This article not to be read until next Monday
Numerous
publishers hold a tight rein on the research papers they accept for
publication allowing no one other than the authors and the editors to see
them until the very day of official publication. The idea is that
important results are given first airing only after the strict peer review
process has been carried out and the work fully assessed and edited ready
for publication. The major players even go so far as to have a full
written and legally binding embargo policy.
Embargo - the word comes from the Spanish for 'arrest' and is usually
associated with ships held in port or countries that transgress international
ethics. It strikes fear into the hearts of scientists and science communicators
alike. The scientists dread it because once they have offered up their work for
publication they have to make sure that they reveal its contents to no one who
might spill the beans before official publication - if said beans are spilt
before that day, the scientist risks rejection of the paper. Those wicked
characters that might wish to mop up the beans and spill them over the pages of
a newspaper or magazine - known in the jargon as journalists - are also very
wary of the great embargo. Should they break it, they risk being ostracised by the publication
in question and their good reputation ruined.
Lately, however, embargoes have begun to crumble. Some science seems just too important to be held in by such political matters and the scientists are talking freely with the journalists well ahead of the grand day of publication. The most famous embargo-breaking 'outing' is perhaps the case of clone celebrity sheep, Dolly. The researchers, I won't name them here, they had plenty of free publicity at the time, had a paper on the whole cloning process in press with one of the big-guys - again naming no names. Somehow, the exciting news made it into the Italian press and from there wended its way to the headlines of one British paper. Once in the public domain, the sheep exploded, as it were, and Dolly was sitting on every news desk the world over within hours.
The newspapers in question claim to have been tipped off in advance by independent sources and that no embargo had been broken at all. The fact remains, however, that the journal in question sends out a weekly digest of interesting news snippets to the media a week in advance of the issue. So, all the journalists receiving the list would have had the news simultaneously. The idea behind this advance digest is to give journalists a fair shot at getting a story prepared ready for dissemination on the official day of publication without the risk of being scooped (the embargo aspect). It also provides, of course, the maximum publicity shot for the journal because every paper and news bulletin will carry the story at roughly the same time.
Dolly is not alone, however. There is an increasing number of cases of the dreaded embargo being broken. This has happened either when scientists themselves send out a press release without bothering to mention an embargo, naively or deliberately, or when a headstrong journalist decides the news is just to important and that Pulitzer just too worthy of their bank account to resist temptation.
An additional aspect that came to light mainly with the Dolly incident is that the embargo can have an effect on the Stock Market. When the Dolly news broke shares in the company associated with her shot up. Now, anyone who had had that advance information and a bit of economic savvy might have spotted this might happen and bought in cheaply and made a killing in the speculation game. Needless to say, the legal aides at various publishers who run an embargo policy now point out to everyone who receives their tipsheets that it is considered insider trading to make use of the information in such a way.
Journalists' discussion groups on the Internet seem to talk ceasely about the issue of embargoes, even more so than freelance rates of pay and copyright. Issues such as the exact timing of the embargo being lifted on publication day and how it affects broadcast and print media differently. Radio KYZ, for instance, might easily scoop the Morning News, for instance. Taking this to its logical conclusion recently, that other embargo-strict journal (the one in the UUUSA) published a special focus at the end of October, carrying several articles on the subject of embargoes.*
The whole system is beginning to creak, especially under the weight of zillions of electrons that carry information across the Web. A gentleman's agreement that suited the journalists and the publishers until now does not seem so sensible when the information can be made available so much more quickly, and perhaps one might say, efficiently using electronic means. The embargo approach is ripe for displacement by something rawer, especially as news information is made more readily available to all - not just journalists.
The embargo date, that holy time at which the publisher deems itself to have published is becoming almost meaningless. Anyone who subscribes to the ACS journals on the Web will probably be aware of their excellent As Soon As Publishable service, ASAP. This spits out research papers almost immediately they are ready for the presses, which can be days if not several weeks ahead of the hard copy appearing. The ACS has in effect scrapped its embargo policy altogether. The same thing is happening with numerous physics and astronomy publishers and indeed many publishers in less immediately applied disciplines have never bothered with an embargo policy at all. The more life science oriented publications, such as Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (known affectionately among students as P-NAS) are still deliberating the issue. The problem of Dolly and the media attention any kind of biotech or medical paper receives makes the issue more sensitive for the public than the discovery of a new molecule in cosmic dust. It is unlikely that the likes of Science and Nature will be able to stave off making a radical decision for much longer.
The case of Dolly does not seem to have done any harm to the journal in question. If anything, the alleged breach of the embargo probably generated even more publicity than might have been expected. Such 'breakthroughs' are always open to spin and hype but if every journalist had been ready and prepared to wait for publication day, there would not have been such a mad fight to get the newsiest story out the quickest and the publicity would have been a bit more woolly. The journal did not suffer - the cynical would say it benefited tremendously - the journalists filled their column inches, screens and airwaves, and the scientists involved seem to be thriving, despite initial media shellshock, especially as their results have recently been reproduced.
Now...the advance publicity surrounding cold fusion...maybe sticking to the embargo might have been a good thing in that case.
Footnote
The embargo rule as it is currently implemented came into being about thirty years ago when Franz Ingelfinger, then Editor of the New England Journal of Medicine came up with the Ingelfinger rule to help protect the journal from being scooped by the popular press and to assist in what he considered amounts to quality control.