A study group has been formed under the IEEE Computer Society SAB
(Standards Activities Board) on the topic of Internet Practices.
Among the projects currently under discussion is a proposal to use
the W3C PICS (Platform for Internet Content Selection) specifications
to indicate "peer endorsement" of articles. (See below for further
details.)
I have offered to provide some feedback on this idea from UK
librarians/information workers/publishers. At this stage in
development, I think that the most relevant forms of feedback would
relate to potential usefulness and general workability of such a
system, rather than the technical nitty-gritty.
I will collate any comments and feed them back to the Study Group.
Thanks
Judith Wusteman
University of Kent
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More details (including the following) are located at :
http://www.computer.org/standard/Internet/csipsg.htm
PICS Peer Review
[Jim Isaak]
PICS
The World Wide Web Consortium has developed a specification: "Platform
for Internet Content Selection" that provides a common foundation for
definition of rating systems, and rating services that can be applied
to objects on the Internet. A key PICS rating service objective is
"parental control", permitting content suppliers and third parties to
rate material in accordance with various systems, and provide clients
the information needed to permit parental (or other) control of access
to in appropriate materials. However the same concepts can be used to
provide for designation of quality material, parallel to the peer
review process that professional organizations pursue with their
publications. This is what makes it a "content selection" method, as
opposed to just a "blocking" mechanism.
Peer review
The IEEE and IEEE Computer Society, as professional organizations who
are actively pursuing electronic publication of materials can use this
system to ensure that members and/or consumers know what materials
have received this Peer endorsement.
These questions are general to many professional organizations, and it
would make sense to have a common rating system that meets the needs
of groups doing peer review publication. At the same time, each
organization will need to control the actual peer review process for
their published materials. The PICS model is designed for just this
division of concepts, and all that remains is for the interested
professional organizations to agree on the rating system following the
PICS model.
Standards Work
The initial work here will be to bring together professional
organizations, and others involved in electronic publishing where peer
review type characteristics are an important "selection" criteria. And
to review the PICS method for accomplishing this. Then proposals can
be made for application of the method to specific organizational
needs, integrated, and a proposed standard be put forward.
Issues, objectives and suggestions surfaced via email reflector.
At the meeting, currently targeted for July, we would hope to have
input from the Web Consortium folks familiar with PICS so we can
better understand how that might be applied to the peer review
objectives.
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Dr Judith C. Wusteman
Computing Laboratory, University of Kent,
Canterbury, Kent, CT2 7NF,UK.
phone: +1227 827734, fax: +1227 762811
http://stork.ukc.ac.uk/computer_science/Html/Wusteman/jcw.html
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