COUNTER Newsletter, January 2025
30 January 2025Late last week we sent out our first newsletter of 2025. Here’s what we said:
Happy new year! We have a roundup of news for you in this month’s newsletter, including updates on when Release 5.1 reports will be available – check out the first story to find out more.
Sadly, 2025 brought the awful news that our valued colleague and Board member, Irene Barbers, has died. Irene’s contributions to COUNTER over the years have been immense, and she will be very much missed by all of us. Her passing also means that we need to recruit a new Board member to fill her place, and there is more information about how to nominate yourself or a colleague to that role later in this newsletter.
Elsewhere in this issue you’ll find an alert about the publication of our long-awaited bug fix Release 5.1.0.1, an update on the 2025 COUNTER Conference (still free for members), and a round up of skill-builder posts from our website.
Release 5.1 reports
We’re into the live phase for Release 5.1, and publishers are racing to get their Release 5.1 tools into live service before the delivery date for the January reports (28 February). We know that libraries are keen to have information about R5.1 availability: be assured that Tasha is in touch with everyone who is in the COUNTER Registry and will be adding information about migrations to the Registry as they happen.
While we always want to offer a personal response to library queries, please be aware that the sheer volume of emails about R5.1 availability is becoming unmanageable and we may not be able to respond to individual messages. If you have a question about when you will be able to access R5.1 reports, please check out our blog post for general information and the Registry for the latest notifications.
Fix Release 5.1.0.1 has been published
As part of our continuous maintenance process, we have published a series of clarifications and corrections as a Fix release, R5.1.0.1. Take a look at our blog post to learn more about the bug fixes, clarifications and improvements to sample reports in this latest fix.
Join the COUNTER Board
We have a new opportunity to join the COUNTER Board. COUNTER’s Board of Directors make sure we are delivering on our mission and objectives. If you are enthusiastic about usage metrics and want to guide us forward, this is the perfect role for you.
The COUNTER Conference 2025 – call for papers
The second COUNTER Conference will be on the theme of “Measuring usage of non-controlled content”. This online, members-only event will take place alongside our Annual General Meeting on Thursday 5th June 2025. We are now calling for proposals to speak at the conference. Take a look at the blog post for details of what we are looking for and send your proposals by 28 February.
Build your knowledge
- Choosing the right metric – how to assess return on investment
- GetFTR and syndicated usage metrics
- Tables of contents – why and how usage of book ToCs can be counted
- Granularity – how to report usage for a whole period, or month by month, using COUNTER’s JSON schema