Preview: KGL PubFactory Virtual Series 2021

Preview: KGL PubFactory Virtual Series 2021

Platform Services Director, Tom Beyer gives us an idea of what to expect at this year’s user group meeting

The PubFactory online hosting platform, established in 2010, has been holding an annual customer meeting—either in-person or virtual—for many years. This eagerly anticipated event is one of the great benefits of belonging to the PubFactory community and continues under ownership of KnowledgeWorks Global Ltd. (KGL).

Once again, from October 13-15, over 60 scholarly publishing stakeholders will convene a three-day Virtual Series to share knowledge, hear from platform partners and industry experts, and learn the latest developments in the PubFactory roadmap during a variety of information-packed and interactive remote sessions. Recently I asked platform co-founder and technical lead, Tom Beyer what we can expect this year.

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Spotlight on Our India Teams

Spotlight on Our India Teams

The worldwide publishing industry today would not function without the experience, support and technical skills of vast content services operations in India. Publishers, in the Global North especially, rely on the production and technology expertise of an entire support industry in one of the world’s largest emerging markets.

While initiatives to promote Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) among staff, authors, reviewers and other stakeholders have (rightfully) taken center stage in recent years at scholarly, education, and trade publishing houses in North America and Europe, they have largely focused on issues of race and gender. Not nearly as much recognition is paid to geographical inclusion or to our industry colleagues in the Global South who ensure the ultimate delivery of a large quantity of the world’s books, journals and other publications.

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The Meteoric Rise of Video Content

The Meteoric Rise of Video Content

Consumer behavior is constantly evolving. Some consumer trends are temporary and relate to the circumstances and conditions du jour, while others take on greater cultural significance, establishing a permanent foothold on society, our habits and customs, and the way we go about our everyday lives.

Our relationship with video content is perhaps one of the most underestimated cultural phenomena of recent years. And global consumption of video as a medium has certainly accelerated since the start of last year. A recent study by video marketing firm Wyzowl revealed that 68 percent of consumers felt the pandemic had impacted the amount of video content they watched online, with 96 percent saying this had increased.

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UX Design Strategies for Journal Websites

UX Design Strategies for Journal Websites

UX design is an integral part of the journal publishing strategy and can lead to increased article usage, longer on-page time and fewer site exits or bounces. Adopting best practices for your journal website is key for attracting and retaining subscribers as well as growing the reach of your journal’s content.

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Content Platform Migrations: 5 Important Lessons

Content Platform Migrations: 5 Important Lessons

The publishing platform business is constantly evolving, with home-grown technologies and commercial solutions continuously developing new capabilities to better serve authors and researchers. As a result, publishers occasionally migrate journals, books and other content from one delivery platform to another, a process considered by many to be something of a perilous minefield.

In March, KGL PubFactory’s very own Tom Beyer took part in a virtual panel discussion at the Electronic Resources and Libraries (ER&L) Annual Conference 2021 entitled “How We Work Together: Improving the Content Platform Migration Process”, alongside some of our friends and colleagues in the NISO Content Platform Migrations Working Group. The session explored the current state of platform migrations from the viewpoint and experiences of a major university press, an academic library and the content platform provider perspective, while showcasing some of the recommendations and deliverables of the NISO Working Group. Here are five key lessons we gleaned from the session.

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Reimagining Virtual School: Better Learning Strategies for a Digital Future

Reimagining Virtual School: Better Learning Strategies for a Digital Future

Perhaps the most fundamental problem with remote learning is the way that school systems approach the use of technology in the classroom, often simply mirroring in-person activities in a digital environment rather than tailoring or reapproaching lessons using different tools that technology offers. When online learning was just a quick fix until students got back to the classroom, that was fine. But as we look ahead to a future with digital learning likely to continue as part of the curriculum to a certain degree, we want to highlight a few ways that schools and educators can reimagine the virtual experience to be more effective for students and teachers alike.

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Innovations in Content Hosting

Innovations in Content Hosting

A year of advances for the KGL PubFactory platform and the scholarly community

Since the beginning of a very disruptive 2020, scholarly publishers have had to contend with uncertainty in institutional markets, sudden demands for rapid dissemination of critical research, and an ongoing existential crisis due to Open Access (OA) mandates. Fortunately, industry partners have been there to support content providers of all sizes and types with enhanced workflows, integrated services, and advanced solutions that met the moment.

A review of the last year of exciting developments here at KGL PubFactory demonstrates how publishers of academic books and journals can evolve and even thrive with the right technology support—better serving their authors, users, and society at large even during challenging times.

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Seven Publishing Trends for 2021

Seven Publishing Trends for 2021

At around the same time last year, publishing industry experts and analysts looked ahead with optimism, hope and excitement as they speculated on what wonders 2020 might bring. As we all know, things didn’t exactly turn out as we expected. But, while many might think that trying to second-guess what the future may hold is a bit like nailing jello to the wall right now, surprisingly there are actually many clear indications of what could be in store for us in 2021. Here are our top seven predictions for what publishers can expect from the year ahead.

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Maintaining Trust in Academic Publishing

Maintaining Trust in Academic Publishing

In the early part of this year, as the COVID-19 pandemic spread rapidly around the globe, the international medical community was attempting to disseminate research as quickly as possible to educate an anxious public on an unknown virus and to advance treatments and ultimately, a vaccine. Social and traditional media featured an alarming amount of misinformation from non-scientific sources, which put even more pressure on journals to validate facts and deliver them as quickly as possible.

Unfortunately, as the pandemic reached a fever pitch, research was publicized and then retracted when questions arose about inconsistencies where journals and reviewers were not provided with the full set of data against which to conduct independent checks. “The hasty retractions…alarmed scientists worldwide who fear that the rush for research on the coronavirus has overwhelmed the peer review process,” reported the New York Times.

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Knowledge Sharing: Five Minutes with Tom Beyer, Director of Platform Services at KGL PubFactory

Knowledge Sharing: Five Minutes with Tom Beyer, Director of Platform Services at KGL PubFactory

Recently, we were very excited to welcome the PubFactory hosting platform to KnowledgeWorks Global Ltd.’s end-to-end portfolio of publisher services. As we wrapped up the PubFactory Virtual Series publisher forum earlier this month, I asked the platform’s technical and creative leader, Tom Beyer what it’s like to join KGL, what makes PubFactory different, and where online hosting technology is taking scholarly publishers and their users.

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Is XR technology’s “Zoom moment” finally on the horizon?

Is XR technology’s “Zoom moment” finally on the horizon?

Every year - like clockwork - technology experts and futurists speculate as to whether this will finally be THE YEAR for mass market adoption of VR (virtual reality), AR (augmented reality) and MR (mixed reality), now commonly referred to under the useful catch-all umbrella term XR (extended reality) technologies.

When the vast majority of the world’s population was plunged into lockdown this year, and whether we liked it or not, staying in became the new going out, these debates around XR adoption logically intensified. This was to be the perfect storm. Suddenly the conditions were ripe for immersive innovations to really come to the fore and show their full potential.

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Confessions of an Accidental Editor

Confessions of an Accidental Editor

KGL’s Peter Olson blogs how an English major wound up copyediting science journals, what he has learned over his long career, and where to start to become an STEM journal copyeditor.

Copyediting is referred to by some as “the accidental profession,” and this pretty much sums up my own odyssey—and I’m not alone. If you were to survey the legion of copyeditors working today, many of them would reveal their secret identities as English Literature majors who, in sidestepping a career in academia, fell backwards into the vortex of copyediting—only to find that it was their true calling all along.

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MUP fields an OA compliance curveball with the support of PubFactory’s SiteGen module

MUP fields an OA compliance curveball with the support of PubFactory’s SiteGen module

In 2018, we collaborated with Manchester University Press (MUP) on a hosting platform that would bring all of their books and journals online.

Manchester is the largest research university in the UK, and the Press is one of the largest University Presses in the UK, publishing around 200 books and 6 journals a year.

Our emphasis at PubFactory over the last 20 years has been one of combining and hosting different kinds of content on a single web platform. The MUP project was of particular importance to us in 2018 in that it not only dealt with both books and journals, but it also involved hosting both subscription and Open Access (OA) content.

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Designing Your User Experience Strategy, Part 3 (The Creative Process)

Designing Your User Experience Strategy, Part 3 (The Creative Process)

When designing your publishing platform, there are many factors to consider to deliver an optimal user experience. It’s critical to establish a user-first driven process.

As discussed in parts 1 and 2, it is imperative that your web publishing platform be designed with accessibility, responsiveness, and consistency for all users and devices. Publisher websites are often built using templates and components to help present content in a familiar pattern that users recognize and can easily access. But when designing the “skin” for these experiences, maintain your stylistic uniqueness to strengthen your brand presence. Your brand’s attributes and voice must be visually communicated.

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Designing Your User Experience Strategy, Part 2 (Accessibility Improves Experience)

Designing Your User Experience Strategy, Part 2 (Accessibility Improves Experience)

Website accessibility is not a new topic. In fact, it’s been a factor since 2010 when the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) published standards that digital technology and information must be accessible to all people. At that point, most companies did not think that responsibility for website accessibility applied to them, or that they were required to address it unless they were receiving federal funds/grants. Additionally, the general perception was that creating accessible websites was more costly and entailed a lengthier process to implement. Not surprisingly, the ROI to include accessibility as part of the web design process was not considered valuable enough to be a default priority.

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Designing Your User Experience Strategy: Part 1

Designing Your User Experience Strategy: Part 1

Tracey Greene is the Chief Creative Director at Digital Artisans, KGL PubFactory’s lead design partner. In this three-part blog post series, Tracey shares valuable insights into maximizing discoverability and accessibility when creating your digital content platform.

Your website platform should be available to every person on any device. The following are critical considerations in a “mobile-first” world for maximizing discoverability and accessibility when creating the optimal user experience for journeys across all of your digital content.

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Teaching with Tech: Five Tips for Navigating K–12 Distance Instruction

Teaching with Tech: Five Tips for Navigating K–12 Distance Instruction

It would be an understatement to say that these are challenging times for teachers. Plunged into lockdown with no time to prepare for it, educators are quickly adapting to the new realities of distance instruction while getting up to speed with technology platforms, unfamiliar teaching techniques, and changing district and institutional guidelines. Throw in pressures to ensure students don’t fall behind juxtaposed with advice to refrain from overwhelming students and their families, and the situation becomes even more delicate.

Technology has without doubt been the great enabler of education during the COVID-19 crisis.

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Fast-Tracking COVID-19 Research

Fast-Tracking COVID-19 Research

Five Questions for Debbie McClanahan, KGL’s VP of Journal Publishing Services

I wanted to look deeper into other areas of the research workflow that can be expedited in the cause of helping authors and publishers vet and distribute important discoveries. So I consulted one of our internal experts, KGL’s Debbie McClanahan, VP of Journal Publishing Services, to draw on her decades of experience helping academic publishers take their content from accepted manuscript to copyedited, typeset and verified articles available for download.

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Education Publishers Rise to the Challenge of Lockdown Learning

Education Publishers Rise to the Challenge of Lockdown Learning

In our recent “Publishing as an essential business” post we looked at how the industry has been responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly focusing on how publishers are contributing to global efforts to confront the crisis and prove their value. There has undoubtedly been a concerted effort from every corner of the industry, whether that’s by making critical content accessible when it’s needed most or by making these distressing times more tolerable and entertaining for isolated readers.

Of all the industry sub-sectors, education publishing in particular has been in overdrive in recent weeks, as worldwide lockdowns have flung parents, students, teachers and educational institutions into the unfamiliar territory of home schooling and distant learning.

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