Dr. Ay, the scientific editor of an American biomedical journal, is preparing accepted papers to be sent to the publisher when he receives a call from Dr. Bee, a scientist in another country where electronic and telephone communications can be problematic. Bee inquires about a manuscript describing the development of a compound that may ultimately have clinical applications. Without mentioning that this paper is ready for the publisher, Ay verifies that the paper is in the journal's editorial office. Bee asks whether his name is included in the byline. It is not. Bee is very disturbed. He has heard from a former colleague that the paper was accepted and says his name was removed from the final version without his permission. He claims not only to have contributed substantively to various aspects of the research but also to have conceived the original idea for the study. He asks for Ay's help and agrees to send available documentation. Soon thereafter, a mass of material arrives at the journal's office by fax. Ay reads the information carefully, files it, and writes to the corresponding author, who is located in a major academic research institution in the United States.

The corresponding author, Dr. Cee, responds to the fax via fax the next day. She impatiently assures A that the "deleted author" was removed from the original byline before the paper was submitted to Ay's journal-as required by the journal in the journal's information for contributors-because Bee had not made 'substantive contributions to the work' and had not read the final version of the paper that was submitted to the journal.

Finding this an insufficient response, Ay faxes to Cee copies of the documentation provided by Bee. Again, Cee states that Bee had no important role in developing the research or the manuscript. She supplies documentation detailing each current author's role in the research. However, she fails to address directly the specific concerns and claims of contribution from the deleted author. She offers to list Bee in the acknowledgments section but insists that he cannot be listed as an author.