Open Reading Mashup – would it work for chemistry?

Bill Hooker – a staunch supporter and campaigner for Open Data – has published his first mashup. He queries whether it actually is one – and I tend to agree – but the effect is to bring together different sources of information – Nature's table of antibody suppliers and Google's custom search. And whatever it is technically it's an example of how linking information on the web can dramatically enhance our power.
FWIW My view of mashup is  informed by the classic ChicagoCrime where two entirely unconnected resources – the city's crime reports , and Google maps – are linked by common, agreed, metadata – in this case the geographical coordinates of the crime. By accessing the crime data the coordinates are transmitted to Google maps and displayed; alternatively you can query the maps (inluding areas and routes) and access the crime database to find out what sort of crime happened in that geographical objects.
The requirements are simple:

• common, agreed metadata
• public information
• re-usable without restriction (e.g. CC-BY)

then anyone can create a mashup where they discover two sources with the same metadata.
So could it work for chemistry? Of course – we publish the information with common metadata (chemical identity, standardized dictionaries of properties, perhaps some human metadata – persons, institutions, etc.). The software overhead is very light – a few pages of javascript is probably enough – a nice web interface and so on.
There's one tiny flaw – where's the public re-usable information? There should be lots – we scientists publish over 1 million compounds per year – that will make a lovely mashup. But then the publishers copyright it and through various techniques – cutting off subscriptions, sending in lawyers, hiring pitbulls put endless obstacles in our way.
But there are growing chinks: Pubchem, ChEBI, the chemical blogosphere, openness of patents, CrystalEye and COD, Blue Obelisk, e-theses. The growing support from outside chemistry. Some of this I'll publicize, some we'll discuss in private e-sessions where we plot our next moves on how we can wrest our rightful data back. A little bit of FUD from our side might be useful 🙂