ALAWON: American Library Association Washington Office Newsline
Volume 11, Number 67
August 20, 2002

In This Issue: PROPOSED CLOSURE OF PubSCIENCE -- COMMENTS DUE by 
September 8th

Since its inception in 1999, PubSCIENCE has provided researchers 
and science-attentive citizens access to bibliographic records of 
peer-reviewed journal literature relating to DOE-supported work, 
addressing the need for a searchable gateway for the Department's 
Web patrons. Based on an extensive public/private sector 
collaboration, PubSCIENCE has covered journals of participating 
science publishers, including hyperlinks to the full text on 
publishers' servers.

DOE is proposing to discontinue PubSCIENCE, because -- it says -- 
private sector information products have emerged that freely offer 
bibliographic records to Web patrons. According to DOE, "A recent 
comparison of the content between PubSCIENCE and Scirus and 
Infotrieve showed that 90% of the journal literature in the scope 
of PubSCIENCE was covered by these two products. Taken as a whole, 
they provide coverage of information for DOE Web patrons."

Comments on this proposed action will be collected using the 
comment form at http://pubsci.osti.gov/psfeedbk.html for a 30-day 
comment period to END September 8, 2002. Comments received will be 
considered in the final decision process for the future of 
PubSCIENCE.



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