Content-update Signaling and Alerting Protocol (CUSAP)

The Content-update Signaling and Alerting Protocol (CUSAP) is a project of the International Association of STM Publishers (STM). CUSAP aims to develop a protocol and common service to actively signal and alert repositories and other stakeholders of updates or amendments to published scholarly content – for example errata, name changes, corrections, retractions, newer versions, or expressions of concern. Such a service is not currently available. The context is that the growth of Open Access is expected to further amplify the proliferation of copies of publications across (potentially many) different platforms – calling for additional measures to steward the use of the correct scholarly literature -- i.e., the Version of Record (VoR) -- and to prevent the use of out of date, amended, or retracted content. The project conducted outreach to potential users, and has developed a metadata package and specifications for an initial demonstrator system.