Crisis of scientific communication: Fact or Fiction?

Abstract

Modern libraries have been around for hundreds of years and served us well with practically the same form of service. Today electronic publishing seems to be changing not only the form of service but the concept of a scientific library as such, as professionals for their work not only need access to the right publications but they frequently want it right now. At the same time some, if not all, modes of scientific communication are experiencing growing degrees of stress. We are faced with an almost exponential expansion of journal titles, many of them published only electronically. When we add to this the current tendencies to assess the scientific merit of an academic by the number of his publications or citations we see the basis for this ‘publish or perish’ culture we all are experiencing. On the other hand the emphasis on the ‘transfer of technologies’ is often forcing scientists to hold back publications of their results in order to protect their intellectual property. Indeed some results are never published or patented precisely because their commercial value is greater when their essential principles are not known. We see the gradual decline of telephone directories as our mobile telephone numbers are deemed to be too confidential to be published. Are we moving in the same direction with the scientific results of a real value?