Altmetrics: NISO Project Brings Scientific Evaluation Into the 21st Century With Altmetrics

Measurement is the big thing today in academe and NISO has finally entered the area hoping to bring some definitions, credibility and standards into this arena. I was asked to write about this for Information Today's NewsBreaks and you can read my report here.

The Altmetrics.org site explains the dilemma this way:

No one can read everything. We rely on filters to make sense of the scholarly literature, but the narrow, traditional filters are being swamped. However, the growth of new, online scholarly tools allows us to make new filters; these altmetrics reflect the broad, rapid impact of scholarship in this burgeoning ecosystem. We call for more tools and research based on altmetrics.

As the Altmetrics.org group notes: "Altmetrics are in their early stages; many questions are unanswered. But given the crisis facing existing filters and the rapid evolution of scholarly communication, the speed, richness, and breadth of altmetrics make them worth investing in."
Hopefully we will soon start to see some of the results of the NISO effort.

Stay tuned! And, feel free to share your thoughts here!