🚀 go-pugleaf

I was surprised to see that copyright became the theme of the discussion of
electronic bibliographies. Is there any difference in principle from the
standpoint of copyright in publishing a bibliography electronically rather then
on paper? Nor am I convinced, in the light of the discussion, that the
copyright issue is the main one. I was thinking of  the kind of focussed
subject-specific bibliography that Avi cites (vulcanology for example). Such a
bibliography, if it were to be really useful could not simply be compiled by a
scissors and paste operation on existing bibliographic databases. It would
surely involve a good deal of 'sweat of the brow' and perhaps more in terms of
quality assessment and commentary than is appropriate for MedLine-type
comprehensive databases. Still I can see difficulties in the way of  the
proposal: (1) there is a problem of granularity: does one go for something as
broad as 'vulcanology' or 'climatology'  or go narrower 'Mt St Helens' or
'climate change', 'climate change in sub-Shaharan Africa'. If one aims at fine
targets it is easier to get a few instances but much harder to attain critical
mass. If one aims at breadth it is very difficult to organise. (2) is the data
really of significant use and value to others? Perhaps every one really wants
to make their own bibliography and is not interested in the efforts of others.
(3) Is bibliographic data invariably kind of messy and hard to package? But one
thing makes me think that it is worthwhile looking for electronically published
bibliographies. They are surely a lot more useful to users of bibliographic
databases than ones published on paper.  If this is the case one should really
look more at the question of how to ensure quality and how to publicise or
promote them.

Adam Hodgkin   Cherwell Scientific