The cios supports the use of information technologies in the service of communication scholarship and education. the cios provides free web-based repositories of scientific information including journal articles and scanned academic books for the general public. it is publisher of the first electronic scholarly journal in the social sciences with all issues but the current issue available for open public access. the cios provides small grants to university professors to enable them to place information about topics in communication theory and research online for free public access. the cios pays for these activities by making high quality academic databases available to individuals, university libraries and communication/journalism departments at low cost.