Kirsty,
Whilst I appreciate the apology and realise that large projects do have
teething problem I feel more could have been done to 'improve' the service
before it was inflicted on users.
Also, there is no referece to my pointing out that ingenta currently
misleads users with regard what they can get for free and what they need
to pay for. Surely this is serious enough to withdraw the current service
and return to the previous interface until it can be fixed or there should
be a 'health warning' pointing out this is a possibility within search
results.
Further, you did not answer, or comment on, my second (and I consider more
serious) comment that ingenta collects personal information BEFORE it
really needs it thus invading the privacy of users to no purpose should
they subsequently choose not to the buy the article. This is a flagrant
disregarding of one of the basic rules of library and information work
where one does not ask for a user for indentification unless it is
necessary to deliver the required service.
Regards,
John Smith,
University of Kent at Canterbury.
On Thu, 7 Jun 2001, Kirsty Meddings wrote:
> Dear Nicholas, John,
>
> First of all, many apologies. We have been having a number of teething
> problems with the launch of the new ingenta website (as you have
> discovered), and are working extremely hard on fixing these to get it
> running as it should be as quickly as possible. Please bear with us -- and
> if you encounter further problems please let us know so we can ensure that
> they are fixed. We also appreciate feedback on the functionality of the
> site that we can feed into our product development process. Please contact
> me or the helpdesk at any time ([log in to unmask]; [log in to unmask])
> with questions or comments.
>
> The ingenta service has undergone a number of changes and improvements prior
> to this launch and the infrastructure has changed significantly. As are the
> risks with big software projects, the transition has not been as smooth as
> we would have wished. These are teething problems, however, and the end game
> is to deliver a much-improved service to our users. We are working very hard
> to deliver that, and regret any inconvenience caused by the transition.
>
> The other point that you raise is your dissatisfaction with the way search
> results are displayed. You are right that searching defaults to the UnCover
> database rather than online journals. Work is underway at present to make
> the distinction between the fax and online databases more obvious to users,
> and to ensure that the options are clearly marked and navigable.
>
> Please get back to me if there are any further issues you would like to
> discuss.
>
> Best wishes,
>
> Kirsty Meddings
> Library Marketing Manager
> ingenta
> www.ingenta.com
> CatchWord, an ingenta company
> www.catchword.com
> +44 (0)1235 555877
> ---------------------------------------------
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "J.W.T.Smith" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Thursday, June 07, 2001 2:18 PM
> Subject: Re: ingenta site + some other faults/failings of ingenta
>
>
> There are other faults with this service. For example it doesn't report
> correctly just what a user has free access to.
>
> A specific example: We subscribe to the journal Addiction from Carfax
> Publishing and we have full access to this title via CatchWord. However if
> I search for articles in this title in ingenta the results list indicates
> I have free access to some articles but tries to get me to pay for access
> to other articles. Of the first ten references in my results list only
> three are correctly reported as available from CatchWord the others I am
> asked to pay for.
>
> A related matter: If you need to pay for an article the system collects
> your details BEFORE it tells you how much you need to pay to get an
> article. THIS IS CONTRARY TO ALL THE BASIC RULES OF PRIVICY that I, as a
> Librarian, believe in. Should you choose to pay for an article then it is
> obviously a requirement to provide information for payment and delivery
> BUT NOT BEFORE.
>
> Regards,
>
> John Smith.
> University of Kent at Canterbury.
>
> On Thu, 7 Jun 2001, Nicholas Lewis wrote:
>
> > Leaving aside the current IP address recognition problems, I would be
> > interested in sharing ideas about how best to provide guidance for our
> users
> > on the new ingenta web site.
> >
> > The default 'search ingenta' option is a challenge as it seems to default
> to
> > 'uncover plus'. At first sight, having read the new help files under
> 'about
> > this site' (top of window), I had assumed that 'uncover plus' would now
> > include articles available in full-text online as well.
> > I quote: "The ingenta and UnCover content has now been integrated to offer
> > users single-point access to an unparalleled 25,000 publications linked to
> > the full-text articles of over 4,500 publications from 150 academic and
> > professional publishers. The combined service is UnCoverPlus."
> >
> > In fact, there is a separate 'online articles' tab for full-text articles.
> I
> > think this will be very difficult for our users, many of whom will be put
> > off if they see no results returned in the default 'uncover plus'. There
> is
> > no prompt then to check the 'online articles' tab which is what most of
> our
> > users will be wanting. ('Uncover plus' seems only to list those articles
> > available by fax or Ariel fax delivery.) I have looked at the
> > context-sensitive help (Need help?) at this point but the options that
> > display are not those I see on the screen.
> >
> > An example to try is: search for: tourism publication title:
> Singapore
> > Journal
> >
> > This returns no hits in 'uncover plus' but 3 in 'online articles'.
> >
> > I may be missing something here, so any suggestions would be gratefully
> > received!
> >
> >
> > Nicholas Lewis
> > Electronic Resources & LLT Subject Librarian
> > UEA Library
> > Norwich
> > NR4 7TJ
> > phone: 01603-592382
> > fax: 01603-259490
> >
>
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