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Blockbuster: ProQuest Buys Dialog
ProQuest announced this afternoon, June 12, that it signed an agreement to acquire Dialog from Thomson Reuters; financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. ProQuest said that it would update Dialog’s platforms, renovate existing products, and explore new opportunities. Founded 40 years ago, Dialog was the world’s first online retrieval system of commercial databases to be used globally. Its portfolio of products offers access to the "best of" business, engineering, finance, science, and law resources. Dialog has direct operations in 27 countries and serves information professionals and end users in more than 100 countries.
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As Comments Close on NIH Implementation, a Common Plea Emerges: Help Us
On May 31, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) closed the comment period on implementing the agency’s recently adopted public access mandate, which went into effect on April 7. Although it is still too early too tell how the implementation process is going in practice, from the 178 responses, which addressed four key questions, a common message seemed to emerge: help us. Respondents included investigators, university and library personnel, and publishers. While expressing varying levels of support or opposition for the NIH mandate itself, all seemed to encourage the NIH to offer more concrete guidance on how to ensure compliance with the access mandate, with efficiency in mind.
In comments, respondents cited challenges ranging from confusion over correct citations, to a wide range of policies—from journals, institutions, and funders—that could create confusion for those who must comply. Wyatt Hume, provost of the University of California (UC), wrote that UC remained “deeply concerned” that the policy does not address “complexities associated with the loosely-coupled roles of authors, principal investigators, institutions, and publishers.”
Hume also observed that “publishers are under no obligation to assist, or even permit, authors to retain the rights needed to deposit their manuscripts in PubMed Central in compliance with the policy, and the authors’ institutions generally have neither the legal standing nor the means to intervene.” This “ambiguity about rights” is amplified, Hume noted, by the range of compliance methods that have emerged among publishers. “Some automatically deposit either the final published article or the author’s final peer-reviewed manuscript in PMC, others have publication agreements that permit the authors to deposit, others authorize compliance only through the mechanism of an optional ‘author pays’ publication agreement, yet others provide unrestricted open access to all their publications.”
Compounding matters, the NIH currently offers no mechanism to track the range of compliance methods. “UC therefore strongly recommends,” Hume wrote, “that NIH address this problem by establishing a systematic program, working with publishers and institutions, to define a single, simple model that facilitates and supports deposit of NIH-sponsored works in PMC.”
That suggestion was echoed by Patrick White, writing on behalf of the Association of American Universities. White urged the NIH to help negotiate a blanket permissions agreement. “What is needed is a modified standard copyright agreement acknowledging that the author retains the right to provide a copy of the final manuscript to NIH for posting by NIH on PubMed Central within 12 months of publication by a given journal. We request that NIH work to encourage publishers to adopt such agreements.” White also suggested enlisting a third party, such as the National Academies of Science, to track and analyze “the impact of the implementation of its Public Access Policy on scholarly publishing and trends in faculty publishing decisions as well as the costs associated with compliance under the new policy.”
Establishing a blanket license, however, would seem to be a tough sell for publishers. In an extended post, Association of American Publishers’ Allan Adler, a strong critic of the policy and of the legislative process that enacted the policy, said that “blanket requirements in grant contracts would effectively deny authors and publishers the benefits of their copyrights.” Adler wrote that while publishers “appreciate NIH’s vision for an interconnected world of science,” they remain troubled by the policy’s current implementation. “Other alternatives to the NIH policy of mandated centralized posting on PMC can and should be considered.”
The American Physical Society’s Joe Serene, who oversees the operation of a range of non-profit journals, echoed Adler’s comments, and reiterated publishers’ concerns about potential, unexplored side effects of the policy, particularly regarding archiving. “The announced implementation effectively establishes NIH as a duplicate publisher for an unknown fraction of the literature,” Serene observed. “We believe that NIH should immediately begin serious and substantive consultations with publishers to explore a variety of cost-effective alternatives that show more appreciation for the service to the scientific community provided by nonprofit society publishers, and that avoid producing variant archival copies of the same paper.”
While publishers have pushed for a federal rulemaking procedure, that is unlikely to happen. NIH will consider the range of comments, many of which constructively advise NIH to sharpen its policy in practice, “as they relate to the early days of compliance and will post analysis and results” for public view on the NIH site by September 30, 2008.
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Cornell Librarian Feels Vindicated After Verdict Over Digitized Article
A federal judge last week dismissed Cornell alum Kevin Vanginderen’s $1 million lawsuit over a 1983 Cornell Chronicle article digitized by the library and crawled by Google, but the matter isn’t entirely over yet. The court now must rule on a second, $10 million defamation suit filed by Vanginderen.
Driving that suit is Vanginderen’s contention that in filing Cornell’s response in open court, the university’s attorneys essentially attempted to smear his name by improperly loading its reply, which is publicly available, with unnecessary police and court records related to his arrest and plea in connection to a string of campus thefts in 1983. Cornell deputy university counsel Nelson Roth, however, told the Cornell Daily Sun that Vanginderen’s defamation case is “completely without merit,” noting that Cornell was entitled to defend itself against the libel charge.
That suit notwithstanding, Cornell librarians this week said the decision in the first case was a victory for the library, even though the judge did not address whether digitizing the article in question and making it available via the Internet constituted republication. “I do share concerns that individuals might have about potentially embarrassing material being made public,” Cornell university librarian Anne Kenney said, “but I don’t think you can go back and distort the public record.” Kenney said that the library has no plans to alter its digitization procedures as a result of the case. “I feel this is a real victory for the library in terms of being able to make documentary material accessible,” she said.
In his ruling, Judge Barry Moskowitz granted Cornell’s motion to dismiss the suit under California’s “anti-strategic lawsuit against public participation” (anti-SLAPP) statute which protects against punitive lawsuits that curb free speech and freedom of the press. Moskowitz found that since the content of the article was mostly accurate, Vanginderen’s libel claim could not succeed, never getting to the question of republication.
Cornell University Library archivist Peter Hirtle reflected on the potential negative impact that could have resulted had Moskowitz found that digitization was the equivalent of republication. “It would be disastrous if every time we scan something, we had to take the same editorial responsibility as the initial publisher,” Hirtle said, adding that verdict reaffirmed “the important role libraries can play in promoting free speech and providing ready public access to information on the activities of government.”
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HBCU Libraries Launch Online History Collection
The first digital collection of documents and materials chronicling the founding of America’s historically Black colleges and universities is now available online. The project, entitled A Digital Collection Celebrating the Founding of the Historically Black College and University, was funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and represents “the first collaborative effort by Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) libraries to make a historical collection digitally available.” It includes more than 1000 scanned photographs, manuscripts, letters, and publications from ten institutions designated as Historically Black.
The online collection, the product of a partnership between the HBCU Library Alliance, HBCU institutions, the Southeastern Library Network, and Cornell University, is hosted by the Robert W. Woodruff Library of the Atlanta University Center. Its rich content dates back to the early 1800s, and includes campus charters, student yearbooks, early campus architectural drawings, and an assortment of photographs ranging from portraits of first presidents, to graduating classes, famous alumni, and churches, which often served as the first classrooms at several of these institutions.
The online collection features materials from Alabama State University, Atlanta University Center, Bennett College for Women, Fisk University, Grambling State University, Hampton University, Southern University, Tuskegee University, Tennessee State University, and Virginia State University.
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Depository Library Council Adds Five New Members
Public Printer Robert Tapella has announced the appointment of five new members to the federal government’s Depository Library Council. The council, composed of 15 members who each serve three year terms, advise Tapella on policy matters relating to the Federal Depository Library Program, which provides access to government-published information through partnerships with more than 1250 public and academic libraries.
The five new council members, who will serve from October 1, 2008 to September 30, 2011, are: David Cismowski, regional depository librarian, California State Library, Sacramento; Carlene Engstrom, library director, D’Arcy McNickle Library, Salish Kootenai College, Pablo, MT; Sarah (Sally) Holterhoff, associate professor of law librarianship and government information/reference librarian, Valparaiso University Law Library, IN; Justin Otto, social sciences and government documents reference librarian, Eastern Washington University, John F. Kennedy Library, Cheney; and Suzanne Sears, head of the Government Documents Department, University of North Texas Willis Library, Denton.
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Best Sellers in Latin American History, October 2007–present, as compiled by YBP Library Services (13-digit ISBNs in brackets)
- Forgotten Continent: The Battle for Latin America's Soul
Reid, Michael
Yale University Press
2007. ISBN 0300116160 [9780300116168]. $30.00
- Central Africans, Atlantic Creoles, and the Foundation of the Americas, 1585-1660
Heywood, Linda Marinda
Cambridge University Press
2007. ISBN 0521770653 [9780521770651]. $75.00
- Revolution of Hope: The Life, Faith, and Dreams of a Mexican President
Fox Quesada, Vicente
Viking
2007. ISBN 0670018392 [9780670018390]. $27.95
- Fidel Castro: My Life: A Spoken Autobiography
Trans. by Andrew Hurley
Castro, Fidel
Scribner
2008. ISBN 1416553282 [9781416553281]. $40.00
- Americanos: Latin America's Struggle for Independence
Chasteen, John
Oxford University Press
2008. ISBN 0195178815 [9780195178814]. $28.00
- Discovery of Mankind: Atlantic Encounters in the Age of Columbus
Abulafia, David
Yale University Press
2008. ISBN 0300125828 [9780300125825]. $35.00
- Santa Anna of Mexico
Fowler, Will
University of Nebraska Press
2007. ISBN 0803211201 [9780803211209]. $45.00
- African Slavery in Latin America and the Caribbean
Klein, Herbert S.
Oxford University Press
2007. ISBN 0195189418 [9780195189414]. $99.00
- Political Disaffection in Cuba's Revolution and Exodus
Pedraza, Silvia
Cambridge University Press
2007. ISBN 0521867878 [9780521867870]. $75.00
- Bananas: How the United Fruit Company Shaped the World
Chapman, Peter
Canongate Books
2007. ISBN 1841958816 [9781841958811]. $24.00
- Hyperborder: The Contemporary U.S.-Mexico Border and Its Future
Romero, Fernando
Princeton Architectural
2008. ISBN 1568987064 [9781568987064]. $35.00
- Why Immigrants Come to America: Braceros, Indocumentados, and the Migra
Stout, Robert
Praeger
2008. ISBN 0313348308 [9780313348303]. $49.95
- Path of Empire: Panama and the California Gold Rush
McGuinness, Aims
Cornell University
2008. ISBN 0801445213 [9780801445217]. $35.00
- Fifty Years of Change on the U.S.-Mexican Border: Growth, Development, and Quality of Life
Anderson, Joan B.
University of Texas
2008. ISBN 0292717180 [9780292717183]. $60.00
- Polemics of Possession in Spanish American Narrative
Adorno, Rolena
Yale University Press
2007. ISBN 0300120206 [9780300120202]. $55.00
- Ecuador and the United States: Useful Strangers
Pineo, Ronn F.
University of Georgia Press
2007. ISBN 0820329703 [9780820329703]. $59.95
- In From the Cold: Latin America's New Encounter with the Cold War
Gilbert M. Joseph
Duke University Press
2008. ISBN 0822341026 [9780822341024]. $99.95
- Women Legislators in Central America: Politics, Democracy, and Policy
Saint-Germain, Michelle A.
University of Texas
2008. ISBN 0292717164 [9780292717169]. $65.00
- Book of Salsa: A Chronicle of Urban Music from the Caribbean to New York City
Trans. by Frances R. Aparicio
Rondon, Cesar Miguel
University of North Carolina Press
2008. ISBN 0807831298 [9780807831298]. $59.95
- Return of the Native: Indians and Myth-Making in Spanish America, 1810-1930
Earle, Rebecca
Duke University Press
2007. ISBN 0822340631 [9780822340638]. $84.95
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