1991 Definition of Primary and Secondary Information Sources

Information may be categorized into primary and secondary material. If information is new and has never been published before it research, new legislation and survey results, like government is termed primary. It includes original statistics. Primary information is always up-to-date, detailed, accurate and specialized. Consequently, fewer people want to use it and it tends to be expensive. Information produced when scientists re-work primary material for a special purpose, like writing a ski...

 More Scientific Papers are Published Than Can Possibly be...

We should admit in theory what is already very largely a case in practice, that the main currency of scientific information is the secondary sources in the forms of abstracts, reports, tables, &c., and that the primary sources are only for detailed reference by very few people. It is possible that the fate of most scientific papers will be not to be read by anyone who uses them, but with luck they will furnish an item, a number, some facts or data to such reports which may, but usually wi...