citations that indicated one further test that could rule out the surgery.
The parents returned to the specialist and requested the addi- tional test. The physician complied; the results were negative, and the procedure was cancelled. The child’s ears and hearing are perfect today. Without knowledge of the test acquired from the MEDLINE search, the child may have undergone unnecessary surgery. (See “Objective diagnosis of otitis media in early infancy by tympanometry and ipsilateral acoustic reflex thresholds,” by C. D. Marchant in the Journal of Pediatrics, Volume 109, pages 590–595, October 1986).
Thirty dollars is negligible when health and peace of mind is at stake. In 1990 the parents could not have accessed MEDLINE and performed the search themselves. Now consumers are empowered to do so, and at no cost.
National Criminal Justice Reference Service (NCJRS) http://www.ncjrs.org/search.html
The NCJRS offers two great services for site visitors seeking criminal justice information from books, pamphlets, government reports, unpublished research reports, and journal articles. You may search either the “Abstracts Database” for citations or the
“Online Full Text” database. Periodicals indexed include Prison Journal, Justice Quarterly, Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, Police Chief, and Crime & Delinquency. Approx- imately 100 journals are scanned for inclusion in the searchable database.
Staying Alert Without Caffeine,
maintain the leading edge on certain topics sought information specialists who subscribed to expensive databases for current awareness services (CAS) and selective dissemination of informa- tion (SDI) services.
A typical SDI involves taking a topic, working it into an efficient search strategy, and entering it into a database for storing and rerunning on a periodic basis (usually monthly). The search results are then delivered to the subscriber, who evaluates the results and decides whether to obtain the original articles to which the SDI refers. The benefit of SDIs and CASs is the updating function they offer through automatic notices to subscribers.
Another form of current awareness involves a less sophisticated approach, but many readers find it still works. In this service only the tables of contents from the newest issues of selected periodi- cals go to subscribers.
Many people admit that information overload has all but para- lyzed them, but staying on top of topics of importance continues to be a priority. Many of these same people have SDIs performed by research librarians at their companies, academic librarians at their institutions, or execute their own SDIs, usually on subscrip- tion databases. It should come as no surprise that several valid free Web databases offer users the opportunity to stay on top of their searches without charge.
Databases for Free Alert Services
Ingenta: A registered user (registration is free) may request up to five tables of contents from over 5,000 online periodicals. Alerts are e-mailed whenever the journals publish a new issue. Keyword search alerts, called “Research Alerts,” are only available to users who have purchased a license. The Research Alerts cover more than 20,000 additional print journals.
• Begin at the home page (http://www.ingenta.com) and register.
• Click “Manage My Ingenta” on the left of the screen.
• Choose “my e-journal alerts.”
• Click “create a new alerting profile” and add up to five journal titles.
• Note: A related alert service from the commercial database vendor DIALOG costs approximately $11.75 per month based on charges for file 141—Reader’s Guide Abstracts Full Text.
HighWire Press: Five thousand science and medical journals, including MEDLINE and 342 free HighWire-based publications.
• Begin at http://highwire.stanford.edu and click “Register”
(free).
• Once you have registered, begin at the HighWire Press Home Page, sign in, and click “My Email Alerts.”
• Click “Add a new eTOC alert” or “Add a new CiteTrack alert.” You may create alerts for tables of contents of selected journals (eTOC Alerts) and/or create customized alerts using authors or keywords (CiteTrack Alerts).
• You will receive e-mail concerning relevant articles and specified tables of contents.
Infotrieve: Select from 20,000 journals for tables of contents alerts.
• Begin at http://www4.infotrieve.com and “Register”
(free).
• On subsequent logons:
• On the right-hand side of the Infotrieve home page click “Tables of Contents.”
• Locate the journal you want and click “Add to TOC alert profile.”
• Infotrieve will notify you when a new table of contents for your periodical(s) becomes available.
PubMed: Articles from thousands of biomedical journals.
• Begin at PubMed: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/PubMed
• Looking to the left of the screen, scroll down and click
“Cubby.”
• Register (free) to save search(es) in your Cubby.
• Enter your search terms and click “Go.”
• After your search is run (you may or may not have retrieved any articles), click “Cubby” on the left and store your search.
• Whenever you return to PubMed, you may go to your Cubby, select the saved search you want to run, and click
“What’s New for Selected.”
• Follow your usual procedure for obtaining the full text of important items.
• Note: A related alert service from the commercial database vendor DIALOG costs approximately $6.40 per month based on charges for file 154, 155 MEDLINE.
However, DIALOG will e-mail you the results without requiring you to remember to return to the service.
STM—Scientific, Technical, and Medical Literature:
Whither Free Content?
The beginning of this chapter mentioned the resignation of a scholar, Professor Mark Riley, as an unpaid peer reviewer for Elsevier Science. It also mentioned the vote of confidence he got from Charles Miller, a librarian colleague, on his campus. The
scholar left because he felt the publisher charged too much for its science journals; the librarian applauded the move because he agreed.
Web publishers of medical literature such as BioMed Central have intrepidly begun offering electronic journals for free.
FreeMedicalJournals.com is a dedicated gatekeeper site of links to more than 900 free biomedical journals, mostly from traditional publishers. And individuals seeking to identify important biomed- ical articles need search no further than the free PubMed database.
There is probably no category of periodical literature generally more expensive to access than the scientific, technical, and medical (STM) literature. Ironically, there is probably no greater need for inexpensive access to a category of literature than STM. In order to promote health, treat diseases, and make informed administrative, research, and clinical decisions, medical researchers generally agree that the dissemination of this literature should be rapid and free. The British Medical Journal Publishing Group has recognized this priority and announced that it will disseminate 23 of its spe- cialist journals without cost to 100 developing countries.4
Another resource in the STM researcher’s toolbox is “preprint servers.” What is a preprint? Several professional organizations and government departments have defined them. The United States Department of Energy, Office of Scientific and Technical Information defines a preprint as “a document in pre-publication status, particularly an article submitted to a journal for publica- tion.”5The American Physical Society expands this by stating that the concept of e-prints includes any electronic work circulated by the author outside of the traditional publishing environment.6The American Chemical Society, which does not accept manuscripts previously posted online, defines preprints as “a draft of a scholarly paper that has not yet been formally peer-reviewed.”7 In some subject fields, where rapid transmission of knowledge is critical, electronic dissemination of preprints is an absolute necessity;
subsequent traditional publication is a formality. In mathematics and physics, for example, formal publication provides archiving and serves more as a notice to the scholarly community reminding it of the paper’s initial appearance and, ultimately, as a vehicle to support the standing of the author.8
Not long ago, scholarly communication involved mail, fax, or, more recently, anonymous FTP, gopher, and electronic mail.
Although these methods of sharing information are still used, it is easier, quicker, and less expensive to post papers on the World Wide Web for reference, review, and comments. While traditionally produc- ing and publishing a document requires a significant investment of time, materials, and money, placing a preprint on the World Wide Web involves no printing costs and practically no distribution costs. Access to an HTML program and a Web server are usually all that is required.
Paul Ginsparg, a renowned physicist formerly at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and presently at Cornell University, developed the first preprint archive in August 1991. Originally dedicated to papers in high-energy theoretical physics, the “arXiv.org e-Print Archive” at http://xxx.arxiv.cornell.edu initially attracted 1,000 users, but, after a few months, reported from 35,000 to 150,000 visits per day.
Professional societies, government sites, and universities often host preprint servers. Disciplines such as astronomy, chemistry, computer science, mathematics, and physics have been on the leading edge of preprint distribution. The vast majority of preprint servers contain scientific information. Fields in the humanities and social sciences have recently followed the trend, but signifi- cantly lag behind in terms of servers. CogPrints (http://cogprints.
soton.ac.uk) offers preprints in psychology, anthropology, philoso- phy, and linguistics.
Many preprint servers contain links to other preprint servers, as well as being searchable themselves. Here are some notable preprint sites:
e-Print archive
http://xxx.arxiv.cornell.edu
Begun in 1991 at the Los Alamos National Laboratory and moved in December 2001 to a server at the Cornell University Library, this well-organized, if somewhat user-unfriendly server, covers physics, mathematics, nonlinear science, and computer science. Full text is available in various electronic formats.
CERN Document Server: Preprints http://preprints.cern.ch
Full text is usually provided; coverage extends back to 1994 and includes links to other preprint servers.
SLAC SPIRES-HEP (Stanford Public Information Retrieval System
—High Energy Physics)
http://www-slac.slac.stanford.edu/find/spires.html
Containing over 500,000 entries with full text from various other sites, the scope of this Web site includes preprints, journal articles, theses, technical reports, and other documents.
American Physical Society E-Prints http://publish.aps.org/eprint
This server began in 1996 and, although a searchable archive, it was closed to submissions on May 31, 2000. It now redirects authors to Ginsparg’s site at Cornell University or to the American Physical Society’s journals.
Clinmed Netprints
http://clinmed.netprints.org
Launched by the British Medical Journaland HighWire Press, this site provides a place for authors to archive their completed studies before, during, or after peer review by other agencies. It covers origi- nal research in clinical medicine and health and includes a warning
that articles posted “have not yet been accepted for publication by a peer reviewed journal. … Casual readers should not act on their find- ings, and journalists should be wary of reporting them.” It also has a list under Journal Policies of journals that will and will not accept submissions that have appeared on preprint servers.
Social Science Research Network (SSRN) http://www.ssrn.com
SSRN is a database of working papers in accounting, econom- ics, finance, and law. This server helps users identify papers and authors, but charges to view them.
E-Math
http://www.ams.org/preprints
The American Mathematical Society maintains this preprint server for mathematicians. The mission of the server is to make available the current home page URLs and e-mail contacts of all mathematical preprint and e-print servers throughout the world.
The server itself does not offer full text, but it may be used as a tool to link to servers that include text.
Chemical Physics Preprint Database
http://www.chem.brown.edu/chem-ph.html
A joint project of the Los Alamos National Laboratory and Brown University’s Chemistry Department, this archive hosts full-text doc- uments for the international theoretical chemistry community.
ChemWeb
http://www.chemweb.com
Launched in July 2000, this site allows free searching of chem- istry journals as well as reviewed chemistry Web sites. Citations and abstracts are free, but full text is by subscription or “pay as you go.”
NCSTRL (Networked Computer Science Technical Reference Library)
http://www.ncstrl.org
Online since 1995, this server distributes technical reports in computer science. Searching and online access to full text are free.
PrePrint Network
http://www.osti.gov/preprint
Sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, this searchable gateway links to preprint servers that deal with scientific and tech- nical disciplines of concern to DOE, including scientific and tech- nical disciplines such as physics, materials, and chemistry, “as well as portions of biology, environmental sciences and nuclear medi- cine.” Users can search across the gateway by author, title, full record, date, and collection, or browse the databases alphabetically or by subject pathway. Search returns include title, author, source, number of pages, and a link to an abstract, which then links to the full text. The format of the full-text papers can vary considerably.
Preprints and the Future
Some searchers may find that pinpointing the best preprint server for their search is a challenge, but scholars in the scientific disciplines are working on a solution in real time. Imagine a sce- nario in which any researcher quickly accesses any preprint from any archive. Librarians, publishers, researchers, and computer sci- entists met in Santa Fe, New Mexico, in October 1999 where their unifying goal was the establishment of such a universal preprint archive. Laying the foundation for the resolution of technical chal- lenges such as archive maintenance, accessibility, and interoper- ability, the project was called the “Open Archives Initiative.” The database is now called “ARC: A Cross Archive Search Service.”9 (Search the service at http://arc.cs.odu.edu.) Searching the open archives is exciting because it offers metasearches of important
preprint servers and then delivers the information in a clear man- ner using user-selected sorting (Figure 1.5).
For Web surfers as well as Web researchers, preprint information may play a role in freely locating and accessing the full text of important papers that may never appear in a journal.