E-Currents

Citation

Falk, H. (2003), "E-Currents", Library Hi Tech News, Vol. 20 No. 9. https://doi.org/10.1108/lhtn.2003.23920iae.001

E-Currents

Howard Falk

PLoS Biology is launched

The first issue of PLoS Biology is now available at http://biology.plosjournals.org/. This is the leading open-access journal published by the Public Library of Science. A preview of two papers for the issue appeared on the Web site in August 2003, covering molecular analysis of a microbial pathogen and the evolutionary history of an Asian elephant. The publishers believe the published material demonstrates that the journal operates at the highest level in its field. The content of PLoS Biology is freely available to all on the Internet. No log-in or subscription is required. Users can freely download the papers, print them, copy them, pass them along to colleagues, and use them for classes.

New PubMed Central journals

PubMed Central, the National Library of Medicine (NLM) open-access digital archive of medical and life sciences journal articles, now contains about 100,000 articles from more than 120 journals. NLM scans back issues of select journals, then posts them on their Web site (www.pubmedcentral.gov) in full text and PDF formats. Journals most recently added to the site include the American Journal of Human Genetics, Canadian Journal of Veterinary Research, Canadian Veterinary Journal, Cell Stress and Chaperones, Epilepsy Currents, Journal of Athletic Training, Primary Care Companion to The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, and The Royal Society of London: Philosophical Transactions Series B, and Proceedings Series B.

Journal publishing merger approved

The Information Access Alliance, a coalition of six leading library organizations in North America, now maintains a Web site (www.informationaccess.org) that offers a PDF version of "Publisher Mergers: A Consumer-Based Approach to Antitrust Analysis". This paper examines the impact of mergers among scholarly and legal publishers and calls for a new standard of antitrust review of such mergers. Specifically, the Alliance has been urging the US Department of Justice to block Cinven and Candover's proposed purchase of BertelsmannSpringer, the academic publishing arm of Bertelsmann AG. The Alliance was concerned that this transaction would result in reduced access to critical research information.

However, at the end of August, 2003, the US Department of Justice announced that it had approved the acquisition of BertelsmannSpringer. The department has also given approval for the two firms to merge their acquisition with Kluwers Academic Publishers. The newly merged company, which will be called Springer, will have revenues of about 880 million euros and will be the world's second-largest publisher of scientific, technical and medical (STM) journals, exceeded in size only by Elsevier. BertelsmannSpringer publishes approximately 700 science, technology, and medical (STM) journals. Kluwers Academic Publishers, which Cinven and Candover recently acquired, also publishes approximately 700 STM journals. Libraries are the primary market for these journals. Over the past 20 years, the prices libraries pay for journals have risen at three times the rate of inflation. Recent studies have shown that merger activity has been a significant factor in this inflation.

Bill for open access to federal research

Congressman Martin Sabo (D-MN) has introduced the Public Access to Science Act of 2003 (H.R. 2613). This legislation would place articles into the public domain if they report on research that has been federally funded. The NSF Division of Science Resources Statistics reports that 59 percent of all US university research is currently funded by the federal government. The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) and SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) support the bill. Arguments for the bill center on the idea that research conducted with taxpayer dollars ought to be freely available to those taxpayers. Proponents believe that the purpose of federally funded research is to advance knowledge and accelerate new discoveries benefiting society at large. They point out that it is critical that this new knowledge be readily available to physicians, researchers, and individual members of the public, including those who do not have access to libraries that subscribe the journals or databases that are the current outlets for much federally-funded research. Some critics believe that the bill could hamper academic publishing and nonprofit publishers. They fear that it might negatively affect research funding, academic research and publishing.

New US archive projects

The Moving Images Collection is expected to offer access to more an 80,000 films, along with television images and other videos. It is being developed by the Georgia Institute of Technology Interactive Media Technology Center, Rutgers Universities Libraries, and the University of Washington, under a $900 million National Science Foundation grant to the Library of Congress.

The NDIPP (National Digital Information Infrastructure and Preservation Program) at the Library of Congress is looking for project proposals designed to collect digital materials. Initially, NDIPP projects will focus on historically-significant, and at-risk digital-only materials. The program was launched at the request of the US Congress with the aim of ensuring that digital materials are available to future generations (www.digitalpreservation.gov/programannouncement).

The US Government Printing Office currently provides online access (www.gpoaccess.gov) to over 250,000 titles, including the Congressional Record, the Federal Register, and the Code of Federal Regulations. To ensure permanent public access, the National Archives and Records Administration has undertaken to permanently archive this collection as part of the official Archives of the United States.

BBC to archive television recordings

Plans to create a "BBC Creative Archive" containing classic television recordings have been announced. The archive is to be open to the public, but a licensing system will limit further distribution of the archived materials. Entire entertainment shows will be available to archive users. However, some premier shows that BBC sells in video and DVD formats will be available only in the form of brief clips. No fixed date has been announced for launching the archive.

Digital library in Iran

The Pasteur Institute in Tehran, Iran has announced that its library now makes some five million articles and scientific documents available online to researchers. Access to this collection has been in development for three years. The documents are drawn from worldwide Internet sites and from digital libraries within Iran. The collection covers basic medical sciences such as molecular biology and medicine, medical sciences, immunology, micrology, physiology, medical parasitology and other subjects associated with biological technologies. Equipment that hosts the collection is said to be capable of handling a 12-fold increase in the number of documents.

China digital library

Digitized versions of about 200,000 books have been prepared at the National Library of China. Over $130 million has been set aside to generate databases containing some two million books, six million pictures and 8,000 video programs by 2005 (www.china.com.cn/english/PP-e/32407.htm). The goal of the project is to reorganize Chinese library resources nationwide and to allow them to be shared by people within China and throughout the world.

DRM developments

The decision of Barnes & Noble to discontinue selling e-books raises an interesting question for libraries that have purchased these books. Will B&N take responsibility to maintain their records for the e-books they sold, or will they perhaps transfer the records to another vendor? The B&N discontinuance announcement includes a statement that those who purchased an e-book in the Adobe format have 90 days from the date of purchase to complete their download, and those using Microsoft format have until December 9 to access their e-books. It appears that in a short while libraries and other customers that purchased e-books from B&N may not be able to access their ebooks in the future because of the Digital Rights Management (DRM) software embedded in those e-books.

Consumers have been alienated by DRM techniques that seek to protect copyrighted materials. Results of a study by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard Law School together with Gartner, Inc., indicate that DRM techniques should support fair-use expectations and that current DRM measures have stifled or penalized innovation. The study emphasized a need for DRM techniques that allow copyrighted content to move more freely from one device to another, while preventing uncontrolled copying (http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/home).

DRM techniques that seek to protect copyrighted materials may be a nuisance to consumers and librarians, but businesses are finding uses for these techniques. For example, companies that are publicly traded are required by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act to preserve and not alter documents that are part of federal investigations, and there are similar state laws that now require businesses protect personal and medical information. Companies are now looking to protect such information with the help of DRM techniques. The recently-released Microsoft Windows Rights Management Services will allow companies to resrict copying, printing and forwarding of their documents. Other computer software suppliers are developing similar DRM products.

New e-book devices

Hewlett-Packard has developed (in Bristol, England) an e-book display device that is one centimeter thick, has a metal case and is about the size of a standard sheet of printing paper. Touch sensitive strips along the sides of the display allow users to move from one page to another. The effect is similar to turning pages in a print book. Users can zoom in or out on displayed text using the same strips and this capability may allow viewing of newspaper pages. The device can be connected by wire or wireless to download content.

The EB-660 runs on two AA batteries and it draws power only when the screen content is changed. The unit has flip buttons for turning pages and its memory is expandable to 128 megabytes or more. PDF files can be handled, but the device is not suitable for users who want to display HTML material from the Internet. The EB-660 sells for the equivqlent of about $100 in China, and is produced by several different manufacturers. It is available from Argosy Technology (www.argosy.nl/company1.htm)

The Sigma Ebook displays two pages of text and images. The device measures 11 by 8 by ø inches when folded and it weighs 19 ounces. The blue-on-white display is visible in room light or sunlight. It runs on AA batteries, which are said to last for 3-6 months since power is used only when a page image changes. The price of the Sigma Ebook is $250, and a single-screen model is slated to sell for $150. It will be initially sold in Japan and marketed in China for use in schools. Models will then be offered in the US and Europe.

Matsushita Electric is starting a trial service, using the Sigma Ebook at the Narita International Airport in the fall of 2003. Users will receive the device for use on their current trip and will be asked to report their opinions about it.

Barnes & Noble discontinues e-books

Executives at Barnes & Noble said that limited sales and unsatisfactory technology has led them to stop selling e-books. Although purchases of e-books have been growing rapidly, overall sales remain only a tiny fraction of the book business. The leading competitors for ebook sales continue to be Palm Digital Media, OverDrive, Inc., and Amazon.com. The exit of B&N from the e-book business takes place at a time when consumer preference has been shifting towards ebooks that display on Palm handheld devices, an option that B&N has not been offering. In addition, Amazon.com has announced plans to provide a feature that will allow customers to browse more fully into ebooks they are planning to buy and make keyword searches through the full text of their prospective purchases.

German language e-books

There is now a single point of access to numerous e-books in the German language – www.ebookportal.de. Through this portal, users can now access over 2,000 e-book titles formatted for Palm devices, Pocket PCs, and personal computers. The database at the portal combines the offerings of six large e-book vendors and there is no charge for searching. The portal also provides editorial descriptions of individual titles. If users decide to buy an e-book, they are linked to the appropriate page of a vendor's Web site.

CD-R unreadable after two years

Recordable CDs (CD-Rs) were found to become completely unreadable 20 months after they had been recorded in a test conducted by the Dutch magazine PC-Active. In that test, 30 different CD-R brands were used to make recordings. Test results are displayed at www.aktu.nl/pc-active/cdr.htm. The text is in Dutch language but the illustration shows colors from white (easily-read) to red (cannot be read) that indicate the severity of errors on a typical disk.

Popular articles for display and downloading

KeepMedia (www.keepmedia.com) offers browsing, display and downloading of material from back issues of over 140 magazines for a fee of $4.95 a month. Magazine issues are posted on the Web site after they are no longer available on newsstands. However, if users of the site need an individual current article immediately, they can purchase at the site. Popular magazines available at KeepMedia include US News, Esquire, Foreign Policy, Variety, Kiplinger's, Forbes.com, Mother Jones, and Psychology Today.

Howard Falk (howf@hotmail.com) is a freelance journalist based in New Jersey, USA.