Director's Desk

I recently attended two workshops on electronic publishing and digital archives. A common theme to both workshops, and I suspect to many conversations on campus, was the imbalance found among the rights of authors, publishers, and the users of scientific literature in the electronic era. Many scientists and researchers want to address this imbalance by reclaiming the scholarly communication process. The recent proposal out of NIH represents a step in this direction. Congress has, in spirit, approved this proposal through the following wording: “Under this policy, NIH would request investigators to voluntarily submit electronically the final, peer reviewed author's copy of their scientific manuscripts; six months after the publisher's date of publication, NIH would make this copy publicly available through PubMed Central. The policy is intended to help ensure the permanent preservation of NIH-funded research and make it more readily accessible to scientists, physicians, and the public.” To read more, go to: http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/newsletter/12-02-04.htm.

If you would like to follow up on the question of author’s rights, go to the SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) web page on “Copyright Resources for Authors” at http://www.arl.org/sparc/author/. SPARC has prepared two draft agreements for authors to use when negotiating with publishers regarding the retention of rights. Draft 2 is of special interest to researcher and educators who wish to use their published work in teaching and non-profit research. Comments on either draft may be sent to Rick Johnson, SPARC, at rick@arl.org. For additional information, take a look at the 2002 report, “Electronic Publishing in Science Seizing the Moment: Scientists' Authorship Rights in the Digital Age,” from the AAAS at http://www.aaas.org/spp/sfrl/projects/epub/.

Happy reading and best wishes for a prosperous 2005!

Anne Linton, Director, Library Services