It’s been “the year of generative AI”, so I thought I’d ask ChatGPT to help me write some cracker-standard Christmas jokes with a scholarly communications theme. Despite my expert prompt engineering, the results were terrible, so I have mixed in some of my own efforts — see if you can tell which is which. Enjoy.

Man at holiday table reading joke from a Christmas cracker

Q: What flavor stuffing do publishers have with their Christmas turkey?
A: SAGE and onion!
Q: What color baubles does OASPA have on its Christmas tree?
A: Green and gold!
Q: Which book order for the scholarly publishing course arrived in the library on January 6th?
A: Three Tenopir & Kings!
Q: Why did the publisher take a break over the holidays?
A: They needed some rest and RELXation!
Q: What did the scientist say to Santa when he asked for a gift?
A: “I hope it’s not a Springer, I’ve got enough peer reviews!”
Q: Which seasonal publisher did Taylor & Francis buy in 2015?
A: HogManey!
Q: Which organization sponsors the seasonal fireworks for scholarly communications?
A: SPARC!
Q: Why did the engineer build a snowman on Christmas Eve?
A: He wanted to demonstrate IEEE (IcE Engineering Excellence)!
Q: What did the librarian most want for Christmas?
A: Noelsevier!
Q: What is a scholarly author’s favorite Christmas song?
A: Jingle Bells, journals swell, impact all the way, oh what fun it is to cite in a well-referenced essay!
Q: What do copy editors sing during Advent?
A: O come, o come, Emmanuel of Style!
Q: Which is the most seasonal professional association?
A: Institution of Civil Engineers – ICE!
Q: What do you call the festive gathering of scholars who celebrate Christmas and scientific discoveries together?
A: “Once in Royal David’s Society”!
Charlie Rapple

Charlie Rapple

Charlie Rapple is co-founder of Kudos, which showcases research to accelerate and broaden its reach and impact. She is also Vice Chair of UKSG and serves on the Editorial Board of UKSG Insights. @charlierapple.bsky.social, x.com./charlierapple and linkedin.com/in/charlierapple. In past lives, Charlie has been an electronic publisher at CatchWord, a marketer at Ingenta, a scholarly comms consultant at TBI Communications, and associate editor of Learned Publishing.

Discussion

3 Thoughts on "Scholarly Communications Meets your Christmas Cracker"

Thanks, Charlie. I had a good chuckle. Enjoy the holiday season!

It’s a tradition to have some really bad ones in the cracker box, right? Enjoy your holidays and best wishes for a healthy and happy 2024.

I asked ChatGPT to write a BMJ Journals themed Twelve Days of Christmas and it didn’t disappoint (and adorned my out-of-office for the Christmas period):

🎶 On the twelfth day of publishing, BMJ gave to me, Twelve reviewers reviewing, eleven editors editing, ten global collaborations, nine podcasts playing, eight citations soaring, seven graphs a-rising, six editorial insights, five impact factors! Four open access articles, three research themes, two peer reviews, and a groundbreaking study on a pear tree. 📝✍️🌍🤝🎙️📑📈📈📈📈📈📈📈📚

Quite what a ground-breaking study on a pear tree would mean I’m unsure (sounds out of scope for BMJ, unless there’s a climate element to the planting of a tree or the nutritional benefits of pears). 12 reviewers reviewing resulting in only receiving 2 peer reviews was very astute of ChatGPT.

Comments are closed.