HUM-MOLGEN archive: LITE: various August 1998

A new LITE(rature) message! This LITE message contains: (1) Information on recent Journal TOCs (2) Embargo's on scientific communication: Do Journals have the right to tell scientists not to discuss their own work (which is about to be published in that Journal) in the press? (PLEASE COMMENT) (3) International reactions on the HUM-MOLGEN preprint initiative; (ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WELCOME) (4) HUM-MOLGEN (pre-)prints (5) Call for new (pre-)prints Arthur Bergen (LITE editor) ***************************************************************** (1) An update of TOCs of allmost any Journal of your interest can be found in a summarized fashion at: http://www.informatik.uni-rostock.de/HUM-MOLGEN/update/journals.html ************ (2) Embargo's on scientific communication: Do Journals have the right to tell scientists not to discuss their own work (which is about to be published in that Journal) in the press? (PLEASE COMMENT, ADVICE) Leading scientific Journals, such as NEJM, JAMA, Science and Nature currently use the Inglefinger Rule, which states that scientists are not allowed to discuss the results of their own work in the press, before these results have been officially published by the Journal. Several questions and point of discussion arise directly: (a) Is such an embargo fair to the scientist(s) involved? In other words: does the Journal in fact not claim some of the "glory" of the scientist or scientific discovery to be published, in which they do not have a part? If the Journal announces the discovery first, could they likewise also not claim a potential stake in some patents concerning the discovery? (b) Can such an embargo be upheld? Is it legal? What can a Journal in fact do to "punish" scientist who break the embargo? If the embargo only concerns the press, and for instcance not colleagues, what is easier to give a friendly scientific colleague a preprint copy of the paper, with the friendly question to slip it to the press? (c) Does such a embargo harm the progress of science? Is the embargo, with the possiblity of direct internet communication completely out of date? (d) Finally, would it not be much better if Journals simply request scientists to mention their Journal (in which the results are published) in all communications with the press? PLEASE COMMENT, ADVICE ************* (3) We obtained several international comments and reactions on the HUM-MOLGEN (pre-)print initiative, one of which (Science Netwatch) can be viewed at: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/280/5371/1807 Questions and remarks asked were, among others: (a) Why are biologists and clinicans so far behind physicists concerning preprints? (b) Given the 80 % support for preprints in our survey of last year, one would expect a very large number of pre-prints to be submitted already. So far, only 10 documents in 2 months, including pre-prints, comments etc. have been submitted. (c) On the other hand, the submittal of documents to the Ginsparg archives in physics started very slow, too. (d) If their is sufficient active interest, it might be a wise idea to join the Ginsparg archives. Additional comments welcome. ************* (4) HUM-MOLGEN (pre-)prints can be found at the DOCUMENTS SECTION of HUM-MOLGEN, via homepage http://www.informatik.uni-rostock.de/HUM-MOLGEN ************** (5) Invitation for (pre-)prints: Given the succes of pre-prints in other fields of science, and your positive response to pre-prints in our previous survey, we invite you to submit pre-prints: preferentially short letters/abstracts. We will also accept comprehensive reviews. Your pre-print will be exposed to over 5000 colleagues at once after low key moderation. SIMPLE RULES for (PRE-)PRINTS (we can and will not accept other forms): (1) State your full name, title and affiliations. (2) Pre-prints should be no longer than 750 words and could be f.i. abstracts of your paper to be published. Alternatively, you may submit concise reviews. (3) The SUBJECT heading of your E-mail reply should at least start with: LITE: PRE-PRINT (4) E-mail your letter/preprint preferentially as an attachment in Word 6.0 or WordPerfect 6.0. (5) Send your pre-print to HUM-MOLGEN@nic.surfnet.nl (6) Indicate at what date your pre-print should be (automatically) removed, if needed Thank you in advance for your effort and collaboration Arthur Bergen ******** The pre-print serivces are supported by the IWI, the dutch foundation for innnovative scientific information exchange. ******** Copyright: HUM-MOLGEN ************************************************************************ Dr. Arthur A.B. Bergen Department of Ophthalmogenetics The Netherlands Ophthalmic Research Institute (IOI) Royal Academy of Sciences of the Netherlands (KNAW) ** Snail-mail: ** ** FAX: ** ** E-mail: ** P.O.Box 12141 (+31)206916521 A.Bergen@IOI.KNAW.NL 1100 AC Amsterdam The Netherlands ************************************************************************