One example
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Dear Miss/Mr.,
Good day.
We have the honor to read the project of CMDFALL and are full of interest in the dataset.
We extremely hope to be able to compare our new algorithm with other algorithms on your dataset, so could you please share the dataset with us through our account as soon as possible?
Our account is xxx@sjtu.edu.cn
Thanks for your elaborate work. If you need us to provide other information, please feel free to contact us.
Best regards.
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xxx (advisor: xxx)
Institute of xxx
Shanghai Jiaotong University, China
some advices
Don’t be shy. Let’s get this out of the way first. If you go about it well, there’s no absolutely no harm in asking. Most researchers are keen to share and discuss their work. Never be afraid to reach out to big names.
Make your purpose clear. Before you send your inquiry you should have a thorough understanding of your goal. Make sure you can explain this. Nobody wants to hand out a hard-earned dataset to a potential hoarder who’s unlikely to ever make good use of the data. Outline your intended project, describe how you’ll publish the results, or better yet, propose a collaboration. You might well have identified a win-win situation for everyone involved. What’s more, the authors are more willing to share their data when the replicator is perceived as trying to be helpful rather than cross-checking results.
Make sure you’ve done your homework. Understand the implications of obtaining certain datasets, such as privacy concerns, risks to others, or repeatability of the experiment. If you’re basing your inquiry on a specific piece of work such as a paper, blog post, or open-source project, again, be concrete. Don’t say things like “in your recent paper” but name the exact context.
Make your affiliation clear. Don’t use a random Gmail or Hotmail address (good luck particularly with the latter) when you have one that shows you’re in the Computer Science department of a well-known university. Identifying the exact group you’re working in, as well as who’s your adviser, also helps.
Find the right point of contact. If you’re addressing the authors of a paper, start by contacting the first author. Some papers explicitly list the right contact for correspondence regarding the paper. Under no circumstances should you send an individual email to each listed contact in parallel.
Be responsible. Understand limits if others ask you for the data you’ve received.
Be respectful and grateful.