Hi folks,

We came across an interesting article
(http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.drudis.2008.11.015), which happens to be
freely accessible here:

http://csemails.elsevier.com/DDT/jan2010/Review2.pdf

Novel web-based tools combining chemistry informatics, biology and
social networks for drug discovery

Abstract:

A convergence of different commercial and publicly accessible chemical
informatics, databases and social networking tools is positioned to
change the way that research collaborations are initiated, maintained
and expanded, particularly in the realm of neglected diseases. A
community-based platform that combines traditional drug discovery
informatics with Web2.0 features in secure groups is believed to be
the key to facilitating richer, instantaneous collaborations involving
sensitive drug discovery data and intellectual property. Heterogeneous
chemical and biological data from low-throughput or high throughput
experiments are archived, mined and then selectively shared either
just securely between specifically designated colleagues or openly on
the Internet in standardized formats. We will illustrate several case
studies for anti-malarial research enabled by this platform, which we
suggest could be easily expanded more broadly for pharmaceutical
research in general.

Kind regards,
Vedrin

PS1:  OT could provide more than the services, described in the
article, since it is open source, while CDD is not (AFAIK). In
particular, anyone could grab OT software and deploy it wherever
she/he wants and sees fit, while CDD's solution bears a striking
similarity to centralized platforms like Facebook and Twitter (and
probably most of it's value would be concentrated in the loyal user
base if it succeeds to get sufficiently popular in the scientific
community).

PS2: It is somehow ironic that an article in which data
confidentiality and security are major topics has been made
inadvertently freely accessible by it's publisher :-) ... A closer
look at http://csemails.elsevier.com/DDT/jan2010/ reveals that
probably the article is offered for free intentionally. However this
highlights another issue -- the article is accessible only to paying
customers when you follow the official references to it (e.g. DOI,
etc). In an ideal world, you should always get the best offer, but
apparently this goal hasn't been achieved by Elsevier yet (or is not
being pursued at all)...