Basic presentation of altmetrics, introducing some central concepts, seen in relation to traditional bibliometrics. Discusses the potential, but also the theoretical problems, of altmetrics.

1. Jens Peter Andersen
MLISc, PhD
Aalborg University Hospital

2. 
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Citations
Journal impact

3. Research
Journals
Internet
• Citations
• ”Impact”
• Twitter
• Facebook
Usage
• Mendeley
• CiteULike
Impact
News media
• Newspaper
• Television

4. 
Alternative metrics
◦ Not JUST citations

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Usage (downloads, readership)
Dissemination (Tweets, shares, likes, reddit, blogs,
youtube, newspaper etc.)

5. 
Communication between researchers
◦ Research publications
◦ Citations

6. 
From researcher to:
◦
◦
◦
◦
◦
◦
Researcher
Society
Media
Patients
Politicians
Etc.

7. 
”Societal impact” – broader, more diffuse than
”scholarly impact”

Distinction between impacts is central to altmetrics

8. 
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Altmetric.com (free librarian account)
ImpactStory (free user access, uses Orcid)
F1000 (Expert recommendations)
Mendeley (Readership)
PLoS (demo of altmetric.com, ALM)

15. 
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How do you count downloads?
Is a tweet always a good thing?
How sure are we of e.g. ”members of the public”?

16. 
Different types of tweets?
◦ Different degrees of impact?
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What does a download mean?
What does it mean to be a ”reader”?

17. 
References can (probably) be aggregated to citations,
especially for large units (macro-analysis)

Is this transferable to altmetrics?

18. 
Large amounts of data available
◦ Potential for macroscopic analyses

Usage of altmetrics is primarily local
◦ Micro- or mesoscopic analyses

19. 
Aggregates of altmetrics data
◦ University analyses etc.
◦ Potential for indicators

20. 
Paul Wouters distinguishes between:
◦ Theories of citations, references, indicators

Is there an equivalent approach to usage and social
data?
◦ How can we move from individual tweets to theories of their
meaning? Especially the meaning of multiple tweets.
◦ How about readership and downloads?
◦ What type of meaningful indicators could be constructed
from this?