I very much agree with Jan-Marcin that scientists in NAS countries hold much valuable data that deserves to be exposed to worldwide scrutiny. I’m not sure, however, that all data owners/holders are as enlightened as he is. I get the impression that for many people there are four main issues.
1) Internet publication isn’t seen as “proper” publication and people fear that their data will be misused in some way
2) Publication of data in a journal would be beneficial to us all; but how many journals publish large tables of raw data?
3) The the Internet is largely in English, a language that many of the older scientists in NAS countries do not feel confident to write.
4) The high cost of mainstream journals effectively keeps them out of the libraries in many NAS countries. Its very difficult to write a paper that will be published in an international journal if you can't read the literature first.
I can't agree that the major need is to make hidden archive data available to others elsewhere in the world, rather I believe that NAS scientists need to build the capacity and confidence to publish fully synthesised data in the international literature under their own authorship.
Although the situation varies from country to country, I fear that in some places such a willingness to publish in international journals might take some time to evolve. It may have to be led by younger scientists who have previously been supported by travelling scholarships abroad and who feel confident communicating in English.
In other countries young NAS scientists are already making their presence evident on the international stage.
Mike Kendall
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Michael A Kendall
Plymouth Marine Laboratory
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