New means to disseminate scientific information

"The current structure of science leads to costly and needless delays in release of scientific information resulting from the structure of the publication process. Moreover, costly page charges lead to tightly written documents, but at the expense of key information being included. An antischolarly approach ensues: limitations in number of citations prevents all but limited literature from being cited, effectively leading to "loss" to the scientific community of valuable older information, the costs of which have already been expended. (Rather than it being required that each declarative statement should have a source cited, it is now possible for authors to make assertions that may have no basis in evidence—and if they do, the reader is not in a position to ascertain what that basis is.)
In the modern internet era, new approaches to speeding information dissemination, by capitalizing on internet technology should be seriously considered. (As one primordial suggestion, a system could be generated by which new research results could be posted on the internet. The system would have in place an opportunity for peer-review comments to be appended. This permits new readers to post their comments and expertise. A continually modifiable process of credentialing reviewers, with rankings by other readers, could allowing ranking of review comments. Among the advantages of this process, full database information could be provided, circumventing space limitations in journals, permitting others to perform their own analyses. Space limitations in journals often prevent pivotal information from being expressed."
Beatrice Golomb, Assistant Professor (of Medicine; Family and Preventive Medicine; and Psychology) at UCSD