If we build it, will they come? Curation and use of the ESO telescope bibliography

The ESO Telescope Bibliography (telbib) is a database of refereed papers published by the ESO users community. It links data in the ESO Science Archive with the published literature, and vice versa. Developed and maintained by the ESO library, telbib also provides insights into the organization's research output and impact as measured through bibliometric studies.

Curating telbib is a multi-step process that involves extensive tagging of the database records. Based on selected use cases, this talk will explain how the rich metadata provide parameters for reports and statistics in order to investigate the performance of ESO's facilities and to understand trends and developments in the publishing behaviour of the user community.