-- First vendors compliant with COUNTER Code of Practice for Books --

Coutts-MyiLibrary, Greenwood Publishing Group and Xrefer are the first
three vendors to achieve compliance with the new COUNTER Code of
Practice for Books and Reference Works. As such they are providing their
customers with credible usage statistics that can be used to assess the
value of the growing number of online books now available.

"Greenwood Publishing is delighted to see the COUNTER efforts gain
traction...Potential customers of both our database products and our
ebooks consistently look for COUNTER compliance." Birgitte Elbek,
Greenwood Publishing

"By becoming one of the first aggregated eBook vendors to be COUNTER
compliant, MyiLibrary has responded to the changing demands of its
library customers worldwide for usage statistics in an industry standard
format." James Tucker, MyiLibrary

"COUNTER standardization of the usage reports enables librarians to
understand better the patterns of use of the resources to which they
subscribe; it also helps them in their collection development decision
making." Jenny Walker, Xrefer

 
The COUNTER Code of Practice for online books and reference works was
published in March 2006. Vendors seeking to comply with it should follow
the procedures described in the Code of Practice document, which is
available on the COUNTER website (http://www.projectCounter.org). Its
features include:

*	A set of six basic usage reports that cover full-text requests
for a whole title, as well as for sections (eg chapters, encyclopedia
entries) within a title. Searches, sessions and turnaways are also
covered.
*	A comprehensive set of definitions of terms relevant to books
and reference works
*	A format and structure consistent with the existing COUNTER Code
of Practice for journals and databases. Only the content of the usage
reports has been changed and the set of definitions of terms expanded.
The specifications for report delivery, data processing, auditing, and
compliance are identical to those already prescribed in the Code of
Practice for journals and databases.


-- About COUNTER --

COUNTER (Counting Online Usage of NeTworked Electronic Resources) is a
multi-agency initiative whose objective is to provide a set of
internationally accepted, extendible Codes of Practice that will allow
the usage of online information products and services to be measured
more consistently. COUNTER is actively supported by the international
community of librarians, vendors and intermediaries, and by their
professional organizations.

For more information, please contact:
Peter Shepherd
Director - COUNTER 
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