Requests

There is a critical publication issue limiting the dissemination and
implementation of text mining technology that I have never seen addressed.
Your data mining Web site/ KDNuggets newsletter may be the appropriate forum
to discuss this issue.

ISSUE

Science and technology (S&T) text mining technology is developed mainly by
the information technology community.  The eventual end user for S&T text
mining technology should, in many cases, be the technical domain expert.
How well does the text mining technology presently diffuse from the
developer to the technical specialty user?  In particular, how does present
text mining technology diffusion limit text mining technology
implementation, and how can the diffusion process be improved to accelerate
implementation?

BACKGROUND

The focus of this discussion is literature-based text mining technology
diffusion.

1) Information Technology Literature
Literature-based diffusion potentially allows the value of combining text
mining technology with traditional technical analysis to be demonstrated to
the performers/ managers/ evaluators in the technical specialty communities.
Presently, most text mining technology diffusion pathways are very indirect,
especially for the text mining technology applications to the technical
specialty literature.  This is a major reason for minimal implementation of
S&T text mining technology in the technical specialty communities.

The text mining researchers and developers appropriately publish new
methodologies in the information technology literature.  Unfortunately, the
text mining researchers/ developers/ appliers also publish technical
specialty text mining applications almost exclusively in the information
technology literature, including the Proceedings of information technology
conferences.

Effectively, this is preaching to the choir.  I know of almost no technical
specialists (Physical/ engineering/ life sciences) who read the information
technology literature.  They have a difficult enough time keeping up with
the extensive literatures in their own technical specialties.
Paradoxically, they are the people who would benefit most from the potential
efficiencies and Technology Watch capabilities that S&T text mining could
offer.  Thus, the present information technology literature route is
extremely inefficient for transmitting S&T text mining application
information to the prime technical specialty end user.

2) Technical Specialty Literature
For the most part, the technical specialty literature contains no text
mining studies.  The technical specialty journal editors overwhelmingly
interpret their charters as the traditional theoretical/ experimental/
computational technical approaches to S&T.  Most of these editors do not
include hybridization of text mining/ information technology with the
technical specialty as part of their charter.  Thus, the transmission of S&T
text mining applications technology through the existing traditional
technical journals is practically non-existent.

3) Hybrid Information Technology-Technical Specialty Literature
A few of the more progressive technical disciplines have initiated journals
that combine information technology with the technical specialty.  Journal
of Chemical Information and Computer Science (Chemistry) and International
Journal of Medical Informatics (Biomed) are good examples, and they are
first rate journals.  There may be some technical discipline specialists (as
well as information technologists) that read these hybrid journals, since
they address topics of interest within the technical discipline.  I remain
to be convinced that a substantial fraction of the technical specialty
communities reads these hybrid journals, especially relative to the fraction
that reads the traditional technical specialty journals.

DISCUSSION

I believe that the best way to disseminate the S&T text mining information,
to eventually maximize its implementation in the technical specialty
community, is the direct approach.  Somehow, the hybrid information
technology-technical specialty papers need to find their way into the
traditional mainline technical specialty journals.  For the past year, I
have been attempting to publish our S&T text mining application studies in
the traditional technical specialty journals, in parallel with maintaining
text mining methodology publications in the information technology journals.
In some technical speciality disciplines, that are more advanced
technologically and have some progressive journal editors, publication in
the specialty literature has been straightforward.  In other disciplines,
especially those where publication tradition predominates, publication in
the specialty literature has been a struggle.  YET IT IS IN THESE SPECIALTY
DISCIPLINES AND THESE SPECIALTY JOURNALS WHERE THE NEED FOR TEXT MINING
DIFFUSION IS THE GREATEST!  THE READERS OF THESE JOURNALS ARE THE END USERS
THAT WE NEED TO TARGET WITH TEXT MINING TECHNOLOGY.  How do we accomplish
this goal?

RECOMMENDATIONS

I believe that proactive steps by government and industry are required.
Perhaps grants to some traditional technical specialty journals that would
subsidize an information technology section in each journal issue would be
one solution.  There may be other incentives, and other solutions, and it
would be valuable if your readers could suggest them.  The data mining/ text
mining community contains very knowledgeable people who have thought about
information technology implementation for some time, and they might have
valuable ideas on improving dissemination and implementation of text mining
technology.

Do you think this is a topic that would be worth addressing in your
newsletter/ Web site?

RNK
http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/kostoff/index.html
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