Data, Data Everywhere and Not a Byte to Share
Digital data management, preservation, and access are posing growing challenges for scientists, research institutions, and national science funding agencies. This past week's issue of Nature has a special report on the cultural and technical challenges of scientific data sharing, encompassing both data preservation and open access. The report mentions promising initiatives such as GenBank and the UK Joint Information Systems Committee, but points to NSF's DataNet program, which launched a request for proposals in 2007 that led to the funding of the DataONE program, as evidence that efforts by the US are lagging behind. (An example of an established US model of data preservation and access may be the Electronic Records Archives program of the US National Archives.) Who is ultimately responsible for preserving digital data and making it openly available, and who is going to pay for it? The special section covers these issues and more. Unlike most Nature articles, these are available online without a subscription.