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Open Source Molecules 294

Posted by Zonk from the chemistry-for-the-people dept.
manganese4 writes "They've been discussed before in relation to Google, but the American Chemical Society has launched a new effort against perceived competitors. They are attempting to limit the government's ability to freely publish the results of scientific work paid for by tax dollars. The British journal Nature and the Univeristy of California reports on efforts by the ACS in attempting to shutdown a free database, PubChem, of molecular structures because it competes head to head with the fee-for-service Chemical Abstract Service. Their rationale is that the government should not spend taxpayer dollars on something private business is already doing. Luckily the government has not backed down."
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Open Source Molecules

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  • Private and public are not mutually exclusive (Score:5, Insightful)

    by October_30th ( 531777 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @03:55AM (#12861249) Homepage Journal
    Why is it that people always see public and private services as mutually exclusive options?

    For instance, private and public health care as well as transportation work very well together.

    • it seems that they are threatened financially by this. I wonder how many universities would make a switch or use PubChem as a supplement?

      • Re:Private and public are not mutually exclusive (Score:5, Interesting)

        by October_30th ( 531777 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @04:41AM (#12861375) Homepage Journal
        it seems that they are threatened financially by this.

        Yes, sure, but isn't it essential for a business to come up with something that justifies the cost of their services? In healthcare business private clinics you get to see a specialist sooner. In public transportation it means being able to get a taxi instead of having to wait for a bus/underground.

        It's outrageout to say "we produce the same data, so the government should get out of our business". ACS should come up with other services (data mining, consultation,...) by which it differentiates itself from the free service.

        • It's outrageout to say "we produce the same data, so the government should get out of our business". ACS should come up with other services (data mining, consultation,...) by which it differentiates itself from the free service.
          Why should the government get into the ACS's business in the first place?
          • For one, if my tax dollars are funding the research, why shouldn't I have open access to the findings? If private companies want to keep this stuff private, let them do it without tax-based assistance. They're free to charge for their findings, but the gov't shouldn't suppress the free dissemination of data from tax-funded research just because somebody else was previously making a buck on it. The private company will have to find a way to add value such to justify the cost of their service. That's how
      • it seems that they are threatened financially by this.

        And it's the goverment's role (on behalf of the people, remember) to reply by saying "so?".

        It's always possible that the people would be better of if the company has "unfair" competition from subsidised government services, or even is put out of business by this. In theory, governments serve people before companies.

    • Re:Private and public are not mutually exclusive (Score:5, Insightful)

      by /ASCII ( 86998 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @04:03AM (#12861277) Homepage
      So true. I live in Sweden, and here there are laws prohibiting most forms of private healthcare, private transportation, etc. In America, there seems (at least from what we get reported here in Sweden) to be a strong movement to prohibit public broadband efforts, public chemical databases, etc.

      I am a big fan of small government, but in my book, small government means fewer laws and the possibility for the government to take swift action. If it the private sector is overpricing something that can benefit the community, I don't see why there should be laws agains the government providing a little competition.

    • Because they are. (Score:4, Funny)

      by noamt ( 317240 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @06:19AM (#12861676) Homepage Journal

      Service.java:2: illegal combination of modifiers: public and private
      public private void service() {
      ^
      1 error
    • I believe the problem here is that the ACS wants to eliminate their competition from the public sector.

      In this case, taxpayers have already paid for this research and I think we should have access to the results and not have to pay a private monopoly again for the information.

  • it's essential that these databases be open (Score:5, Interesting)

    by cahiha ( 873942 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @03:57AM (#12861257)
    Data mining is becoming more and more important for science. But you can't do data mining if the data is locked up and requires cumbersome and costly subscriptions to access.

    Chemical, biological, and other scientific databases need to be open, free, and freely redistributable for science and technology to continue to make rapid progress.

  • by that logic (Score:5, Insightful)

    by poor_boi ( 548340 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @03:59AM (#12861265)
    Their rational is that the government should not spend taxpayer dollars on something private business is already doing.

    Guess we can shut down public schools then, now, eh?

    • Guess we can shut down public schools then, now, eh?

      Law enforcement can be outsourced to some good company who could make law enforcement robots with human brains, too!

      Stop wasting taxplayers' money on something that can be done well by profit making companies!

    • Re:by that logic (Score:3, Interesting)

      by FidelCatsro ( 861135 )
      Don't forget the military , plenty of Mercenaries out there to do that job.
      Police , forget about it . countless security companies and organised crime rackets to do protection.
      Review of laws and making new laws , well there are plenty of private companies who can review legal papers.
      Budget , who needs the cabinet , Plenty of accountancy firms .
      Who needs public libraries when there are book shops.
      • The military has two functions, inviade other countries and protect the country from invasion. It goes against an anarchocapitalist socienty to ever invade a country, so that aspect of a military is redundant, and no one in their right mind would ever invade an anarcho capitalist society, so that is not an issue either. So there is no need for a military.

        Given the amount of police corruption in todays society, I think people would get bettr protection from choosing between different security companies and
        • The problem with doing away with your military is that you would have to persuade everyone else to do the same.
          Police corruption , if handled by a private security firm/s would just shift the corruption to another organisation.
          Less laws are a good thing , just keep to the core of sensible ones

          If the government was non-existent then we would still need a budget to handle inflation and what not (unless we had major reform)

          I agree on the last point entirely , though a lot of people still like paper hard copi

    • Re:by that logic (Score:3, Interesting)

      by SilverspurG ( 844751 ) *
      Access to high level chemical and biological research material is hardly a basic service like education.

      But, as long as you bring it up, government funded and regulated education is a horrible scam. It's wasteful, it's ineffective, in many cases it repropagates complete falsehoods (eg. Pearl Harbor, the reason why the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the motives and causes behind the 1929 stock market crash, the Great Depression, and the creation of the Federal Reserve), and in today's worl

  • Adjective != Noun (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Their rational is that...

    That's rationale, you illiterate clod.

  • Well, then... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by JanneM ( 7445 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @04:01AM (#12861273) Homepage
    I guess your government shouldn't be paying for any of the research either, then, including the research done by graduate and doctoral students. Maybe time to send a bill to every company employing one of those people?

    • Re:Well, then... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by SilverspurG ( 844751 ) *
      Maybe there's a good reason for wanting to reevaluate funding sources and access to data.

      Why should you, as a taxpayer who doesn't give a rat's butt about advanced research in niche fields like Density Functional Theory, or 3+2 cyclizations, or Palladium catalyzed cross-coupling, be forced to pay for the infrastructure for the government to make this information available to you?

      I'm a chemist, I like this stuff but this is really information that should be on a subscription basis. If you like it, you'll

      • Re:Well, then... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by idiot900 ( 166952 ) *
        Why should you, as a taxpayer who doesn't give a rat's butt about advanced research in niche fields like Density Functional Theory, or 3+2 cyclizations, or Palladium catalyzed cross-coupling, be forced to pay for the infrastructure for the government to make this information available to you?

        Because you, as a taxpayer, already paid for said advanced research, because it's important for the greater good of the nation and private companies won't fund it. Why should you then be forced to pay a private entit

      • Re:Well, then... (Score:3, Insightful)

        by tfoss ( 203340 )
        Why should you, as a taxpayer who doesn't give a rat's butt about advanced research in niche fields like Density Functional Theory, or 3+2 cyclizations, or Palladium catalyzed cross-coupling, be forced to pay for the infrastructure for the government to make this information available to you?

        Because we live in a society. Because we understand that the point of research is not solely to have direct, obvious applications to everybody's life. Basic research benefits the society in many indirect ways, and th

  • So when... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Vo0k ( 760020 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @04:07AM (#12861291) Journal
    When Osama Bin Laden will apply for US govt to remove and stop funding the US Army, because private parties (him) own private military groups?
    Corporate-owned Police, IRS replaced by Mafia, and of course schools under management of MTV. Go Private Property!
  • I'm generally against the idea of the government spending money obtained through illegal, coercive measures (read: taxes) on much of anything. That said, scientific research is probably one of the best uses they can make of the money they steal from us... so as long as they're going to continue stealing our money, I think resources like this should be kept freely available to the public. After all, we **already paid for it.**
    • How are taxes illegal? Also, if we removed taxes and government funding, how would people stay secure from theft (thinking especially disabled people and the poor)?

      Chris

  • Adapt or die... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Eric Damron ( 553630 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @04:21AM (#12861324)
    When will society become outraged at the corporate mindset? The mindset that says that society can not be enriched if it costs the corporation or in this case the "not-for-profit" organization?

    It is unfortunate that the only way that society can protect itself is to become and stay fighting mad. I don't want to be angry all of the time but the world is filled with greedy assholes who would turn our world into a hopeless pit of poverty if left unchecked.

    Can a Utopian world where even the poorest among us can live comfortably and a corporate world where piggy CEOs can slurp up million dollar salaries coexists? If not, I for one choose Utopia.

    So I say to all of the greedy sons-of-bitches "Don't get in the way of a better world. Adapt or die!"

    • Re:Adapt or die... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Jim_Callahan ( 831353 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @05:22AM (#12861500)
      "When will society become outraged at the corporate mindset?"


      When it stops working so well. The corporate mindset produces what my classmates would term a "fuckton of money", which makes "a Utopian world where even the poorest can live comfortably" an actual possibility instead of the unattainable, wild goose chase that most slashdotters would use the ideal as in order to trick people into conforming to their stupid ideas regarding economics.

      There. Was that outraged enough for ya? I can add more smouldering rhetoric, if you want.
    • So I say to all of the greedy sons-of-bitches "Don't get in the way of a better world. Adapt or die!"

      They'll have no trouble "adapting". It's the rest of the world I'd worry about if we ever head for "Utopia". After all, greedy sons-of-bitches have historically hijacked or engineered every utopian movement that actually achieved power.

  • ACS most worried about journal articles (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 20, 2005 @04:21AM (#12861325)
    Just from glancing at the PubChem site, it seems like its main function at the moment is to find journal articles relevant to a given chemical. This is probably what worries the ACS most, as there are already plenty of databases online that provide info about chemical properties (such as the NIST Chemistry Webbook or the Spectral Database Server), they just don't link to journal articles. It would be fairly outrageous for the ACS to complain about these.

    At any rate, the ACS's complaints seem pretty silly to me, as I only know of a few systems for finding chem journal articles (CAS, Beilstein and SciFinder Scholar). I would guess they're all horrendously expensive, and only accessible to individuals at university libraries, so a free system like this would certainly be great for the average citizen. Additionally, it may well be worth the government's while, in terms of cost, to develop a free system for their own use.
  • One option would be to sell this new database to the competitor?

    I agree the government should normally keep its hands off, but some things are either just too important or simply don't work well in a capitalist system (for example the police). Im not sure about this particular case, it seems like it probably shouldn't have been created in the first place and now its too late - why did a government department need to create this database if they could have just used the existing one? Although that has its o

  • Oh, it hurts. (Score:5, Funny)

    by otter42 ( 190544 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @04:29AM (#12861350) Homepage Journal
    Who finds it ironic that Nature charges for access to an article championing free access to information?

  • Out of context!!! (Score:5, Informative)

    by robotkid ( 681905 ) <alanc2052@nospAm.yahoo.com> on Monday June 20, 2005 @04:44AM (#12861384)
    I've been following this debate, alot of high-profile journals are full of opinion articles on this. But here's some context for all those too lazy to RTFA: ACS publishes "SCIFINDER" and "CHEMICAL ABSTRACTS" which is NOT a database of journal papers. It is a database of chemical structures and properties which is invaluable to any research chemist because a) most information on exotic compounds are not published in journals and b) even if they were you'd have a very hard time searching journals for occurences of chemical compounds. (FYI most of this info was probably NOT gained through tax-funded research, it's mostly industrial) Just about every chemistry lab in the nation has to pay a subscription for this service, but it obviously requires many, many curators to keep up to date because of the crazy amount of info out there. ACS is a nonprofit organization and it uses the proceeds to fund things like scientific meetings and putting every journal article from the last 100 years online (they are way ahead of most journals that only have 5 or 10 years online).

    That being said it is strange that they are so vehemently against an NIH database which is primary geared towards biological compounds (i.e. proteins and nucleic acids and derivatives) which is pretty orthogonal to most of the chemical research world. But it would be a gross oversimplification to paint the ACS as an evil money grubbing organization.

    Besides, chemists are rarely evil. Science fiction proves it's always an overweight doctor come-geneticist played by marlon brando that's evil.

    • ACS publishes "SCIFINDER" and "CHEMICAL ABSTRACTS" which is NOT a database of journal papers. It is a database of chemical structures and properties which is invaluable to any research chemist because a) most information on exotic compounds are not published in journals

      The information in Chem Abstracts is mostly from journals. Some from meeting reports, a lot from patents. Where does the ACS get its data if not from journals? Certainly not from proprietary databases of private companies.

  • And vica vrsa? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Mac Degger ( 576336 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @06:11AM (#12861644) Journal
    "Their rational is that the government should not spend taxpayer dollars on something private business is already doing"

    Of course, you can turn this around: private business shouldn't spend its investor's money on something the government is already doing.
  • Most of the comments on this thread have been in support of the free online database, but where is the line between the free-market economy and government programs to be drawn?

    I think anyone of us would be somewhat pissed if we worked hard to create a successful business, only to be driven out of it by a government subsidized effort which was able to undercut your prices because it received free money from the taxpayers.

    That's essentially what these programs are: corporate welfare; taking tax-payer dol

  • The ACS = tits on a boar (Score:3, Interesting)

    by paiute ( 550198 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @07:47AM (#12862160)
    The ACS is a useless organization, and I speak as a practicing chemist of many years. Nothing - and let me repeat this for emphasis - nothing that they have done has ever had any positive impact on my job or career. I toss their monthly letter inviting me to rejoin unopened into the trash. It would be money flushed down the toilet. They could disappear tomorrow, and I would not notice. Except for less junk mail, I guess.

    Can you tell that I think they are a bunch of worthless pantloads? Just checking.

  • Police forces should be abolished (Score:3, Informative)

    by cabalamat2 ( 227849 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @08:40AM (#12862531) Homepage Journal
    Obviously the government shouldn't have a police force, since that takes businress away from private security companies. Nor should the government run schools, since that takes money away rom private education. And having an army is unfair competition for mercenaries.

  • Think of the CHILDREN (Score:4, Funny)

    by Idarubicin ( 579475 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @08:48AM (#12862588) Journal
    Now where's the common sense here?

    If molecules are open source, then people will be able to make them in their own homes, without appropriate supervision or regulation. Many people may not be aware of the following facts about molecules.

    -All known chemical poisons are made of molecules.
    -Osama bin Laden's men were carrying molecules when they boarded the aircraft destined to strike the WTC towers. It is believed these molecules were used in the attack.
    -Molecules are frequently used as part of copyright infringement schemes. Bootleg DVDs contain high concentrations of molecules.
    -Weapons of mass destruction contain molecules.

    Please, will someone think of the of children?

  • If they'd been a bit more creative, the ACS would have realized that they have the inside track for developing PubChem. Instead of trying to get Congress to protect their monopoly, created in part with federal funds, they should be seeking federal grant funds to take their database public to make it part of PubChem.

  • Weird logic (Score:4, Insightful)

    by bitspotter ( 455598 ) on Monday June 20, 2005 @11:38AM (#12864257) Journal
    By this reckoning, Government should shut down police forces because we have private security firms we can all hire. ...or they should be prohibited from offering free municipal wireless services because there are existing ISPs that can charge to do it.

    When did government begin existing at the behest of profiteers?

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