This Article  • Full text  • PDF  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Citing articles on HighWire  • Citing articles on Web of Science (3)  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Related article  • Similar articles in JAMA  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

To the Editor.— Dr Rennie and colleagues¹ present an interesting discussion of the concept of authorship along with their proposals for overhauling what, to them, must seem like an outdated system. However, in reading the authors' use of the new "contributor" concept, one can only wonder exactly what they hope to accomplish. For example, we are told that Dr Emanuel "wrote the first draft," Rennie "wrote numerous drafts," and Ms Yank "produced the final draft." It is difficult to imagine any reader who could possibly be interested in this information or in any of the various other details that are presented. The attribution footnote further informs us that all the authors "codeveloped and corefined the intellectual content" of the article, a statement that is as vague as none at all and that could be said about virtually anyone associated with the project. In addition, Rennie et al¹ state, "All 3 . . . [Full Text of this Article]

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?

RELATED ARTICLE

When Authorship Fails: A Proposal to Make Contributors Accountable
Drummond Rennie, Veronica Yank, and Linda Emanuel
JAMA. 1997;278(7):579-585.
ABSTRACT  

THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES

Authorship and Ethical Considerations in the Conduct of Observational Studies
Tornetta et al.
JBJS 2009;91:61-67.
ABSTRACT | FULL TEXT  

Who Did What?: (Mis)Perceptions About Authors' Contributions to Scientific Articles Based on Order of Authorship
Bhandari et al.
JBJS 2003;85:1605-1609.
FULL TEXT