You Don't Need to Purchase Articles for Outrageous Fees Anymore. You Can Now RENT Them Instead!

In putting together my last post I noticed something interesting (disturbing?) from the Cambridge Journals site.  If you would like to purchase a PDF of the Parringtonia gracilis redescription paper I just mentioned it will cost you $45.00 U.S. The atrociousness of this has been discussed in detail at several other blogs most notably by the SV-POW guys.  Anyhow, for those of you who don't want to (or can't afford to) shell out this kind of cash for a single article there is now another option available.  You can rent the article instead for the low(er) price of $5.99 U.S.!!!  You get 24 hour access to the article, which is probably enough to cram in a couple of readings if you don't really want to fully comprehend the paper. Also just think of the hard drive space you'll save if all of your PDFs 'disappeared' after a 24 hour period.  Currently I'm very hard pressed to think of a reason why this would be attractive. I suppose if you simply wanted to download the article and print it for future use.... Anyone else able to present this in a positive light?

Kudos to PLOS ONE

The latest dinosaur paper causing a buzz on the blogosphere is a new paper by Hocknull et al. describing three new dinosaurs (two sauropods and one theropod) from the Middle Cretaceous of Australia. Because the paper is Open Access you can download and read it for free from here. Other blog coverage includes bits from SVPOW (of course) and The Open Source Paleontologist. In the later post Andy Farke briefly mentions that this new article makes clear statements to establish the nomenclatural availability of the newly proposed taxonomic names. If you remember this topic recently caused some intense discussion on Carl Zimmer's blog The Loom regarding the early primate Darwinius. I also covered it briefly here, and subsequently the journal PLOS ONE, which is an open access online only publication, took steps to ensure the taxonomic availability of Darwinius and then went back and did the same for other new taxa which it had published.

Well it looks like PLOS ONE clearly has their act together now regarding the ICZN rules. A section in the new Hocknull et al. paper explicitly lists the libraries where paper copies of the article have been distributed (satisfying ICZN Article 8.6). Furthermore, interested parties can order paper copies for $10 from PLOS ONE. I find this last bit interesting. Of course, with open access papers you can download and print off your own copy; however, in many cases you are at the mercy of the print quality of your printer. Now for a modest fee ($10 in this case) you can get a printed (hopefully reprint quality) copy sent to you. I'm definitely one of the older crowd who still has a hard time reading off a computer screen and love holding an actually printed copy in my hands. Now I may not fork out the $10 for this particular article given that I'm currently not working on Cretaceous sauropods, but if I were I would think that $10 is worth a good hard copy of a 51 page monograph (assuming this is post paid and the quality is good).

Anyhow, kudos to PLOS ONE (and the authors) for recognizing the need to adhere to the current ICZN rules and being so quick to sort out the problem and go above and beyond in solving it. This clearly demonstrates one of the reasons why PLOS ONE is quickly becoming a major player in paleontology publications.

REFERENCE

Hocknull, S.A., White, M.A., Tischler, T.R., Cook, A.G., Calleja, N.D., Sloan, T., and D.A. Elliott. 2009. New Mid-Cretaceous (Latest Albian) Dinosaurs from Winton, Queensland, Australia. PLoS ONE 4: e6190. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0006190

Here we go again: redux.

Yesterday I commented on the status of taxonomic names published in online only journals and received from great comments. In my post I linked to a similar article by Carl Zimmer on his blog "The Loom". Read here to see the follow-up after he contacted the ICZN. In a nutshell until the ICZN rules change or another code is adopted these names are not valid. Another possibility (as suggested by Brian Axsmith) is for PLoS One to follow what Palaeontologia Electronica does... deposit print copies in at least five libraries and openly state where the copies are located. This makes the name valid according to the ICZN.

By the way...some were worried that because the online article is not recognized by the ICZN, then the first print medium (e.g., newspapers, magazines) that "publish" the name would gain priority. However, ICZN rules also state (and unfortunately I don't have my copy nearby as I am typing this) that the article in which the name first appears must intend to actually erect a new taxonomic name. The authors of newspaper and popular magazine do not have this intent and therefore do not "officially" erect the name except as a nomen nudem. Nomina nuda have no status and thus are still available for the authors of the official publication.

Postscript: Check out this comment on The Loom from Peter Binfeld, the managing editor of PLos One. Way to go guys, but unfortunately this is just one case. For more discussion see this post on DinoGoss.

I've missed Mike Taylor's comment on Rioarribasimius....can anyone tell me where it was made?

Here We Go Again: Darwinius, the ICZN, and the Online Publication of Taxonomic Names

I brought this up back in February regarding the new stegosaur Miragaia longicollum; about how regardless of the claims made by journals, unless the guidelines put forth by the International Committee of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) regarding publication are adhered to (i.e., hard copy placed in at least five libraries that are explicitly identified in the document) published names in online only publications are simply not valid. Now a similar case is coming under heavy discussion.

The newly described primate Darwinius masillae (Franzen et al., 2009) has been receiving tons of press heralded as being a 'missing link' in primate evolution (however see this article in Laelaps), however, it is not only the phylogentic position and its interpretation that is being hotly debated. Now the validity of the taxonomic name is being called into question because the name was published in the online-only journal PLoS One. Carl Zimmer's blog The Loom has a great discussion of this. Check it out.

Hopefully the ICZN will soon amend the code as advocated by Harris (2004) to deal with the increasing trend of online only journals and the early online releases (ahead of print versions) now popular with many journals.

This is becoming a serious problem.

REFERENCES

Franzen, J., Gingerich, P., Habersetzer, J., Hurum, J., von Koenigswald, W., & Smith, B. (2009). Complete Primate Skeleton from the Middle Eocene of Messel in Germany: Morphology and Paleobiology PLoS ONE, 4 (5) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0005723

Harris, J.D. 2004. 'Published Works' in the electronic age: recommended amendments to Articles 8 and 9 of the Code. Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature 61:138-148.

Early On-line Publications and Establishing Taxonomic Names

I may have not been paying attention lately but when I was downloading the new paper yesterday on the new stegosaur Miragaia from the Royal Society website I noticed something at the bottom of the download cover sheet that surprised me as I do not recall seeing anything like this previously.

Advance online articles have been peer reviewed and accepted for publication but have not yet appeared in the paper journal (edited, typeset versions may be posted when available prior to final publication). Advance online articles are citable and establish publication priority; they are indexed by PubMed from initial publication. Citations to Advance online articles must include the digital object identifier (DOIs) and date of initial publication.

So the editors of the Proceedings of the Royal Society B are claiming that new taxon names such as Miragaia longicollum are established upon publication online, so in this specific case M. longicollum was established on February 25, 2009 and until the article comes out in print it is cited with this date (I have fixed this in my previous post and am glad that they explicitly state how to cite an advance article).

What does the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) say about this? Jerry Harris had an article a few years back (Harris, 2004) where he recommended amendments to Articles 8 and 9 of the code to accommodate DOIs and advance online publications. Specifically this would deal with Articles 8.6, which states that on-line publications must deposit hard copies “in at least 5 major publicly accessible libraries which are identified by name in the work itself” and Article 9.8 which states that “text or illustrations distributed by means of electronic signals” do not constitute valid work (ICZN, 1999). Thus, according to the ICZN, the name would not be valid until the printed version is made available to the public (unless an amendment has already been made, which I am unaware of). Countering this Harris (2004) argued that on-line publications met the availability criteria and that DOIs provide unique, archived identifiers that fix the date of publication, and thus proposed:

“I propose to the Commission that, under Article 78.3 ('Amendments to the Code'), Articles 8 and 9 of the current Code require both pro- and retroactive (to the effective date of the Fourth Edition, I January 2000) modification to accommodate the following issue: documents published electronically with DOl numbers and that are followed by hard-copy printing and distribution be exempt from Article 9.8 and be recognized as valid, citable sources of zoological taxonomic information and that their electronic publication dates be considered definitive. Note that this does not require electronic publications to have DOl numbers; only that any paper appearing in electronic format that does have a DOl number, and is followed by traditional, hard-copy issuance, is an acceptable place for the appearance of zoological nomenclatural action. Electronic publications lacking DOl numbers lack the citability benefits enjoyed by DOl registered documents and, regardless of whether followed by hard-copy release, will still be subject to Article 9.8 and be considered invalid for zoological nomenclatural actions. Such a change may be issued as a Declaration (Article 78.3.3 and subject to the provisions of Article 80.1), since it entails only minor changes to Articles 8.1.3 and 9.8, as follows (recommended additions in italics): Article 8.1.3. It must have been produced in an edition containing simultaneously obtainable copies by a method that assures numerous identical and durable copies, including documents that contain identical Digital Object Identifier numbers and for which electronic documents are followed by hard-copy release. Article 9.8. Text or illustrations distributed by means of electronic signals (e.g. by means of the World Wide Web), except where such material meets the provisions of Article 8.1.3”.

Given all of this, I want to know does the statement by The Royal Society fix the publication date for the name Miragaia longicollum as February 25, 2009?

As a side note check out Adam Yates comments at Dracovenator on the taxonomic name of this specimen.

Harris, J.D. 2004. 'Published Works' in the electronic age: recommended amendments to
Articles 8 and 9 of the Code. Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature 61:138-148.

International Committee of Zoological Nomenclature. 1999. International Code of Zoological Nomenclature 4th Edition. The International Trust for Zoological Nomenclature, London, 126 pp.