Database Audit
An audit of the subscriber database which would link each subscriber to an authoritative master record for the institution and provide additional metadata for both.
Information Power Ltd (IPL), a Ringgold Company, has developed a database of subscribing organizations originally based on the Subscriber Database Audit project which was undertaken in 2003 for Oxford University Press (OUP). There is now a database of subscribers covering 16 countries, and containing the formal name, city, region, postcode, country, type, size and URL for the institutional parent of each subscriber. It includes tiered structures such as JISC bands and Carnegie classifications where appropriate. Each of the subscriber records is linked to a master institutional record, and a hierarchy is created to bring all subscribers into a grouping at the highest level, which may be a consortium or the global headquarters of a company.
OUP found this database service to be enormously valuable and is encouraging other publishers to join in the development of this database. Because this is being done for a group of publishers, the master records are reused and the research costs substantially reduced. Ringgold uses qualified researchers around the world to identify the local organizations and to research the information about them. This collaborative effort is open to all publishers, and new countries and institutions are being added on a regular basis.
An updating service has now been established so that participating publishers can ensure that their subscriber information, once audited, is kept regularly up-to-date. This is accomplished by the regular assignment of institutional parents to new subscribers and by the regular uploading of information concerning changed parent/child relationships (e.g., company take-overs, health service reorganizations, academic institution mergers).
For more details, contact: Helen Henderson
