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The Harbingers project, which studied the working lives and scholarly communication behaviour of early career researchers (ECRs) over 6 years, found evidence of changing attitudes to questionable (grey) publishing. Thus, whilst predatory publishers have come to be treated with equanimity, as a problem easily dealt with, there was growing concern with the high volume of low-grade research being generated, some of which by 'grey' open access publishers for want of a better name (questionable and non-standard have also been used). With the recent announcement (2023) that the government of Malaysia (a Harbinger case country) is not providing Article Processing Charges (APCs) for articles published by MDPI, Frontiers and Hindawi on quality and cost grounds, we set out to see what lay behind this decision and whether other countries exhibited similar concerns. Information was obtained by asking Harbinger country leads, mostly embedded in research universities, from Australia, China, France, Israel, Malaysia, Poland, Spain, UK, and the US to conduct desk research to establish what is happening. It was found that countries, like ECRs, appear to have formed into two different camps, with China, Poland, France, and Spain joining Malaysia in the camp of those who felt concerned about these publishers and the UK, US, Israel, and Australia belonging to the camp of the unconcerned. Explanations for the split are furnished and whether the Malaysian position will prevail elsewhere is considered. Finally, in this paper, we have aired issues/concerns, rather than provided robust, systematic data. For a systematic study we shall have to wait for the fuller study we are hoping to conduct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After two-years of repeat interviewing around 170 early career science/social science researchers from China, France, Malaysia, Poland, Russia, Spain, UK and US about their work life and scholarly communications in pandemic-times, the Harbingers project is now in possession of a mountain of data on what constitutes a very important academic topic. The purpose of the paper is to share the early highlights of the data, with a focus on the main and lasting impacts of the pandemic. The data presented comes from the national interviewers, who had conducted 3 rounds of interviews with their 20 or so early career researchers (ECRs) over two years and, thus, knew them well. They were asked to provide an ‘aerial view’ by identifying the most important impacts they had detected while things were still fresh in their minds. The main findings are that: 1) ECRs, the research workhorses, have generally proved to be resilient and perseverant and some have prospered; 2) the pandemic has fast-tracked researchers to a virtual and remote scholarly world, with all the advantages and disadvantages that comes with it. The data, however, is nuanced, with significant differences occurring between countries, especially China and France. The paper also updates a literature review on the topic previously published in this journal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital native media have gone through different stages since their emergence in the last decade of the twentieth century under the shadow of the evolution of the ‘network of networks’ and digital transformation. Despite the influence that legacy media have exerted on the models of many digital media, the efforts they have made to find their own way in the digital communication ecosystem have resulted in the introduction of new practices and strategies that have fuelled renewed debates on journalistic frontiers. The aim of this paper is to review the birth, evolution and current landscape of digital native media with special attention given to research in this field. This is an object of study with its own and differential characteristics in relation to legacy media, which attracts the focus of more and more digital communication researchers every day. To offer a current assessment of such research, a systematized review of articles published in scientific journals included in the Web of Science and Scopus databases was carried out. The results show that the conceptualization of digital native media, their mapping in media ecosystems and comparison with legacy media, the study of their typology and characteristics, research on their economic and organizational models, the analysis of their content, and their relationship with audiences are among the main objects of research. These media constitute a fundamental sector in the current media ecosystem, which will require multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives in their research to face the challenges of digital media, digital native media and digital journalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Around 170 early career researchers (ECRs) from 8 countries were interviewed about the whole range of their scholarly communication attitudes/behaviours during pandemic times and this paper analyses what they said about predatory journals in a wide range of scholarly communication contexts. Because of the delicacy of the topic there was just one question exclusively directed at predatory journals, which asked about policies rather than actions, which yielded nevertheless wide-ranging comments on the topic. ECRs also volunteered information on predatory journals in another half dozen questions, most notably including one on questionable research practices. The source of data was mainly the final interview of three undertaken, with some comparisons made to rounds one and two. Findings disclose the existence of a whole raft of formal and informal assessment policies/codes that direct ECRs to legitimate journals and away from predatory ones. Despite being junior, ECRs are very accultured to the criteria of what is considered as prestige and quality and believe predatory publishing is not even conceivable. They are far more concerned about low-quality research, preprints and borderline 'grey' journals. The pandemic has increased the level of questionable practices and low-quality research, but predatory journals were only singled out by a relatively small number of ECRs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

“What is the role of universities nowadays?” is one of the questions that those of us who work there should be asking ourselves. Knowledge transfer has emerged as academia’s third mission and must drive social change and development. Specifically, this paper aims to analyze knowledge transfer’s significance in the social sciences and, more specifically, in communication sciences, by looking at the call for the six-year academic research period on knowledge transfer in 2018 and taking into account what is happening in other disciplines. The contributions of the Spanish university community in terms of knowledge transfer fall behind other countries in our field. Only approximately 1% of international patents result from Spanish research. This disparity between these two realms demonstrates the need to promote knowledge transfer as the third helix of the triple helix of an interactive and dynamic university model in communication with institutions and social agents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After two-years of talking to around 170 early career science/social science researchers from China, France, Malaysia, Poland, Russia, Spain, UK and US about their work life and scholarly communications during the pandemic, the Harbingers-2 project is in possession of a mountain of verbatim data. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the kinds of comments ECRs are raising, with a focus on those that provide a particular interesting and illuminating take on ECRs' experiences under difficult times. Comments, for instance, that might challenge the established order of things or that presage big changes down the line. The selection of comments presented here were made by the national interviewers shortly after the completion of the last of three rounds of interviews (two interviews in the case of Russia). The understandings, appreciations and suggestions thus raised by the ECRs are insightful and constructive, which is what we might have expected from this cohort who are very much at the forefront of the research enterprise and veritable research workhorses. Sixteen broad scholarly topics are represented by quotes/comments, with the main focus of the comments on a subset of these: research performance and assessment, scholarly communication transformations, networking and collaboration, social media and access to information/libraries, which suggests, perhaps, where the action, concerns and interest mainly lie. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers a genealogy of the field of mass media and communication theory and research, with the purpose of distilling a grand narrative of media studies and communication science. Such a 'story of stories' is articulated with recurring concerns over the categories and taxonomies of the communication process, the rapid development and penetration of new information and communication technologies, and attempts by scholars around the world to respond to our increasingly complex and convergent media environment. In conclusion, an argument is developed for a vital, creative, and public way forward for the field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Doctoral dissertations enable the transfer of research skills and capacities to future generations and the consolidation of lines of research in a given area of knowledge. The field of Library and Information Science in public universities in Spain is characterized by the supervision of doctoral theses by academics in the area. We identified active professors during the 2019-2020 academic year, their date of appointment as civil servants within the public university system, the dissertations that they supervised, and their participation in papers published in scientific journals. The analysis included 644 theses. About a quarter (23%) of university faculty have never supervised a doctoral thesis, and most faculty members and tenured professors (60%) show a lower than average rate of adviserships per year since their academic appointment. There is a high concentration of PhD advisers in just a few institutions and academics (8% of university professors have supervised 42% of the dissertations), with an important gender imbalance: women supervised an average of 1.8 dissertations, compared with 2.6 for men. Information units and services, study metrics and scientific publications, and information sources are the topics of 47% of the dissertations. Many of the professors with 10 or more adviserships (n/N = 12/18) lack a subject area specialization, and their role in PhD supervision was not related to their participation in research activities oriented toward publishing in scientific journals. Our results suggest that considering supervision of doctoral theses as an important academic merit could contribute to a further concentration of power and social capital among a small group of advisers. This phenomenon could reduce the plurality of topics addressed and favor suboptimal adviserships. The imbalances described emerge as another threat, exacerbating the epistemological crisis in the discipline and in the university studies in this area of knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The currently dominant model of scientific production in the field of communications research exhibits an over standardization of mainly empirical research, which is overwhelmingly carried out using quantitative techniques based on simple statistical analysis, in many cases limiting the presented results to an interpretation of the available data. This paper presents an innovative proposal in the field, designed as a new strategy for scientific dissemination and presentation. It puts forward the objective of building three composite indicators that, applied to European public service media, will allow the assessment of the perception of their social value, independence, and management efficiency. Moreover, a study that enables a comparative vision of these three issues in all the countries of the European Union, excluding Malta and Luxemburg, is also proposed. This methodology represents an innovation because it thoroughly explains the process and justifies the validity of the documentary sources used to facilitate their reproduction or questioning. It also reinforces the discussion of the results with the evaluation of the indicators' robustness before deciding which of them is most appropriate on each occasion for comparing the results using a multicriteria decision analysis technique, the Technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (Topis) method, proposed by Hwang and Yoon (1981). The results attest that synthetic indicators are an innovative, original, and validatable methodological tool that can contribute to the progress of research in the field of the communications sciences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To know the perceived and real difficulties of the company in Spain in relation to the implementation of R+D+i by the Spanish business, we start from the vision that employees have about the ease or difficulty of their companies at the time of doing research and development and therefore, innovation. In this paper we analyze the highlights of the survey prepared under the auspices of the "Scientific Culture Research Project: perception and attitudes towards science and innovation in the Spanish business sector" funded by the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness. The results obtained advance that education and the promotion of an innovative attitude are the basis for achieving a successful business development since innovation is one of the key pillars of the maintenance and survival of companies today. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reference management software is a well-known tool for scientific research work. Since the 1980s, it has been the subject of reviews and evaluations in library and information science literature. This paper presents a systematic review of published studies that evaluate reference management software with a comparative approach. The objective is to identify the types, models, and evaluation criteria that authors have adopted, in order to determine whether the methods used provide adequate methodological rigor and useful contributions to the field of study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spanish research in Documentation (or Library and Information Science, LIS) began to stand out in the 1980s, in parallel with the creation of university studies in Library and Information Science, and it increased its activity significantly until the year 2000. In this period, research in Documentation was oriented to disseminate rather than innovate, and also had a low international impact, shortage of economic and human resources, and poor methodological quality. In the first 20 years of the 21st century, we have witnessed an outstanding growth and diversification of this research activity, which has led to the overcoming of most of the problems mentioned before. The objective of the text is to present a general overview of the development of Documentation research in Spain in the last 20 years based on the analysis of five fundamental aspects: publications (articles and monographs), topics and methodologies, scientific journals, research projects and doctoral theses. General descriptive data from public statistical sources and comments from a bibliographic review are provided for each of them. As a conclusion, a very positive global balance of Spanish research in Documentation in the last 20 years stands out, not only a quantitative increase (in publications, theses, research projects, etc.) but also a qualitative improvement in the use of research methods and techniques, as well as a diversification of the research topics. In any case, internationalization (collaboration with foreign authors) and the presentation of international projects could be improved. Finally, there is a risk in near future related to aging and the absence of generational renewal of the research staff that can will slow down this growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers a management model to create an open access office at the Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. This office intends to provide instruction and training to the members of the different open access projects being developed at the University. It aims at improving the scientific communication system and giving visibility to the academic production, as well as the historic resources that belong to the libraries, museums and archives of the University. A detailed description of the mission, vision, objectives, structure and main functions of the open access office are described [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mobility and access to Web contents and services from any place having an internet connection are both advantages of using mobile devices like mobile phones, pdas, smartphones, ultra mobile PCs or ultra low cost PCs. However, new questions also arise, mainly related to content accessibility: their characteristics, connections and the way people in motion connect to the internet generate different requirements. In this paper a general landscape of the mobile web is drawn from a librarian's perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The state of the Spanish LIS profession and specialities in 2002 is reviewed. Statistical data is provided about both the number and type of Spanish libraries and archives as well as of practising professionals, according to geographic distribution, training and job description. Spanish library and information authorities are identified as well as professional associations and learned societies and conferences held. University education is also examined with descriptions of existing institutions, degree levels and data on student enrolment and teachers. The primary media for professional communication are described, in particular publishers, bulletins, scientific journals and electronic fora. Publishing output is quantified: books, journal articles, and conference papers both at national and international levels. Finally, research in the field is analysed through the total of Ph. D. dissertations presented, research articles published and research projects funded. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we show that the aggregation of bibliometric indices is an appropriate way to evaluate scientific production of researchers because it allows us to develop much more precise new bibliometric indices that combine the advantages of each index that is aggregated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]