I'm not sure why but yesterday was this blog's best day ever as measured by unique visitors - 2570. I'm equally unsure (and slightly worried) as to why http://www.used-aircraftsales.com/ should be the top referrer.

More movement on the issues around the dissemination of scientific research using the web and its impact on researchers, funding bodies, libraries and publishers. The Research Information Network in the UK has published a very full report on the operations and costs of scholarly publishing. The idea was to take some of the heat out of the open-access debate and replace it with some light and informed debate. I've been invited to chair a workshop on November 14 in London and everyone is welcome. There are many sides to this discussion but at least this report has been prepared properly, thoughtfully and impartially. Not least because the Chair of the overseeing panel is an old acquaintance from the days when I was a medical commissioning editor and signed him up to co-author the Oxford Textbook of Clinical Pharmacology.

And more on public libraries. The Libraries Minister, David Lammy, has dismissed those trying to focus libraries on books (as opposed to community centres or worse) as:

Those that want to turn the clock back to some highly-selective and rose-tinted vision of libraries from their own childhoods are out of luck.  I’m with them as far as putting the written word at the heart of the library service.  And I’m with them on the campaign to keep the book stock fresh and relevant.  But there’s more to this than nostalgia.

His solution is to commission a White Paper on Communities, presumably supported by many very wise (and expensive) consultants. Fortunately the importance of libraries and books has been recognised by politicians outside the junta and pressure is building for the implementation of genuine management improvements, genuine investment and genuine recognition of the centrality of the printed word in a modern society. More on this at the excellent Good Library blog.

Incidentally, I must confess that I was rather worried when I spotted Mr Lammy at the Man Booker Prize dinner last week. It might have confirmed his prejudice that the book trade was populated by white, penguin-suited, public-school-educated middle-class (or worse) men entirely cut off from the real multicultural Britain. Thank goodness then that the prize was won by an American-domiciled Indian woman.