“Crocodile” initiative keeps snapping up new sponsors
Kudos has announced the latest expansion of its fast-track research initiative, ‘Taming the Crocodile’, with a broader group of sponsors and an enhanced research scope focused on the growing impact of AI-generated search experiences.
New sponsors joining the initiative include AIP Publishing, IEEE, Clarivate and Cactus Communications. Alongside this expansion, phase I of the project will now incorporate dedicated surveys of both publishers and librarians, aimed at benchmarking how the sector is responding to AI-generated overviews in search engine results and AI chat tools.
The library survey will examine the impact of zero-click search on user behaviour and training, as well as its implications for usage of library resources. It will also capture librarians’ concerns and decision-making processes around AI adoption by users.
In parallel, the publisher survey will explore how AI overviews are affecting content usage, alongside the pace and nature of publisher responses. Findings will provide sponsors with anonymised, aggregate benchmarking data to assess their own strategies and progress.
The expanded study also includes a survey of end users, focusing on shifts in awareness, perceptions and behaviours related to search journeys, intent and trust. Insights from all three surveys will be brought together in a final report, contextualised through a wider environmental scan of how other information-focused sectors are responding to AI overviews and zero-click search.
As reported in Research Information, sponsors already participating include Emerald Publishing, Elsevier, Wiley, Springer Nature, IOP Publishing, Silverchair, BMJ Group, American Physical Society, Oxford University Press and De Gruyter Brill. The initiative therefore represents a broad cross-section of publishers, societies and platform providers examining the implications of zero-click search (“Google Zero”) and AI-generated overview panels for the scholarly communications ecosystem.
More information is available by downloading the initiative’s information pack.