Archetype

The worst hangover I ever had

I did my undergraduate studies in Biology at UNAM in Mexico City. While this institution holds the best science libraries in the country, there was always the odd paper I couldn’t find, especially when it came to insect taxonomy with its plethora of obscure journals. Add to this that electronic journals had yet to come into existence (it’s not that I am old, they are really a very recent phenomenon).

Back then, getting papers in the subject of one’s interest consisted in meticulously thumbing  through the heavy telephone books for animals called Zoological Records*, writing down some potentially useful references, and filling a petition for copies at a special place in campus that dealt with international inter-library loans. After that, you only had to wait a couple of weeks to get photocopies of some papers that were not quite what you were looking for. It felt like I was doing some serious research nevertheless.

All this changed when I arrived to Cornell University in the U.S. to pursue a Ph.D. in Entomology. Cornell has the best library for entomology in the Americas, and with its rare book collection it rivals some of the bests in Europe. I went from having a modest access to scientific literature to having anything I could think off. Occasional Papers of the Southwester Entomological Station? Sure, we have it, no problem. It was like a never ending cocktail party with open bar.

And that was when my thirst for scientific papers began. It started as an innocent activity.  Social reading at first, a couple of papers a week in discussion groups and lab meetings. It quickly changed to reading articles by myself, anytime, anywhere. Soon I had already went through a chapter in a edited book and some meetings proceedings before lunchtime.

I inevitably became a regular of the entomology library, spending countless hours chugging away one monographic revision after another:

- I think you have had enough for today Mr. Keller.

- Huh? What time is it? I lost track of time…

- It’s closing time. You can leave those books on the desk, I’ll take care of them. Do you want me to call you a taxi?

- No. It’s O.K. Marty, I’ll take the campus shuttle. See you in the morning I guess.

I photocopy everything at first, not knowing where will I end up after graduation. But soon journals went electronic, JSTOR digitized back issues and, for ants, Donat Agosti compiled all taxonomic publications since Linnaeus and uploaded the pdfs to antbase.org. No need to carry all that paper around. And the best of it, all these papers accessible online at a mouse click. 24 hour long happy hour.

My reckless, addictive behavior continued as I moved to the American Museum of Natural History to continue my dissertation research. The library of the AMNH also has a substantial and comprehensive collection and they have been pioneers in all manners digital. I graduated last summer and haven’t been at the AMNH for some time now, but I kept accessing the library and its online journal subscriptions remotely.

All this changed a little more than two weeks ago. I received and automatically generated message telling me that my AMNH account was about to expire in two days unless renew! Panic. This is the account I use to access the digital library. Worst still, the message came during Thanksgiving weekend, so there was no one I could contact to prevent this catastrophic event from happening.

And so it did. It all suddenly came to an abrupt stop. Involuntary cold turkey. One day I was carelessly reading about the thoracic morphology of Archostematal beetles, the next day I needed to “log in or make a payment in order to read this story in full.” For the first time after all my years as a graduate student and postgraduate time I woke up feeling sick and withdrawn. My head felt like it was about to explode. I reached for the Internet in vain, as even antbase.org couldn’t help me since most of the recent articles about ant taxonomy are still published in copyrighted journals.

During the first week without access I tried to ease the anxiety by going through the free online abstracts. Some journals even let you read the first page without a subscription! But I soon realized that it was like trying to get drunk by sipping wine samples from the promotional stand in the liquor store. The employee has just so much patience.

I received Nature‘s table of content in my e-mail. I was afraid to open the message. What if there is a paper, letter or editorial comment that interests me? I knew I wouldn’t be able to read the full article. I decided it was better not to know for now. If there was something truly important, I thought, I’ll surely read about it for free in the Science section of the New York Times online.

By the end of the second week, in desperation, I reached a new low. I searched for some old papers on molecular systematics I had stored in my computer’s hard drive and read through the PCR protocols, trying to squeeze the last drops of information out of them. It made me feel disgusted. I was afraid someone was going to enter through the door and find me doing that, how embarrassing.

Everything is alright now. I contacted the secretary of my department at the AMNH and she kindly agreed to fill out the appropriate form and send it to IT department to have my account reactivated. The headaches and dizziness are gone. After what seems to me like the worst hangover I ever had, I still wonder, however, how does an individual outside of the institution can keep up-to-date on primary scientific literature, let alone do even the most basic research? Lets hope the open access moment keeps its momentum and we find ways of making the results from scientific research widely available while keeping publishers afloat.

Tags: Open access

3 Comments to The worst hangover I ever had

1

Alejandro
December 17, 2008

At least you did not woke up and realized that you had a black out of what happened “the night before”.

But I know the feeling that you describe. When I left the ETH I also lost access to a lot of online Journals. I still sometimes write to friends with access and ask them to send me a digital copy of an article… following your analogy, it is like being the friend that visits someone expecting to be invited to a glass of wine only because he cannot pay for his own alcohol.

2

James C. Trager
December 18, 2008

“Lets hope the open access moment keeps its momentum and we find ways of making the results from scientific research widely available while keeping publishers afloat.”

YES!!! Living on the periphery of Academia, I have only occasional, and sneaky, full access. Something like the eating habits of dumpster divers, you could say.

3

TimurAlhimenkov
January 2, 2009

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Thanks in advance.

Sincerely, Your Reader.