From Knowledgespeak

Cornell University’s

arXiv project, which includes an e-print archive of scientific papers, is looking to covert the existing simple database to a more interactive one. It is being projected as a place where authors, articles, databases and readers talk to each other to help users identify a work’s main concepts, see research reports in context and easily find related work. The project is funded by a three-year $883,000 grant from the National Science Foundation, with federal stimulus money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).The arXiv currently contains close to 600,000 papers in physics, mathematics, computer science, quantitative biology, quantitative finance and statistics, with some 5,000 new papers submitted each month.

Researchers submit their work as ‘preprints’ before formal publication.

New tools will link papers by concepts, not just by the citations they contain. This is expected to help users without advanced expertise including some outside the scientific community – understand the significance of new research. The system will also identify related databases and commentaries.

It has just come to my attention that Nature has “obtained” Scientific American.  Immediately arises concerns of access and subscription costs.  We currently access SA through EbscoHost.  Content may be pulled from this vendor.  From other institutions, I have heard as much as 145% increase for current subscription rates and a $5000 fee for archive access.  NPG base rates on FTE.  I must be realistic.  If our rate is increased to these levels, electronic access to SA may jeapordized. 

Here is the NPG announcement:

“2010 promises to be a landmark year for NPG, as we continue to build our consumer media division with Scientific American at its heart. Scientific American became part of NPG in 2009, after many years as a sister Holtzbrinck organization. My colleagues and I feel privileged to be able to offer our customers the two iconic brands of Nature and Scientific American. We are looking forward to introducing institutional site license access to Scientific American on nature.com later this year, offering the functionality, support, services and interlinking with the NPG portfolio that you have come to expect from us. As we move forward, our goal is to become the authoritative and comprehensive science media group, from consumer to researcher, from London to New York to Tokyo.”