A researcher’s core interests may be in a specific set of areas, but effective discovery also helps that researcher to stay aware of adjacent areas of interest or even potential areas of unknown interest. Personalized approaches to discovery can improve research efficiency without sacrificing serendipity.
The benefits of personalizing discovery are already playing themselves out in the consumer space, suggesting tremendous opportunities for using data to personalize the research process. Given the scale of data needed for effective personalization, the implications of changing discovery processes will cascade through the scholarly ecosystem.
New research demonstrates that there’s a decent likelihood that your data exhaust can be used to find out sensitive things about you.