Mintel 2010 - reporting on Irish Life and Work

Take a look at the series of new reports from Mintel in 2010. These include

> Young People (18-24s)and their Attitudes to Alcohol
> Convenience Retailing - Ireland
> Hot Trends in Retail Bakery - Bread,Cakes and Biscuits
> How Have Irish Companies and Consumers Embraced Online Shopping?
> Premium Alcoholic Drinks
> Personal Loans
> Expansion of Non-Food Lines in Supermarkets
> Savings - Ireland
> Targeting the Over-50s
> Domestic vs Overseas Holidays
> In-home Entertainment

Have a browse at www.dit.ie/library/databases/. Simply select Mintel Irish Reports from the A-Z list.

Reports from Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC)

There are a number of interesting reports on the PWC website which are worth a look. Under their Research and Insights section, for example, there is an analysis of the Transportation and Logistics industry to 2030, a Global Entertainment and Media Outlook from 2010-14 and a number of useful management reports. All reports are full text. In their Global Pressroom area business/marketing/media researchers might be interested in Back on Track - think global, win local to succeed in the global sports market and Consumer behaviour drives change: Entertainment and Media players seek new roles in digital value chain. These releases are not full text but contain key information nonetheless. For more see www.pwc.com.

News International withdraws from Databases

The future delivery of online newspapers and whether, in fact, they are financially viable has been a favourite industry topic in recent years. Sometime ago we posted a piece on the 'paywall' recently installed on The Times and Sunday Times websites. [See July 14th] At the time we were wondering if this was the future for online newspapers. It would seem that News International thinks it is. Two of the Library's major database suppliers - Westlaw UK and the Lexis and Nexis services - have now informed us that The Times, Sunday Times, The Sun and News of the World have all withdrawn their archives from these databases and terminated all future provision. It seems that the only way we are going to get to read News International publications online from now on is to pay up and scale that paywall!

2010 Case Study Writing Competition

Want to try your hand in the European Case Study Clearing House case writing competition? September 30th is the deadline for submissions to ecch. There are various categories listed on the website and the individual prize is £1,500 - as well as the fame of course! Visit www.ecch.com/casecompetition for further details.

What a paywall looks like!

Take a look at the new 'paywall' introduced on July 2nd. by the The Times and Sunday Times newspapers. The paywall is a screen you get when you try to go beyond the homepage at thetimes.co.uk. The options are a 24 hour day pass for £1 or you can pay £1 for 30 days and £2 per week thereafter. BBC Breakfast called the paywall 'a tollbooth in the middle of the ocean' and the Guardian has offered a warm welcome to 'former Times readers'. Is this the future for online newspapers? Apart from complaining about the need to login all the time, The Times blog comments are surprisingly favourable.

DIT Library and partners win funding for bibliometrics research

Four Irish academic libraries, UCD, DCU, DIT and Maynooth, are collaborating to produce online learning resources to support bibliometrics and research assessment awareness and training.

Bibliometrics is a set of methods used to measure research publications and is one key approach being used to assess research impact.

This project will produce a range of materials hosted on the NDLR dSpace platform that can be downloaded, customised and used under Creative Commons license by anyone providing bibliometrics awareness and training.
The successful bid was made for project funding from the NDLR LInCS (National Digital Learning Resources - Learning Innovation Community Support) 2010 programme (http://www.ndlr.ie/) with the materials available at the end of the year and showcased in the annual NDLR event.

Enhancements at Google Scholar

Google Scholar has now introduced e-mail alerts of newly indexed material that matches a previous search. To use simply carry out your search,display results and if you want to set up an alert, click the 'Envelope' icon on the top left. You can use proper names, keywords and phrases in your search but the alerts do not work with journal titles.

Scholar also now allows you to search within citing articles. Simply click on the "Cited By" link in the search results page. Then click on the "Search within articles citing" checkbox.

New Web Pages for Aungier Street Library

Aungier Street Library has now put together a specific set of web pages aimed at outlining the resources and services available to Business, Media and Law staff and students. The idea is that you will find everything you need to know about the library in the one spot! We hope you will find it useful. Have a look at http://www.dit.ie/library/sites/aungierst/

Business Barometer Service

The Business Barometer service from Vision-net is worth taking a look at. Describing itself as 'Tracking the pulse of Irish business risk weekly', the latest issue headlines "130 more Irish Company Insolvencies in 2010 than for the same period in 2009". The barometer includes data on company closures, insolvencies, appointments, CRO updates, registered mortgages/charges and more. If you are interested send your email address to receive updates.