Scholars ‘stumble through’ as British Library tools stay offline

Loss of access to EThOS archive of 600,000 doctoral dissertations causes major disruption for PhD students

Published on
December 4, 2023
Last updated
December 4, 2023
Jack Grove
A model train enthusiast works on their railway to illustrate Scholars ‘stumble through’ as British Library tools stay offline
Source: Getty images
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Reader's comments (3)

#1 Submitted by s.... on December 4, 2023 - 7:57am
It’s not entirely free. In a huge number of cases, the first person who wants to access a dissertation that’s not already been uploaded has to pay £50 to the respective university for the eThOS digitisation process. Those who come afterwards then get to read it online for free, as the £50 version is uploaded to the database. This is a policy that badly needs remediating and hits certain research sectors and students much harder than others.
#2 Submitted by davep@... on December 4, 2023 - 8:56am
So how did it happen? What holes were exploited?
#3 Submitted by m.... on December 4, 2023 - 3:54pm
As I constantly say to my students: BACKUP!!!! Was the database not backed up anywhere? It beggars belief that it cannot be got up and running again.

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