This is a list of “top technology trends” written for ALA Mid-Winter, 2009. They are presented in no particular order....
The pendulum of data ownership is swinging - I believe it was Francis Bacon who said, “Knowledge is power”. In my epistemological cosmology, knowledge is based on information, and information is based on data. (Going the other way, knowledge leads to wisdom, but that is another essay.) Therefore, he who owns or has access to the data will ultimately have more power. Google increasingly has more data than just about anybody. They have a lot of power. OCLC increasingly “owns” the bibliographic data created by its membership. Ironically, this data — in both the case of Google and OCLC — is not freely available, even when the data was created for the benefit of the wider whole. I see this movement akin to the movement of a pendulum swinging one way and then the other. On my more pessimistic days I view it as a battle. On my calmer days I see it as a natural tendency, a give and take. Many librarians I know are in the profession, not for the money, but to support some sort of cause. Intellectual freedom. The right to read. Diversity. Preservation of the historical record. If I have a cause it then is about the free and equal access to information. This is why I advocate open access publishing, open source software, and Net Neutrality. When data and information is “owned” and “sold” an environment of information have’s and have not’s manifests itself. Ultimately, this leads to individual gain but not necessarily the improvement of the human condition as a whole....
Posted by
Peter Suber at 2/09/2009 10:53:00 AM.
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.
