Is Mendeley's data Open?

Enquiry Status: Unresolved

Started: Thu Mar 10 19:11:03 2011
ID: e59da4b5-1ef2-43d1-beab-60ec91196f27

Message:

To: william.gunn@mendel....

Subject: Is Mendeley's data Open?

Date: Thu Mar 10 19:11:03 2011

Status: Sent

Dear William,

Thanks for alerting me to the Mendeley API-Binary Challenge where you announce that all your data is "open" and under "a Creative Commons" licence.

I'd be very grateful to know the precise nature of the openness of this data. I have blogged some of the issues: http://blogs.ch.cam.ac.uk/pmr/2011/03/10/mendeley-api-binary-battle-isitopendata/

It would be very useful if you could answer the following question(s):

(1) What is the data? It is important to know precisely what is included and what is not.

(2) How is the data obtained? From your blurb it seems like it may have to be accessed through an API. If so what is the nature of the nature of the API?

(3) Are there any limitations on how much data can be downloaded? If so what is the definition of the subset?

(4) Is there any guarantee that updates to your data base will be made available in the same way or is this effectively a snapshot?

(5) what is the "Creative Commons licence" that you mention?

(0) This is summed up in the single question: is it OKD-compliant? http://www.opendefinition.org/ “A piece of content or data is open if anyone is free to use, reuse, and redistribute it — subject only, at most, to the requirement to attribute and share-alike.”.

If you are not the right contact, please forward the mail and let us know the right contact.

IsItOpenData is designed to help (meta)data providers clarify their conditions and licences in public. Your/Mendeley's reply will be public and permanent. This saves repeated requests from people wanting to know about Openness of data sets and gives both providers and users a clear reference point.

Many thanks,

Peter

[1] http://www.opendefinition.org/1.0/
[2] http://www.opendefinition.org/licenses/

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