CHMINF-L, the Chemical Information Sources Discussion List, is currently sponsored by the American Chemical Society Division of Chemical Information, the American Society for Information Science and Technology Special Interest Group on Scientific and Technical Information Systems, the Royal Society of Chemistry Chemical Information Group, and the Special Libraries Association Chemistry Division.
The discussion that occurred on CHMINF-L in late June-early July 1997 in response to questions about instituting charges for CHMINF-L was very informative. The most common complaint was that the small proposed fee was just too much of a hassle to bother with on an individual basis. One of the respondents to the survey stated:
"... the societies involved should be willing to support the list for its benefits to members without excluding non-members--after all the members do benefit from the contribution of non-members."
This statement guided our thinking in drawing up the ground rules for sponsorship or support of CHMINF-L.
GUIDELINES AND BENEFITS OF SPONSORSHIP
1. Only not-for-profit professional organizations with an interest in chemical information science and technology (chemical informatics) which admit to membership qualified applicants may sponsor CHMINF-L. No direct sponsorship is possible by organizations that are not professional societies or groups with a strong chemical information interest. It is very important that CHMINF-L retain an atmosphere where different points of view can be aired without fear of offending a sponsor.
The sponsorship fee is $1 per year times the number of regular members on the membership roles of the sponsoring organization as of September 1 each year. There will be only one payment per year due no later than December 20, and that covers services for the following calendar year.
It is entirely up to the sponsoring organization to count the number of members and to include only those categories of members they deem appropriate. Indiana University will not keep track of people who have memberships in two or more of the sponsoring organizations, but the organizations themselves may choose to cross-check that.
2. No direct sponsorship of CHMINF-L will be accepted from profit-making organizations, nor will not-for-profit organizations that do not qualify under point 1 above be accepted as direct sponsors. However, both types of organizations may choose to make a donation on behalf of CHMINF-L to one or more of the sponsoring organizations in acknowledgment of their support of the mission of CHMINF-L and its value to their organizations.
At a 1997 ACS CINF meeting, it was pointed out that CHMINF-L is in fact quite valuable to many organizations that might not usually be inclined to support the Division of Chemical Information (CINF) financially for its programming or other expenses. However, those organizations may be willing to make a donation to support some or all of the cost of CINF's activities because of CINF's sponsorship of CHMINF-L. In fact, there were such donations made by two major chemical companies by the end of 1997. We urge other organizations to consider such support. If your organization is interested in sponsoring or otherwise showing support for CHMINF-L, please contact:
Brian Winterman3. In exchange, Indiana University will cover the cost of maintaining the list and the archives* and will provide appropriate publicity and membership leads to the sponsoring organizations.
4. The publicity will take the form of an acknowledgment of sponsorship in the welcoming message sent to each new subscriber during the period of sponsorship and of other Web-based links back to the sponsoring organizations, e.g., on LSOFT's Catalist.
5. Membership secretaries of sponsoring organizations will have the option to contact as prospective members new subscribers to CHMINF-L during the period of sponsorship. Such a decision may be based on geographic location of the new member, subject interests revealed in postings to CHMINF-L, or some other criteria.
6. Anyone may subscribe to CHMINF-L. It is not necessary to be a member of a sponsoring or supporting organization.
7. The list owner reserves the right to serve off problem posters or subscribers.
8. Only subscrbers can send messages to the list. Messages from non-subscribers can be sent to CHEMINFO (cheminfo at indiana.edu) for forwarding to the list if there is no desire to become a subscriber.
CHMINF-L MARKETING POLICY
The following guidelines have been developed for posting of information about commercial products on the Chemical Information Sources Discussion List (CHMINF-L):
4 January 1998
Updated: 10 January 2006