3) Funding for data centers can be perceived as taking away from
potential funding of pure research and development. Consequently few
applications are willing to devote a significant fraction of their
funding to such enterprises. Therefore, its seems logical that AMO data
centers should take on more of a multirole mission. That is, the
existence of a data center only for AMO data relevant to
a single application would be harder to maintain than say a data center
with support from more than one area. This approach, while probably the best,
might also have some disadvantages since "territorial" lines are often
hard to cross, data centers and funders wishing to preserve a kind of
status or territory. Also, as with many perceived cross-disciplinary
endeavors, it is often easy for potential funders to take the point of
view that if the effort is to contribute to a different area, those
users should provide exclusive funding rather than "piggy-backing". Clearly
a open forum and spirit of discussion would help to dispel these narrow
interests and the survival long term projects such as creating and
maintaining AMO databases depends on it.