Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2006 04:14:32 +0100 (BST) From: Subbiah Arunachalam <subbiah_a@yahoo.com> Friends: Here is an excellent article on arXiv, the central archive for physics and related fields, by its founder Paul Ginsparg. He highlights the value of arXiv (and all open access archives) for developing country researchers. Unfortunately, developing countries themselves are doing very little to adopt open access, in spite of the fact most countries have the necessary infrastructure and competence. Subbiah Arunachalam Paul Ginsparg on arXiv, OA, and the future Excerpt: The e-print arXiv, initiated in August 1991, has effectively transformed the research communication infrastructure of multiple fields of physics and could play a prominent role in a unified set of global resources for physics, mathematics, and computer science. It has grown to contain >375,000 articles (as of July 2006), with >50,000 new submissions expected in calendar year 2006 and >40,000,000 full-text downloads per year. It is an international project, with dedicated mirror sites in 17 countries and collaborations with United States and foreign professional societies and other international organizations, and it has also provided a crucial lifeline for isolated researchers in developing countries... For more details, visit: http://www.mysyndicaat.com/myfeed/blog/default/baileycw_Open%20Access%20Update?page=2&ordertype=0