We are pleased to announce the latest release of the Keepers Registry at http://thekeepers.org. This release adds significant new features that will help research library staff make local collection management decisions.
New Features Available in the Keepers Registry
Our new Member Services area provides access to our added-value features.  Once you’re registered you will find:
- Our Title List Comparison service, enabling a user to discover the archival status for a list of serials:  identifying those that are being archived and those that are “at risk”.
- The first version of our SRU and Z39.50 machine-to-machine interfaces.  This will be of value to other service providers who may wish to report Keepers Registry information in their interface.
- Direct Linking to Records to support bookmarking and sharing of specific records.
Access to our Member Services is free. To learn more and try out a Title List Comparison of your own, please register now.
How the Keepers Registry helps libraries
The Title List Comparison service lets you upload a list of titles identified by ISSN and receive a report with information on “who is archiving what” and what is not being archived.
Information from the Title List Comparison was used by one university to assist with local library collection management decisions. They told us about the benefits:
- Identifying which of our e-journal titles are archived. We were very quickly able to see which of our journal titles had some archiving activity reported.
- Lobbying publishers to engage with archiving agencies. Now that we can understand which titles and publishers are not being progressed, there is an opportunity to tell publishers that we think this is an important part of the subscription service.
- Discussing coverage with the agencies. Where we have specific local priorities, we are now better informed to initiate a discussion with archiving agencies to see how our priorities can be met.
- Disposing of print. We collaborate with other university libraries to dispose of print; knowing that the complete run of a title is preserved in electronic form provides reassurance that we are not depending solely on a single print copy.
- Discovery of other agencies. We have discovered other agencies that hadn’t previously been on our radar, and it has made us think about our relationship with other agencies and how we should be working with them.
We would like to hear how the Keepers Registry is helping your institution with collection management decisions. Please get in touch with feedback and suggestions for further improvements to edina@ed.ac.uk.
