Publications on WWW
Marine Biology Laboratory
mblcsdla at netcom.com
Fri Oct 25 13:32:38 EST 1996
Greetings:
I keep seeing my name printed on the screen and wonder if the old
theatrical axiom that some-publicity-was-better-than-no-publicity is
in fact true! Well, since I seem to have broken an egg, may I suggest
that readers give some thought to helping make the omelet? Geoff
recently pointed out an actual on-line journal might be worth
considering--at least he suggested a title for one.
There are of course broad issues unrelated to the actual information in
the article being discussed here. I agree that peer review improves all
writing. Though I wrote all of it, I did not do so in complete privacy,
hidden from editorial inspection. A previous edition of this posting had
already been distributed/discussed with a number of polychaete workers
locally and made available through as many people as read the local
newsletter (I believe paid readership approaches 100-though not all
polychaete types). I also realize this did not satisfy the formal ideal
of anonymous peer review typical of paper science journals. I guess this
allows people to ignore the information in there as not validated. Of
course numerous people have ignored the findings contained in formal peer
reviewed articles. I invited comments on the contents of the
article--and I continue to invite them. I can only imagine that such
comments will make the topics discussed in the article more complete and
useful. To date the only such comment of this nature that I recall is
Blake's suggesting an electron microscopic inspection. I don't have one
of those.
As I have previously commented, the issues of permanence and universal
public access are poorly served by only one media (historically paper)
i.e. I still haven't found a copy of Volume 20, 1991 of the journal
Environmental Control in the U. S. --no access and permanently
unavailable. Solution: Distribute on dual media articles deemed
acceptable for distribution.
I suspect that the rule makers of publications (ICZN, editors) and those
directly involved as librarians should be included in whatever is
subsequently discussed. Like all other cans-of-worms, this one
benefits from first identifying the worms.
Bye for now
Tom Parker
mblcsdla at netcom.com
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