At the American Chemical Society (ACS) meeting, an open meeting of the ACS Joint Board-Council Committee on Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) was considered by many to be the ideal venue for a discussion between ACS membership, governance, CAS, and ACS Publications regarding the society's opposition to NLM's PubChem initiative. CHMINF-L has received two reports (W. D. Ihlenfelt and Gary Wiggins) of the non-discussion which resulted from ACS professionals' decision to proceed with marketing pitches rather than the advertised/promised open discussion.
The decision to avoid member discussion/input has had the reasonably expected effect of angering many ACS members and led to the resignation of at least two members of the joint committee. The action is even more perplexing when one reads the resolution which the committee passed prior to the open session:
"The Joint Board-Council Committee on Chemical Abstracts Service (CCAS) strongly believes that the NIH PubChem Initiative is one of the most significant and potentially harmful challenges ever faced by CAS, and thus, the ACS as an organization. CCAS strongly supports the ACS in its efforts to resolve these issues.
CCAS is seriously concerned that the current communication strategy is not reaching ACS membership.
Therefore CCAS strongly recommends that the ACS:
1. Devise a more effective communication strategy to fully and accurately inform the ACS membership on this significant issue.
2. Involve the membership in appropriate dialog concerning this issue.
CCAS encourages the communication strategy to utilize the strengths of the Society which include the Members, the Council, Local Sections, Technical Divisions, the Board and their related publications both written and electronic."
Posted by
George Porter at 9/13/2005 05:08:00 PM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
