Upcoming Events
January 20-24: NISO Standards Update at ALA Midwinter 2012 (Dallas, TX)
February 8: Embracing the Cloud: Real Life Examples of Library Cloud Implementation (NISO Webinar)
February 13: ERM Data Standards and Best Practices Review (NISO Open Teleconference)
February 22: Taking Library Data From Here to There (NISO/DCMI Webinar)
March 14: Part 1: EPUB3: Putting Electronic Books into a Package (NISO Webinar)
March 21: Part 2: Find That E-book - or Not: How Metadata Matters (NISO Webinar)
April 11: What to Expect When You're Expecting a Platform Change: Perspectives from a Publisher and a Librarian (NISO Webinar)
Workrooms
View public documents and calendar events from NISO working groups and committees
January 20-24: NISO Annual Meeting and Standards Update at ALA Midwinter *** February 8 - NISO Webinar: Embracing the Cloud *** February 13 - NISO Open Teleconference ERM Data Standards and Best Practices Review
Welcome to NISO
NISO is where content publishers, libraries, and software developers turn for information industry standards that allow them to work together. Through NISO, all of these communities are able to collaborate on mutually accepted standards — solutions that enhance their operations today and form a foundation for the future.
NISO News
NISO Publishes New Recommended Practice on Physical Delivery of Library Resources (January 19, 2012)
The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) announces the publication of the new recommended practice: Physical Delivery of Library Resources (NISO RP-12-2012). The physical delivery of library materials is an integral component of the library resource sharing process. Despite the ever-increasing availability of electronic journals, e-books, and other digital resources, the movement of physical items remains a major concern and a major cost for many libraries. In one state, borrowing of returnable items increased by 107.4% in six years. A recent study showed that the average academic library spends more than $6,800/year for delivery services, with some libraries paying as high as $60,000. Given such volumes, libraries are struggling to deal with the labor and equipment costs, material wear and tear, and transit and sorting needs. [Read the full press release]
NISO Releases Updated Draft of SERU: A Shared Electronic Resource Understanding for Public Comment (January 5, 2012)
The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) announces the availability of a draft update of SERU: A Shared Electronic Resource Understanding for public comment (NISO RP-7-201X) through February 19, 2012. SERU offers publishers and libraries the opportunity to save both the time and the costs associated with a negotiated and signed license agreement for e-resources by both content provider and customer agreeing to operate within a framework of shared understanding and good faith. The SERU framework provides a set of common understandings for parties to reference as an alternative to a formal license when conducting business. [Read the full press release]
New Issue of NISO’s Information Standards Quarterly Magazine Focuses on Benefits of Standards Implementation (December 20, 2011)
The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) announces the publication of the Fall 2011 issue of the Information Standards Quarterly (ISQ) magazine with a special issue theme of Standards Implementation Benefits. In this issue of ISQ, we provide several specific examples of the benefits of implementing standards, ranging from savings in staff time to improved customer service and a way to attract new customers. [Read press release] [Go to ISQ issue]
NISO and Open Archives Initiative Receive Grant from Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to Create Resource Synchronization Standard (December 14, 2011)
The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) and the Open Archives Initiative have been awarded a $222,000 grant for a joint project to develop a new open standard on the real-time synchronization of Web resources. Increasingly, large-scale digital collections are available from multiple hosting locations, are cached at multiple servers, and leveraged by several services. This proliferation of replicated copies of works or data on the Internet has created an increasingly challenging problem of keeping the repositories’ holdings and the services that leverage them up-to-date and accurate. As we move from a Web of documents to a Web of data, synchronization becomes even more important: decisions made based on unsynchronized or incoherent scientific or economic data can have serious deleterious impact. [More Information]
NISO Endorses BISG Policy on the Use of ISBNs for E-books (December 8, 2011)
The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) is pleased to support and endorse the Book Industry Study Group’s new policy statement, Best Practices for Identifying Digital Products. This publication will help to clarify the increasingly complex problems associated with the identification of electronic books in the supply chain. [More Information]
NISO Issues COUNTER-SUSHI Implementation Profile for Public Comment (December 7, 2011)
The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) announces the availability of NISO SUSHI Protocol: COUNTER-SUSHI Implementation Profile (NISO RP-14-201X) for a public comment period ending on January 20, 2012. This Recommended Practice provides a practical implementation structure to be used in the creation of reports and services related to harvesting of COUNTER Release 4 reports using the NISO SUSHI Protocol. The Standardized Usage Statistics Harvesting (SUSHI) Protocol was issued as a standard (ANSI/NISO Z39.93) in 2007 to simplify and automate the harvesting of COUNTER usage reports by libraries from the growing number of information providers they work with. COUNTER (Counting Online Usage of Networked Electronic Resources) is an international initiative that published their first Code of Practice in 2003 and issued Draft Release 4 of the COUNTER Code of Practice for e-Resources in October 2011. The comment period for the COUNTER-SUSHI Implementation Profile and COUNTER Release 4 end on the same date. XML schemas supporting the draft Implementation Profile and draft Release 4 of the Counter Code of Practice have also been published by NISO for review during the comment period. [More Information]