Research Guides: Electronic Resources: Cancellation Review

Cancellation Review

Flagged Resources: Usage Statistics Review

Continued transition from COUNTER v4 to COUNTER v5 has made comparing resources from 2019 to 2020 even more complex.
COUNTER 5 reduces the overall number of reports by replacing many of the “special-purpose” reports with four Master Reports (see image below). All COUNTER R4 reports have either been renamed or eliminated in favor of v5 Master Report or Standard View options.

To provide context and analysis, NGL had to focus on one or two metrics that made the most sense (and was closest to our previous "gold standard" of downloads (HTML or PDF) in COUNTER v4 and for COUNTER v5 - that's "Total Item Requests". “Unique Item Requests” report how many unique items (article, ebook chapter, media clip, etc.) are used --- though remember that if an article is used 4x by a patron the Total Item Requests will be 4 while the Unique Item Request will be 1 .
Investigations (searches, record views, link resolver links, links to ILL request, etc.) are typically much higher.
COUNTER 5 does not report zero-use resources. COUNTER v4 did.
Vendors have discontinued COUNTER v4 as of 2020 data—sometimes even mid-year--- making it even more difficult/convoluted to make direct comparisons
Some low usage resources may not be able to be cancelled: TexShare, Big Deals or consortia multi-year deals (licenses), required for accreditation, etc.