Latest From Science, Technology And Medicine [11.25.14]

Gates Foundation /
Open access Scientific Article Publishing

• Gates Foundation to require immediate free access for journal articles (Science Magazine)

"Breaking new ground for the open-access movement, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a major funder of global health research, plans to require that the researchers it funds publish only in immediate open-access journals. 

The policy doesn’t kick in until January 2017;
Articles must also be published with a license that allows anyone to freely reuse and distribute the material. And the underlying data must be freely available. 

The Gates Foundation will also pay the author fees charged by many open-access journals. 

The Gates Foundation spends about $900 million a year on its global health programs, mostly on research. That results in roughly 1400 research papers a year, 30% of which now appear in open-access journals"

Smart Retail 

• Amazon Offers Help Finding Local Handymen (WSJ)

"Listing Service in 3 Cities Aims to Connect Customers With Service Providers"

• The End of the Impulse Shopper : The Web Has Made Consumers More Intentional, Smarter (WSJ)
• Adapting to the New Cherry-Picking Shopper (WSJ)

"Successful Retailers Must Create a Better, Memorable Customer Experience 

Apple’s success with retail locations has sparked more interest in physical retail among traditional online retailers, with even Amazon reportedly planning to open a physical store. The format of stores and shopper behavior may change with the evolution of technology, but stores are definitely here to stay." 

— Dr. Rajeev Sharma is founder and CEO of VideoMining Corp., which analyzes in-store behavior by tracking shoppers.