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ISCTI: news items

  • To: Multiple recipients of list <epc-l@iucr.org>
  • Subject: ISCTI: news items
  • From: Pete Strickland <ps@iucr.org>
  • Date: Thu, 4 Sep 2003 22:22:19 +0100 (BST)
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Subject: ACS Material on Open Access

There is some ACS material on Open Access at

http://www.chemistry.org/portal/a/c/s/1/feature_pol.html?id=c373e9f703c70224
8f6a4fd8fe800100

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Subject: Apropos the ACS material on Open Access

The actual article on Science Publishing is at:

http://www.chemistry.org/portal/a/c/s/1/feature_pol.html?
id=c373e9f703c702248f6a4fd8fe800100

It is an article by Brian Dougherty of ACS reprinted from the August 
2003 edition of Capitol Connection. It comments on the proposal by 
Representative Martin Sabo (D-MN) to introduce legislation (H.R. 
2613) in conjunction with the PLoS [Public Library of Science] 
campaign that would put the results of scientific research 
"substantially funded by the federal government" into the public 
domain. The bill would achieve this by requiring scientists to forgo 
copyright protection for such work.

This proposal and others from the PloS have received a lot of 
publicity in the US recently.

They will form part of the discussions at the forthcoming ICSTI 
Meeting in Paris on January 15 and 16 2004 where we will be looking 
broadly at the 'economic models' of science publishing in the light 
of new technologies, new pressures on scientists such as those 
implied above and the moves away from the 'traditional' methods of 
submission > peer review > publication in a subscription based
journal.

We hope to have a broad discussion with representatives from the 
various interests. The meeting will be a follow-on from our very 
succesful meeting of last January but this time we want to 
concentrate on the economic implications of the changes, not just the 
dollars or euros and cents aspects but what is the likely
future of science publishing in the light of the economic alterations 
in the system.

Note the dates - Thursday January 15 and Friday January 16 in Paris. 
More details later.

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Subject: Article on Economics of Open Access

At:

http://www.biomedcentral.com/news/20030822/02

There is an article on the Economics of Open Acess by  By Catherine 
Zandonella.

It is based on recent activities in the USA; an Editorial in the New 
York Times, a proposed law on access to the results of Federally 
funded research and a tv advert by the Public Library of Science.

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Subject: More on Open Access viability

>From NFAIS ENotes, with thanks to Jill O'Neill.

"Sabo, SOAF, SOAN and More"
Cites and Insights, September 2003

Walt Crawford provides a superior overview of the Open Access debate 
of recent weeks in his September 2003 issue of Cites and Insights.  
Down load the PDF file at: http://cites.boisestate.edu/civ3i11.pdf 
and go directly to pages 9-17.  Crawford, who has stated serious 
reservations about the viability of Open Access, looks at the Sabo 
Bill and considers the various criticisms of the bill put forward by 
the publishing community.  His approach is even-handed and treats 
both sides of the issue fairly. (The Sabo bill is H.R. 2613, and is 
entitled the Public Access to Science Act - see E-Notes August 12, 
2003 for a brief description of the proposed legislation).

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Subject: Agreement on Permanent Availability by the US Govt.

Agreement Ensures Permanent Public Online Access to Government 
Information
By Miriam A. Drake

Public Printer, Bruce R. James, and Archivist of the United States, 
John W. Carlin, announced an agreement that will enable the 
Government Printing Office (GPO) and the National Archives and 
Records Administration (NARA) to ensure free and permanent access to 
more than 250,000 federal government titles available through GPO 
Access.

These titles include Congressional Record, Federal Register, Code of
Federal Regulations, U. S. Code, and the publications of many federal
agencies. GPO Access is available to anyone who uses the Internet. It
provides quick and easy access to important government information. 
People lacking Internet access may use GPO Access at any one of the 
more than1,200 depository libraries, see

   http://www.infotoday.com/newsbreaks/nb030825-1.shtml
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Subject: Open Source meeting cancelled

A meeting which WIPO (The World Intellectual Property Organisation) 
intended to hold on the principle of 'open' research and development 
and its implications - typically the Human Genome Project - has had 
to be cancelled, because of lobbying by large IPR interests, 
especially in the software area, according to WIPO.

There is a discussion on the cancellation in the latest edition of 
Nature at:

http://www.cptech.org/ip/wipo/20030828-Nature-WIPO.pdf
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Subject: EBLIDA reservations about new EU Directive

EBLIDA, the European Bureau of Library, Information and 
Documentatation Associations has expressed reservations concerning 
the proposed EU Directive on measures and procedures to ensure the 
enforcement of intellectual property.

I drew attention to this proposal in a news message on August 12. The 
proposal will require EU Member States to implement common 
legislation to prohibit tampering with rights protection equipment or 
software facilities and require them to offer the same protection to 
all other EU states.

The draft can be consulted at:

http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/en/com/pdf/2003/com2003_0046en01.pdf


'This proposal,' writes María Pía González Pereira, Director of 
EBLIDA, 'was issued by the European Commission on the 30 January 2003 
and is now at the European Parliament under the Co-decision 
procedure. The text of the Directive presents some points in which 
EBLIDA has already expressed our concerns to the European 
Institutions.'

'It is important to raise awareness on the potential impact of this 
newly proposed legislation on our community'
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Subject: Another protest at a proposed EU action

At this URL:
http://insight.zdnet.co.uk/software/developer/0,39020469,39115921,00.htm

You will find a background article on a proposal under discussion by 
the European Parliament to effectively permit software to be patented 
in all EU Member States.

There is a big groundswell of protest to the proposal - from people 
such as those who developed Linux but also from scientists and others 
who maintain they will have to pay license fees to use computer 
certain routines in their work.

In a recent US case Microsoft was ordered to pay over $500m to a one 
person U of Californaia spin-off company with 100 shareholders 
(mostly family members of the founder), for infringing the company's 
IPR in Internet Explorer. EU protestors fear similar cases in Europe 
may effect a) the development of software and b) small businesses who 
do the development.

The Parliament was due to vote today on the proposal but the vote 
seems to have been postpned until later this month.
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Subject: A digital rescue

>From Current Cites:

Domesday Redux: The Rescue of the BBC Domesday Project
     Videodiscs"  [21]Ariadne   (36) (July 2003)
     (http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue36/tna/). - This fascinating 
     article describes how a team of UK preservationists rescued the 
     BBC Domesday videodiscs from certain obsolescence. The modern-day
     [22]Domesday Project aimed to capture a snapshot of life in 
     Britain in 1986, on a pair of videodiscs, as a celebration of the 
     900th anniversay of the original [23]Domesday Book of William the
     Conqueror. Videodiscs are now an anachronism, but these discs 
     were rescued just in time, and recreated using modern 
     technologies. The story is interesting, and is one of the first 
     of many we will experience over the years, as we rescue important 
     data from the death grip of obsolete technologies.
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-- 

Best wishes

Peter Strickland
Managing Editor
IUCr Journals

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