This document provides an overview of altmetrics, which are alternative metrics to traditional citations for measuring the impact of scholarly works. It discusses what altmetrics are, who the major players are in the altmetrics field, when altmetrics data is available, where altmetrics are relevant, why altmetrics are gaining importance, and how altmetrics data is collected and used. The document aims to give the reader a comprehensive introduction to the concept of altmetrics for evaluating scholarly impact and engagement.

1. Overview of Altmetrics
Joseph Kraus
University of Denver
For the CRC Library Advisory Board, June 13, 2015

2. Note:
• With approval, I am going to put this
online at
http://www.slideshare.net/jokrausdu/ov
erview-of-altmetrics, so you don’t have
to take prodigious notes.

3. Altmetrics
• Today, we are going to cover:
–What, who, when, where, why, and
how

5. Altmetrics – What?
• What is it?

7. Other terms
• Article-Level Metrics
• Artifact-Level Metrics

8. Altmetrics – Who?
• Jason Priem, Heather Piwowar
(ImpactStory)
• Euan Adie, Stacy Konkiel, Sara Rouhi
(Altmetric)
• Andrea Michalek and Mike Buschman
(Plum Analytics)
• Martin Fenner (PLOS)
• William Gunn (Mendeley)

9. Altmetrics – Who?
• Other interested parties
–NISO
–Publishers
–Librarians/Information Professionals
–Readers
–Policy makers
–Research Funders

10. Altmetrics – When?
• Right now and into the future
• Some services include digging into past
usage of older information

11. Altmetrics – Where?
• Any place where people care about
metrics
• San Francisco - DORA

12. Altmetrics – Why?
• More current usage data than citations
• Recent engagement and interactions
– See who is engaging with your content
– See how they are engaging with it
– See where they are marking or saving it
• Who is downloading the content?
• Where are people using that content?

13. Altmetrics – Why?
• Concerning social media, “there is a
danger that this form of communication
is gaining too high a value and that we
are losing sight of key metrics of scientific
value, such as citation indices.”
• From
http://genomebiology.com/2014/15/7/424

14. Altmetrics – Why?
• Molecular biologist Buddhini
Samarasinghe noted that some
researchers say: “‘Ha ha, let's laugh at
those silly scientists doing social media
outreach when they should be writing
papers!’ The K-index trivialises those of
us who work hard to communicate
science with the public.”

15. Altmetrics – Why?
• Funders want to broaden the impact
• http://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2007/nsf070
46/nsf07046.jsp
• Altmetrics can help verify that the
imapct has been broadened

16. Altmetrics – Why?
• Publish or perish culture
• Evaluate the quality of the work, not
the container
• Some organizations say that the
publication title is not under
consideration

17. Altmetrics – How?
• Three main funding models for
Altmetrics services companies
– From publishers
– From libraries/institutions
– From authors/researchers

18. Altmetrics – How?
• Altmetric
–For Publishers
–Bookmarklet
–Bookmetrix
–For Institutions and/or individuals

27. Altmetrics – How?
• Plum Analytics
• http://www.plumanalytics.com/abo
ut.html
• Pitt and/or the University of Denver

29. Altmetrics – How?
• ImpactStory
–https://impactstory.org/JosephKraus

31. Altmetrics – How?
• GrowKudos.com
–Ann Lawson
–ann@growkudos.com
–She has worked with someone at T&F
–https://growkudos.com/about/publish
ers
• AddThis & ShareThis services

37. Altmetrics – More examples
• From PLOS ONE
–http://www.plosone.org/article/Met
rics/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0
046150

39. Other things to investigate
• https://www.researchfish.com/ (for
researchers & funding organizations)
• http://symplectic.co.uk/ (For institutions)
• http://www.elsevier.com/solutions/scival
SciVal “Highlight the impact of their research
for assessment and funding purposes”
• https://hootsuite.com/plans/enterprise
• https://dlvr.it/pages/learn-more.php (similar
to addthis/twitterfeed)

40. Pop Quiz
• Who said or wrote:
“Not everything that can be counted
counts, and not everything that counts can
be counted.”

41. Questions?

42. More information
• http://www.asis.org/Bulletin/Apr-13/
• http://crln.acrl.org/content/74/6/292.full
• http://www.ala.org/acrl/publications/kee
ping_up_with/altmetrics
• https://kevinthelibrarian.wordpress.com/
2013/03/09/altmetrics-and-evaluating-
scholarly-impact-whats-out-there-and-
how-can-we-participate/

43. Even more
• Library Journal article on Plum by Bonnie
Swoger
• Assessing Altmetrics: Why law librarians (and
law schools) should care about altmetrics
• https://www.diigo.com/user/jokrausdu/altm
etrics
• Follow #altmetrics on Twitter
• http://www.mendeley.com/groups/586171/
altmetrics/

44. Image credits
• Google Images, “labeled for reuse with
modification”
• Raised hands
http://www.ok.gov/abletech/images/C
lassroom-FourthGraders.jpg via
http://www.ok.gov/abletech/Special_E
ducation_Resolution_Center/
• https://twitter.com/IanMulvany/status
/425006889949495296