An Amazing NEW Research Tool

...too effective to be limited to university libraries

This feature is made possible by recent technological developments, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, and thousands of DLSG digitization systems in nearly 1,000 academic libraries

For Academic Libraries

For research it’s the fastest way to find gaps & inconsistencies in our knowledge clues, patterns & supporting research.

For Public Libraries

It’s the 21st century and everyone should have easy access to the best research tools and the highest quality information & knowledge possible

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Academic Libraries

Imagine your university’s researchers visiting the library more frequently than ever, even more often than pre-digital age. This amazing new research tool complements WorldCat and has capabilities lacking in Google Scholar. To use it, researchers gather articles found on WorldCat combined possibly with content from your print collections and perhaps with some of their own work, and input all content (print and digital) into KIC. KIC can then output the combined content in a form that can be ‘HotLinked’ to a billion of pages of scholarly content, including open access journal articles, open access monographs, pre- and ex-copyrighted content, and OER. Then, as researchers review the content on a tablet, phone or PC, with a simple swipe or mouse click, they are presented instantly with ‘HotLinked’ content that is highly correlated with their content, not just by a single keyword. And, in compliance with Digital Millennium Copyright Act Section 108, even copyrighted monographs in library print collections that have been digitized can be ‘HotLinked’ and instantly accessed in the same way, while the researcher is within the confines of the library.

5 reasons this research tool is so valuable:
  • Virtually all monographs in academic libraries can be instantly accessible while the researcher is in the library. More>Digital Millennium Copyright Act (©-Law) allows four digital copies of every copyrighted monograph and journal in a library’s collection to be kept on-site, one copy for local patrons and three copies for interlibrary lending. Using a new capability of the thousands of existing KIC high-speed digitization systems that are already in academic libraries, ©-Law Content Servers, a global project coordinating system and about 1,000 student worker hours per year, a few hundred large academic libraries can digitize a million books a year, with complete structural metadata, and share the content with each other’s patrons, in compliance with ©-Law.Less<
  • A researcher can rapidly review dozens, even hundreds of different scholarly documents, book excerpts and journal articles, several times more rapidly than with Google Scholar. More>Access is instant, typically with no perceptible time delay to access the next relevant monograph, article, etc. This is especially valuable when a researcher is ‘in the zone’ and his or her mind is entirely focused on finding clues, explanations, gaps and/or inconsistencies in the world’s current understanding of a topic.Less<
  • Many pages of context, not just one or a few keywords are used to find the most correlated and relevant materials. More>KIC and the HotLinks system analyzes the entire set of input documents and compares all of the input data against pre-analyzed data for each piece of content that is in the system, in about a second, typically before the user wishes to access the content.Less<
  • Searching is not limited to the citation or bibliographic record. More>The research system’s speed, effectiveness and lack of limitations allow researchers scan and read each potential source of information, instead of relying on one person’s summary of an article or monograph (citation/bibliographic record).Less<
  • Researchers can ‘get lucky’ and find valuable clues, explanations, gaps and/or inconsistencies that they weren’t looking for. More>The combination of instant access to virtually unlimited relevant content and correlation using many pages of input information yields results that would otherwise never be found because current research methods are too slow and tedious, and depend too much on direct, cognizant thinking by the researcher.Less<

Public Libraries

The most important mission of public libraries has always been to provide egalitarian access to information and knowledge. However, the people of today are more sophisticated than ever before, and the Web provides access to vast amounts of information (and misinformation). To fulfill this most important mission, public libraries must go far beyond what they have ever done before, and there two ways to do that: 1) provide access to high quality content that is not available on the Web; and 2) use technology to make research faster, easier and more effective.

Imagine seeing many new faces each day visiting your libraries to use a new research tool that provides such easy access to vast amounts of content from reputable sources such as the National Institute of Health, The Smithsonian, OpenStacks, open access books and journals, and possibly very soon, academic library collections.

As long as citizens do not have an easy alternative to getting all of their information from the Web, misinformation will continue to be a major problem. This research tool provides a fast, effective and easy to use alternative that is affordable enough to be made available even in communities of less than 1,000 citizens. While many scholarly monographs and perhaps most journal

3 reasons to make this research tool available in your public library:
  • to fulfill common needs of citizens for information that is not available on the Web or is too intermingled with misinformation;
  • to serve citizens who no longer have access to academic library resources, though they may have attended college and are adept at using academic library resources;
  • to give all resource-limited potential leaders, problem-solvers, scientists, engineers, doctors, etc. an opportunity to reach their full potential.

A library was serving the 3rd reason above when, in the mid-1800s, seventeen year old Andrew Carnegie learned enough at a local library to put him on a path to create the US steel industry, one of the key industries that made it possible for the US to have the best economy and best living conditions in the world. Also, by constructing 1,687 public library buildings, Mr. Carnegie fostered the belief that every community in America and eventually, around the world should offer public library services to its citizens.

Real Research is not a Casual Endeavor

Researchers’ needs are poorly met with mainstream search engines. KIC allows them to easily compile and edit 10 to 100 or more pages of relevant information, then submit it to HotLinks Research Tool, which instantly compares all pages submitted to a billion pages of scholarly monograph content, yielding a hundred best matches.

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Scientists, historians, sociologists, economists seldom start and end an avenue of research in a minute, an hour or even an afternoon. Prior to a new library research service, HotLinks Research Tool, the best tools for finding scholarly content that is relevant to an avenue of research have been Web search engines. Web search engines were built for the Web, primarily for laypeople as much for shopping as for answering questions. These search engines are not surprisingly, not ideal research tools.

However, with no better alternatives, for the past fifteen years or more, there has been a major push to get scholarly content onto the Web so that Web-based search engines can be used to sift through the vast information at lightening speeds. Such is the case with google Scholar, a service that is undoubtedly benefitting millions of researchers worldwide, scholars and laypersons alike. Yet online search services for scholarly content are lacking several major benefits that HotLinks Research Tool offers.

The most important benefit of HotLinks Research Tool is derived from its location: inside libraries. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 (©-Law) provides exclusions to copyright protection specifically for academic and public libraries, and research libraries that are open to the public. Hence, 100% of content found using HotLinks Research Tool is accessible, not just 10%, provided the content is in the library and only one user has access to that content at a time. ©-Law allows for one digital copy of each print volume in a library for local use and three digital copies for interlibrary lending.

Perhaps equal in importance to ©-Law’s exclusions for libraries is that researchers can assemble dozens, even a hundred pages of research on a particular topic, digitize printed research and import digital research into any of the thousands of KIC digitization kiosks that are in service in a thousand academic libraries and hundreds of public libraries, remove inapplicable content using KIC Composer, then output to HotLinks Research Tool, which uses all of this content as input for its unique algorithms to find the most relevant matching content from billions of pages of scholarly content. While relevancy comparisons on a hundred pages of content are far more extensive than simply searching for one or a few terms typed by the researcher, HotLinks’ unique algorithms typically produce results in a second or two, with virtually no delay when scrolling between the 100 most closely related pages.

Better than search. Two of the greatest contributions to modern Web search engines were made by Larry Page and Serge Brin: 1) ordering search results according to number and value of links from other Web sites; and 2) lightning fast execution. A search engine operating on a vast digital library of scholarly content can be built to execute with lightning speed, but scholarly content’s ‘linkbacks’ are limited to citations, which are insufficient to effectively cull and sort search results. Other methods must be found, and no matter how innovative they may be, when applied to a few keywords typed in by a researcher, those methods will not compare with the relevancy algorithms of DLSG’s HotLinks Research Tool.

An additional essential benefit of HotLinks Research Tool is the platform it uses to present the results: MyDocs with KIC Study System (KSS). KSS provides HotLinked highlighting that allows researchers to highlight pertinent text in any of 100 items, perhaps thousands of actual pages and view the highlights in a contiguous list that can be grouped and reordered for importance. Navigation is performed by simply touching a highlight. Researchers can jump between the highlights list and the page a highlight was found on. In addition, KSS Provides the following features for easier assimilation of information:

  • High-speed SKIM – computer assisted speed-reading with does not require training <a page of OER at 400wpm>
  • Low-speed SKIM for relaxed reading and for use on small screen devices (e.g. smart phones) <same page of OER at 150wpm>
  • ReadAlong Audio for its well-known benefits
  • Flashcards – to commit certain facts to memory
  • MyDocs Personal Network, which can share all content and read progress with up to three devices, a phone, a tablet and a PC – the researcher can capture the content to his/her phone and it will be automatically transferred to his tablet and PC. The research will always be with him/her, and upon stepping into the library, copyrighted content will become immediately available. When not in the library, non-copyrighted content is accessible and copyrighted content can be purchased.

Note that MyDocs with KSS insures that the researcher is in the library by checking the proximity of the library’s WiFi hotspots.

Another essential characteristic of HotLinks Research Tool is that it benefits the publishers who hold copyrights to the content. By dramatically increasing exposure to their copyrighted content while in the library, but not outside the library, but allowing the purchase of the content when outside the library, HotLinks Research Tool is likely the best promoter of sales of copyrighted scholarly content. Note that without this characteristic, copyright holders might try to restrict use of this extremely powerful research tool.

HotLinks and Copyright Law

HotLinks Research Tool works with DSE Content Servers to ensure compliance with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998. When providing access to copyrighted content, HotLinks Research Tool complies with the following sections of US Copyright Law (pertinent content highlighted and [annotated]).

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108. Limitations on exclusive rights: Reproduction by libraries and archives

(a) Except as otherwise provided in this title and notwithstanding the provisions of section 106 [ONE COPY FOR DIRECT DISTRIBUTION FOR FREE WITH COPYRIGHT NOTICE:] it is not an infringement of copyright for a library or archives, or any of its employees acting within the scope of their employment, to reproduce no more than one copy or phonorecord of a work, except as provided in subsections (b) and (c), or to distribute such copy or phonorecord, under the conditions specified by this section, if—

(1) the reproduction or distribution is made without any purpose of direct or indirect commercial advantage;

(2) the collections of the library or archives are (i) open to the public, or (ii) available not only to researchers affiliated with the library or archives or with the institution of which it is a part, but also to other persons doing research in a specialized field; and

(3) the reproduction or distribution of the work includes a notice of copyright that appears on the copy or phonorecord that is reproduced under the provisions of this section, or includes a legend stating that the work may be protected by copyright if no such notice can be found on the copy or phonorecord that is reproduced under the provisions of this section.
(b) [THREE COPIES FOR DEPOSIT FOR RESEARCH USE IN ANOTHER LIBRARY NOW OR SOME TIME IN THE FUTURE:] The rights of reproduction and distribution under this section apply to three copies or phonorecords an unpublished work duplicated solely for purposes of preservation and security or for deposit for research use in another library or archives of the type described by clause (2) of subsection (a), if—

(1) the copy or phonorecord reproduced is currently in the collections of the library or archives; and

(2) any such copy or phonorecord that is reproduced in digital format is not otherwise distributed in that format and is not made available to the public in that format outside the premises of the library or archives.
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RESEARCH TOOL REQUIREMENTS:

DSE Content Servers ($2,999) + optional journal
KIC Self-service Scan Kiosk (starting at $3,499, up to $17,499)