Some interesting threads in TAXACOM today (yes, really). The following article has appeared in Science : The authors argue that "The availability of adequate alternative methods of documentation, including high-resolution photography, audio recording, and nonlethal sampling, provide an opportunity to revisit and reconsider field collection practices and policies." This has brought a swift response from Kevin Winkler (Re)affirming the

This message appeared on the TAXACOM mailing list: Given that most specimens lack resolvable digital identifiers (a theme I've harped on about before, most recently in the context of DNA barcoding), answering this kind of query ends up being a case of searching publications for text strings that contain the acronym of the collection.

MarkMail is a great tool for searching mail archives. Although focussing on software development projects, they are open to requests, so last week I asked if they could index TAXACOM. My pitch was that TAXACOM is a long running list full of interesting conversations, has been the subject of scholarly study (Christine Hine's book I mentioned earlier), and is topical given interest in biodiversity and the Encyclopedia of Life.