For example, statistics from Virginia Polytechnic and State University (Virginia Tech.) in the USA reveal a very high level of use of their web-based electronic theses and dissertations. An analysis of the accesses from U.S. domains reveals that use of these theses is not limited to educational establishments; over the past few years government, commercial and other miscellaneous organisations have consulted the works.

View Virginia Tech's ETD Usage Statistics

Statistics of increased levels of use provide a major incentive to organisations that are at the stage of considering the establishment of an ETD institutional repository. It will be helpful if as many universities as possible publish their usage statistics on the web so that others can use this information to strengthen their arguments for a culture change within their own higher education establishment.