If you are following the news and understand what is going on in the world of scholarly publishing and libraries – you’re a better man than I, Gunga Din!¹ It gets curiouser and curiouser. ²

In early May, CrossRef announced Members will soon be able to assign Crossref DOIs to preprints . This is seen as a positive step in Open Access. Scholarly publication that has been peer reviewed, but is not the final published version is known as a preprint. Many researchers have their preprint publications available, often on web sites or in repositories. One example of a preprint repository is arXiv.org e-Print archive.

Today, we learn that SSRN — a leading social science and humanities repository and online community — joins Elsevier.

And, from Nature Social-sciences preprint server snapped up by publishing giant Elsevier.

Scholarly communications and science communication is a puzzlement!³

Can John Oliver set us straight? See: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Scientific Studies (HBO) 

— Kimberly Hoffman

^{[1] “Gunga Din (Lit.) Rudyard Kipling’s poem ‘Gunga Din’ (1892) tells of an Indian water-carrier who is killed bringing water to a wounded English officer in the battlefield. The poem ends with the famous lines:}

^{Tho’ I’ve belted you an flayed you, By the livin’ Gawd that made you, You’re a better man than I am, Gunga Din!”}

^{The phrase ‘you’re a better man than I,  Gunga Din!’ is used in admiration for someone’s daring, courage and selflessness.}

^{Oxford Dictionary of Reference and Allusion, Third Edition, 2012: p162}

^{[2] Ibid. Curiouser and curiouser: A phrase used repeatedly by *Alice in Lewis Carroll’s children’s story Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland…}

|
^{[3] Puzzlement: As a mass noun: the fact or condition of being puzzled; perplexity, bewilderment, confusion. Oxford English Dictionary (online).}