Thomson Scientific launches Citation Impact Forum

Thomson Scientific, part of The Thomson Corporation, today announced the launch of its Citation Impact Forum, an online forum promoting scholarly discussion about all aspects of citation-based research evaluation. Areas covered include the much-talked-about Journal Impact Factor to emerging citation metrics, such as the h-index.

‘The online format provides a modern-style roundtable discussion,’ says Jim Testa, Thomson Scientific's director of editorial development. ‘A running discussion on the topic of evaluation methods gives users around the world the benefit of information straight from Thomson Scientific. Additionally, we will use the invitation-only monthly forums to interact directly with the research community as well as to provide a way for the members of that community to interact with each other.’

The Citation Impact Forum will feature interviews with and commentary from industry leaders, bibliometricians, researchers, and publishers about scholarly evaluation. Registered users will have the added ability to join invitation-only forums where they can participate in discussions and recommend future forum discussion topics.

‘The Citation Impact Forum promotes a dynamic dialogue within the research community, allowing users to share with their peers the strategies and tools being used to evaluate researchers, institutions, publications and impact,’ adds Testa.

‘No form of research evaluation is cut and dry - all research metrics have their benefits and their limitations,’ says Jim Pringle, vice president of product development at Thomson Scientific. ‘As partners in research, by promoting an understanding of and discussion about these metrics, we hope to encourage those in the industry to use metrics more effectively.’