On Wed, 28 Feb 2001, Greg Kuperberg wrote: > I believe that accelerated, > stable citation is the single biggest strength of the arXiv over the > alternatives.
For data on this, see the following: http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Tp/Digitometrics/img009.gif This shows the shorter and shorter time until the first (and last, for all but the high impact papers) citation peak is reached: http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Tp/Digitometrics/img011.gif This shows the usual publication lag, and the cross-over in the version cited (from the preprint to the postprint): More data are available at: http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Tp/Digitometrics/index.htm http://opcit.eprints.org/tdb198/opcit/ and http://opcit.eprints.org/ijh198/ For the record, I do not share Greg's opinion that this effect, splendid though it is, is anywhere NEAR being self-archiving's greatest strength. There are much bigger and benefits: http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Tp/science.htm -------------------------------------------------------------------- Stevan Harnad har...@cogsci.soton.ac.uk Professor of Cognitive Science har...@princeton.edu Department of Electronics and phone: +44 23-80 592-582 Computer Science fax: +44 23-80 592-865 University of Southampton http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/ Highfield, Southampton http://www.princeton.edu/~harnad/ SO17 1BJ UNITED KINGDOM NOTE: A complete archive of the ongoing discussion of providing free access to the refereed journal literature online is available at the American Scientist September Forum (98 & 99 & 00 & 01): http://amsci-forum.amsci.org/archives/American-Scientist-Open-Access-Forum.html You may join the list at the site above. Discussion can be posted to: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@amsci.org
