[Two postings: (1) B. Mahon, (2) B. Kirsop] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ (1) List-Post: [email protected] List-Post: [email protected] Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 08:09:19 -0000 From: "Barry Mahon" <[email protected]>
David Spurrett wrote: > I would find an OA-only filtered Google Scholar unhelpful... > When I search the literature I *first* want to know about what > there is, and *after* that I worry about what I can get hold of. > In any event, trying to get Google to provide 'censored' results > is a side-show issue. If all the research was available by OA, > everything in the search results would be freely available. > Also, since accessibility improves citations, stuff that is OA should > look better on the Google results censored or not. (They start with > the most cited at the top.) This seems a little confused (IMO); the *first* aspect, I think, would be recognised by everyone. Since, manifestly, all research (output) is not presently OA then 'censored' (to use David's word, it would not be my choice) Google Scholar output would not provided information on all the material available. Small point - "accessibility" should perhaps be modified to 'accessibility in sources covered by ISI's citation database.....' Barry Mahon --------------------------------------------------------- (2) From: Barbara Kirsop <[email protected]> List-Post: [email protected] List-Post: [email protected] Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 14:48:17 -0000 Stevan, this from HIFnet. Can you comment? Barbara From: <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2004 12:07 PM Subject: [HIF-net at WHO] Google Scholar [3] > ...Universities spend > vast sums of money providing students with access to multiple databases > with peer-reviewed information and also offer instruction on database > searching. If students now flock to Google Scholar, this money will be > increasingly wasted while students access papers that may not be > peer-reviewed and miss out on much worthwhile information. See "Google > Scholarly": http://web.freepint.com/forum/bar/read.php?i=30646 [Comment: Students will be Students, in the web-age, and databases will compete for usefulness and usage. Use software to detect web-based cut-paste jobs and mark/reward source use according to its quality. (Profs should be profs too, in the web age.) Make local non-google resources visible and user-friendly, invite profs to use and assign them in coursework, and let the usership vote with their use. If google wins, database providers will either imitate and compete or fall out. S.H.] > It will be interesting to see where Google's new product fits with PubMed. > Can anyone comment on Google Scholar's implications, if any, for users in > developing countries? [Comment: PubMed as well as the priced databases will no doubt soon have a google-trawler in the background, automatically locating full-texts in google-space for the "hits" that come out of the PubMed or priced database searches. Useful for all -- developing and developed. The poor man's database (google) will either drive innovation and optimization in the priced databases, or drive them out of business. Don't forget that a 100% OA corpus will be a gift to google, unless the priced services think fast. But don't count out the free OA and OAI service-providers like http://citebase.eprints.org/ http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/cs and http://oaister.umdl.umich.edu/o/oaister/ either: They are research-based, highly innovative, ahead of the game, and their day is still to come (with 100% OA). -- S.H.
