publishing deal

In March 2012, Business Information Review published an article on the use of blogs by members of the UK police force.  In Venting, Joining and Educating, the authors explored the motivations of serving police officers when joining the 'blogosphere'.

One police blog author has signed a publishing deal with an imprint of Harper Collins.  Confessions of a Police Constable will join the same publishing list as other 'confession' titles.  One of these, Confessions of a GP, has already sold a quarter of a million copies in e-book form.


Thursday 12 July 2012

Information overload and filter failure


What does it take to be a successful information professional, when so much information is available to us, our organisations and to our customers?  In March 2011, we published an article by Steve Dale.  In Surviving and thriving as a 21st century knowledge and information professional, Steve outlined how information professionals could use readily available tools to help manage information flows and become more effective.
I was reminded of his excellent, practical advice when I came across this blog post today.  Writing for the Gartner blog network, Craig Roth discusses whether there is an additional factor to add into Clay Shirkey’s famous statement that ‘there is no information overload, just filter failure’.
Roth suggests that we should consider not just the information bombarding us and demanding attention, but the information that is ‘hidden’ from us and could be of real value.  It’s a really interesting blog post – well worth a read.
In September this year, we will be publishing an article by Scott Brown.  In ‘Coping with information obesity:  A diet for information professionals’ Scott comes up with some practical solutions for information professionals, including the concept of ‘slow information’. 

If we are to be successful in our chosen careers we need to be able to demonstrate that we can locate, manage, filter, organise and share information appropriately and effectively.  If we can’t do it for ourselves, then why should our customers trust us?!

Monday 9 July 2012

Helpful advice for authors

An article published on Nature.com provides invaluable advice to non-native English speakers who are trying to publish.  

Some key pointers:
  • Be clear, concise and forthright
  • Look for models of well-written papers - read as many English-language papers in your subject as possible
  • Seek informal reviews from native English speakers
The article, along with more detailed advice, is available to download here.