Open Source, Open Access Online Publishing: The Public Library of Science at Net Tuesday January 9, 2007

The second Tuesday of each month, social changemakers and web innovators get together to network, socialize and share ideas at Net Tuesday, an event produced by NetSquared, http://www.netsquared.org, a project of TechSoup, http://www.techsoup.org.

This month our two presenters will be from PLoS, The Public Library of Science, http://www.plos.org. PLoS is a nonprofit organization of scientists and physicians committed to making the world's scientific and medical literature a freely available public resource. PLoS is both an open-access advocate and an online publisher that publishes several peer-reviewed biomedical journals under the Creative Commons Attributions License. PLoS collaborates with Topaz in the development of open-source software to facilitate community-based annotation of scientific articles.

Presenter bios:

Richard Cave, IT Director
Richard oversees the I.T. and Web teams at PLoS. A huge proponent of Open Source software, he was drawn to the passion surrounding Open Access advocacy at PLoS and the commitment to make scientific knowledge freely available to the public. Richard brings more than 15 years of development experience working with start-ups and established companies on projects ranging from natural language processing, database engineering and administration, IT service management software, low-level file routines, a free interactive skateboarding simulation and the Open Source application framework Xaraya. Richard obtained a B.S. degree in Cognitive Science from U.C. San Diego, during which time he also developed a passion for surfing which still beckons him to the cold waters in northern California and warm waters in tropical locations.

Barbara Cohen, Executive Editor, PLoS Publications & Senior Editor, PLoS Medicine
Barbara Cohen was born and raised in Munich, Germany. She obtained a Ph.D. in genetics from Munich University under Herbert Jckle in 1993. Her thesis project, mostly conducted at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, examined limb development in the fruitfly Drosophila. She was an EMBO postdoctoral fellow with Thomas Graf at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory before joining the editorial staff of Nature in London in 1994. At Nature, she was responsible for peer review and publication of manuscripts in developmental biology, genetics, cancer, and plant science. In 1997, Barbara moved to New York and became editor of Nature Genetics. After three years at the helm of that journal, she moved to the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, an international not-for-profit organization that conducts basic and clinical cancer research, to head the office of communication. Missing the world of science publishing, Barbara joined the Journal of Clinical Investigation in 2001. As the executive editor, she oversaw the transition of the journal to Columbia University, where she worked with 18 academic editors to review and select scholarly articles with clinical relevance. Barbara had sympathized with the open access movement since its inception and was delighted to join the Public Library of Science in 2003, initially to launch PLoS Biology. Having developed a strong interest in medical research over the years, Barbara subsequently concentrated her efforts on PLoS Medicine and is now one of four Senior Editors working on that journal.

Official Website: http://netsquared.meetup.com/1/