This third report in the GISWatch series is entitled “Access to online information and knowledge – advancing human rights and democracy” and reveals how vulnerable the internet as we know it is. The report unpacks the key issues impacting on access to online information and knowledge, including discussions on intellectual property rights, knowledge rights, open standards and access to educational materials and libraries. The report also offers an institutional overview and a reflection on indicators that track access to information and knowledge. 48 country reports –-ten more than last year— analyse the status of access to online information and knowledge in countries as diverse as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Mexico, Switzerland and Kazakhstan, while regional overviews offer a bird’s eye perspective on trends in North America, Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa, the Middle East, South Asia and Europe. For the first time there is an innovate section that visually maps global rights as seen through the lens of Google searches, as well as a visual analysis of Twitter messages sent out during the recent Iranian political crisis.

As digital technologies are expanding the power and reach of research, they are also raising complex issues. These include complications in ensuring the validity of research data; standards that do not keep pace with the high rate of innovation; restrictions on data sharing that reduce the ability of researchers to verify results and build on previous research; and huge increases in the amount of data being generated, creating severe challenges in preserving that data for long-term use. Ensuring the Integrity, Accessibility, and Stewardship of Research Data in the Digital Age examines the consequences of the changes affecting research data with respect to three issues - integrity, accessibility, and stewardship-and finds a need for a new approach to the design and the management of research projects. The report recommends that all researchers receive appropriate training in the management of research data, and calls on researchers to make all research data, methods, and other information underlying results publicly accessible in a timely manner. The book also sees the stewardship of research data as a critical long-term task for the research enterprise and its stakeholders. Individual researchers, research institutions, research sponsors, professional societies, and journals involved in scientific, engineering, and medical research will find this book an essential guide to the principles affecting research data in the digital age.

growth in web technologies and increased transparency in the literature - and data - may be contributing to a shift in our perceptions of what constitutes a prior publication. Innovative online journals with virtually unlimited space provide researchers with opportunities to produce novel (original) contributions to the literature that are clearly and transparently linked to previously published articles. These include significantly extended/re-analysed reports of previously published summary findings in journals such as Trials and legitimate or incremental updates to previous studies in BMC Research Notes.

I’m posting up some work-in-progress entitled Exploring Patterns of Knowledge Production (link to full pdf). Below I’ve excerpted the introduction plus list of motivational questions. Comments (and critique) very welcome!