February 7, 2006. The Berkeley Electronic Press (bepress) today announced a major milestone with the crossing of the five million full-text download threshold within its ResearchNow database.
ResearchNow – located at http://researchnow.bepress.com – is a collection of academic materials drawing from several primary sources: the roster of peer-reviewed, Berkeley Electronic Press journals (27 and counting), bepress-hosted subject matter repositories such as the bepress Legal Repository and COBRA: The Collection of Biostatistics Research Archive, and all working papers, preprints and other "grey literature" content from institutional repositories hosted by bepress that have opted for inclusion. More than 50 schools – including the University of California system, the University of Pennsylvania, Boston College, Cornell, and the University of Nebraska, as well as major universities in Europe and Australia – use the bepress platform for their institutional repositories, co-marketed with ProQuest Information & Learning since 2004 as Digital Commons.
"We are proud to have reached the five million full-text download figure," said Greg Tananbaum, President of The Berkeley Electronic Press. "What is most striking is the growing momentum of ResearchNow as a scholarly destination for students and faculty. Close to two-thirds of these downloads have come in the last year alone. With more institutions using the Digital Commons repository service and the launch of several new peer-reviewed journals under our own imprint, we feel confident that we are bringing unique, timely content to scholars worldwide."
ResearchNow contains 85,000 scholarly papers and counting. To facilitate navigation, all materials are categorized (by authors and credentialed librarians) in academic areas ranging from aerospace engineering to urban planning. Readers may also sign up for free email alerts of newly posted content, tailored to their interests. In addition, the entire ResearchNow database is searchable via an XML gateway developed according to the NISO MXG (metasearch XML Gateway) protocol.
About The Berkeley Electronic Press
Founded by academics in 1999, The Berkeley Electronic Press ("bepress") is both a publisher of peer-reviewed electronic journals and a software developer, having created the institutional repository platform marketed by ProQuest as Digital Commons. The Company produces tools to improve scholarly communication via innovative and effective means of content production and dissemination. Bepress has a portfolio of products and services that reduces the costs of and barriers to access.
