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For example, PLoS ONE charges $1350: http://www.plosone.org/static/guidelines.action#about. Other Open Access journals in the neurosciences are comparable, if not a little more. For a more thorough review of fees in various fields, see: http://openwetware.org/wiki/Publication_fees.

This is a good question, the same thing a lot of people are asking. It's unfortunate that Google isn't making more effort to clarify this because I think Wave should take off, and it will help us all in the end if it gets over this hump.

Look briefly at the history of email. It starts as structured ASCII text with some headers. Then it gets attachments. Then it get HTMLized so images can be embedded in line. The point is: everyone wants to put their content in line, no matter what it is: pictures, movies, a gadget. That's one thing Wave can do, and has led to this strategy of a "soft rollout," by which I mean to say that Google apparently thinks we can't handle the truth and has decided to sell Wave on this idea. But for what it is, it's way too complicated to just be an email replacement.

What Wave actually does to achieve this capability of embedding content anywhere is this: Wave has inverted the typical application model. What is an application? It's a bunch of functionality bundled together. If you think deeply about it, for any particular task at hand, an application is actually a bunch of related, yet mostly arbitrarily chosen functionality that is bundled together. The problem is, when you want to type up a simple letter, you're confronted with a UI that does things you're not interested in, like mail merge. (When was the last time you used the mail merge feature of your word processor? When was the last time you exercised a significant chunk of any application?)

In order to let you embed whatever, Wave breaks the application up and disperses functionality into gadgets and robots. You want to do something weird with a piece of content right where it lives in the wave? Ok, just get the gadget that renders it that way. You want to have some functionality change the content? Get the robot. If you think about this, we've been on this path since the componentization of apps have made the more into extensible frameworks than anything else: Firefox comes to mind as a basic browser that you can infinitely configure to do pretty much anything you want. (Emacs was first, I know.) Eclipse without plugins is like a Linux kernel without a shell--it literally is just a framework for plugins that does nothing else without at least the default plugins.

Anyway, so that is, I believe, the idea behind Wave. Invert the application model, let people focus on content as a first order thing, not as a mere byproduct of some application.

So now on to the practical...what is Wave actually good for? I don't think the main use case Google is using to sell wave, as a modern replacement for email, is the right thing. Wave is very good when you want to create a work product that is the result of many people playing different roles (provided the right widgets and gadgets exist, of course). Think not about email, where two people are playing the same role (email author, bouncing back and forth). Think about writing a book, where you have an editor, an author, a layout person, etc. Think about the traditional way a book's content moves around from person to person, their view of that content and how they'd like to work with it. Then think about how that same thing could be done with Wave with much greater ease, with each participant controlling exactly when and how they want the others to access the content and play out their role.

I'm not the only one advocating this as the type of use case for Wave either. Check out the concept for film making and the managing the workflow of a science research lab too. The three ingredients where Wave will excel: complex workflow, multiple people, different roles. You just need the gadgets and robots specific to that workflow.

This is a good question, the same thing a lot of people are asking. It's unfortunate that Google isn't making more effort to clarify this because I think Wave should take off, and it will help us all in the end if it gets over this hump.

Look briefly at the history of email. It starts as structured ASCII text with some headers. Then it gets attachments. Then it get HTMLized so images can be embedded in line. The point is: everyone wants to put their content in line, no matter what it is: pictures, movies, a gadget. That's one thing Wave can do, and has led to this strategy of a "soft rollout," by which I mean to say that Google apparently thinks we can't handle the truth and has decided to sell Wave on this idea. But for what it is, it's way too complicated to just be an email replacement.

What Wave actually does to achieve this capability of embedding content anywhere is this: Wave has inverted the typical application model. What is an application? It's a bunch of functionality bundled together. If you think deeply about it, for any particular task at hand, an application is actually a bunch of related, yet mostly arbitrarily chosen functionality that is bundled together. The problem is, when you want to type up a simple letter, you're confronted with a UI that does things you're not interested in, like mail merge. (When was the last time you used the mail merge feature of your word processor? When was the last time you exercised a significant chunk of any application?)

In order to let you embed whatever, Wave breaks the application up and disperses functionality into gadgets and robots. You want to do something weird with a piece of content right where it lives in the wave? Ok, just get the gadget that renders it that way. You want to have some functionality change the content? Get the robot. If you think about this, we've been on this path since the componentization of apps have made the more into extensible frameworks than anything else: Firefox comes to mind as a basic browser that you can infinitely configure to do pretty much anything you want. (Emacs was first, I know.) Eclipse without plugins is like a Linux kernel without a shell--it literally is just a framework for plugins that does nothing else without at least the default plugins.

Anyway, so that is, I believe, the idea behind Wave. Invert the application model, let people focus on content as a first order thing, not as a mere byproduct of some application.

So now on to the practical...what is Wave actually good for? I don't think the main use case Google is using to sell wave, as a modern replacement for email, is the right thing. Wave is very good when you want to create a work product that is the result of many people playing different roles (provided the right widgets and gadgets exist, of course). Think not about email, where two people are playing the same role (email author, bouncing back and forth). Think about writing a book, where you have an editor, an author, a layout person, etc. Think about the traditional way a book's content moves around from person to person, their view of that content and how they'd like to work with it. Then think about how that same thing could be done with Wave with much greater ease, with each participant controlling exactly when and how they want the others to access the content and play out their role.

I'm not the only one advocating this as the type of use case for Wave either. Check out the concept for film making and the managing the workflow of a science research lab too. The three ingredients where Wave will excel: complex workflow, multiple people, different roles. You just need the gadgets and robots specific to that workflow.

Numerous researchers in synthetic biology have been trying to do exactly that.

Here is an example Open Wetware BioBricks

Synthetic biology has two paradigms the first is the top down approach which deals with gene knock outs to look for minimal sets necessary for life that can then be tailored to suit specific needs/tasks. The other approach is the bottom up which have inspiration from the Miller-Urey experiments. They are trying to spontaneously generate a new biological system from scratch. Some researchers in this camp trying to create synthetic cellular components in hopes of putting all the synthetic parts together to create a functioning cell such as synthetic Golgi bodies

There has been some promising results from both approaches. It is a pretty exciting time in Biology.

I like how she responded to this issue with the word 'democratization'. She doesn't seem to be so worried about some crazy terrorist getting access to this technology, as governments monopolizing it for biowarfare development. And I'm inclined to agree that we should be just as worried about the latter as the former. A few links about this scientist/entrepeneur:
Her Bio
Forbes article - DIY Life
MIT TechTV Video - DIY Biology

(AC, so I'm not as much a karma whore)

http://diybio.org/ - open source hardware, biology, XMLizing lab protocols, the goods.
http://openwetware.org/
http://biopunk.org/
http://syntheticbiology.org/
http://partsregistry.org/
http://igem.org/ (international genetically engineered machines competition)
http://ponoko.com/
http://shapeways.com/
http://thingiverse.com/
http://instructables.com/
lifeboat foundation (AKA "fearmongers click here")

cat * > /dev/trend-spotting-machine

http://openwetware.org/wiki/Main_Page

This is the info sharing site for bio-hackers. Has everything from courses for the gene-script kiddies to protocols and other neat stuff. It's a better resource then the corporate site for those who want to know about it.

BioBricks? Synthetic biology has already produced results - now all we need is an economically viable production model :-/

Thanks for your enlightning hint, but i wanted to know what a "BioBrick" normally is:
http://syntheticbiology.org/BioBricks.html
http://openwetware.org/wiki/BioBricks_construction _tutorial

A lot of people are thinking about this.

See the Synthetic Society Working Group for more information.
http://openwetware.org/wiki/Synthetic_Society