The Open Knowledge Definition has been translated into Icelandic.

Harold Varmus, co-founder of the Public Library of Science and former director of the U.S. National Institutes of Health, has been selected by President-elect Barack Obama to co-chair the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. (Thanks to Heather Joseph.) The other co-chair will be Eric Lander, founding director of the Broad Institute. Lander was also a lead researcher in the Human Genome Project.

Bill Hooker, The serials crisis has a name, and it's Reed Elsevier, Open Reading Frame , December 20, 2008.

The International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions has issued a call for papers for its 2009 conference (Milan, August 23-27, 2009). The theme for the Library Theory and Research Section is "Research into open access". Abstracts are due by December 31, 2008. Submissions can be made in the IFLA languages (Arabic, Chinese, English, French, German, Russian and Spanish) and Italian.

The Journal of Alternative Perspectives in the Social Sciences is a new peer-reviewed OA journal published by the Guild of Independent Scholars. The inaugural issue is now available. Authors retain copyright to their work.

The new issue of ScieCom Info is now online.

Alexis Madrigal, Google Shutters Its Science Data Service, Wired Science , December 18, 2008.  Excerpt: PS:  Also see our past posts on the Palimpsest project and our post on the ongoing Amazon alternative, Public Data Sets. Update .  See Antony Williams' comments.

JISC has launched a YouTube channel.

Fernanda Peset and Antonia Ferrer, Implantación de la Open Archives Initiative en España, Information Research, December 2008.

Mike Linksvayer, CC6+, Mike Linksvayer's blog, December 17, 2008.

ccLearn, What status for “open”? An examination of the licensing policies of open educational organizations and projects, report to the Hewlett Foundation, December 15, 2008. See also the summary on the Creative Commons blog.