Good news from NSF: In the most recent update to the Grant Proposal Guide, they have strengthened and emphasized the requirements for data sharing. Here is the summary from the GPG Summary of Significant Changes page:

In response to NSF's call for White Papers in the SBE 2020 Initiative, Jeff Good and I have submitted a paper outlining our take on Cyberinfrastructure for Linguistics, why its necessary, and how it can come about. The abstract:

The Endangered Languages Archive (ELAR) at SOAS preserves and disseminates digital documentation of endangered languages around the world, especially (but not limited to) the outcomes of ELDP-funded projects. ELAR's recently re-launched website is designed specifically to suit the needs of endangered languages archiving, using "Web 2.0" methods to implement a nuanced access control system and make the site user-friendly for a range of audiences.

It is our pleasure to announce the launch of the L&C Field Manuals and Stimulus Materials, a web resource providing access to many of the field manuals produced by the Language and Cognition group at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics.

Steven Abney and Steven Bird published a provocative paper (.pdf) at ACL 2010 calling on the computational linguistics community to work to create a "Universal Corpus", an undertaking that they compare in both scale and potential impact to the Human Genome Project. Here is the abstract:

The NSF Directorate for the Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences (SBE) released last week a Dear Colleague Letter inviting members of the research community (individuals and groups) to submit by September 30th, 2,000-word-maximum white papers outlining what they think are "grand challenge" questions in the fields supported by SBE "that are both foundational and transformative". These contributions will be used to help the Directorate make plans to support research over the coming decade and beyond.

The location for the Conference on Electronic Grammaticography, previously announced on this blog, has been moved to the University of Hawaii so that it can be held under the umbrella of the 2nd International Conference on Language Documentation and Conservation.

Abstracts are due on 31 August 2010.

On 4–5 August, the RELISH project held a workshop on lexicon tools and lexical standards. Slides from many of the presentations are posted on the workshop site.

NYTimes: Sharing of Data Leads to Progress on Alzheimer’s

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/13/health/research/13alzheimer.html?_r=3&pagewanted=1&hp

The LSA announced today that both resolutions on the May 31 ballot (the Resolution on Cyberinfrastructure and the Resolution Recognizing the Scholarly Merit of Language Documentation) have passed!