Naiveté Scene — Open Source vs. Scale in Scholarly Publishing
Once again, the term “open” requires further thought to probe the pros and cons. With open source, we may be once again doing things that make the big bigger and the small less relevant.
A Confusion of Journals — What Is PubMed Now?
PubMed is found to contain predatory journals and publishers, likely reflecting a long-term and broader problem, which only adds to the confusion about what exactly PubMed represents at this point.
Revisiting: Why Technology Will Not Get Cheaper
Revisiting Kent Anderson’s 2016 post on the ever-increasing costs of digital publishing.
The Walls Around Us — Why Cambridge University Press’ Predicament Demands Attention
The recent attempt by China to censor scholarship points to a growing set of challenges in information dissemination. Blaming the publisher obscures these issues.
Trust Falls — Are We In a New Phase of Corporate Research?
Conflicts of interest and corporate-funded research have expanded, with journals increasingly used by mega-corporations to advance their initiatives. What will this mean for scholarly publishing?
Beyond Labels — Does the Type of Business Matter?
The superficial distinction between non-profits and for-profits bears scrutiny. What are the true differences? Is either structure innately superior?
Trouble at Hand — How Mobile Devices Perpetuate Weak Business Models
The rise of mobile is cementing business model expectations and driving new monopolies, but the ethics, incentives, and consequences of these models need to be considered.
The Trance of Dysfunction — Why Trolls Have Come to Dominate Discourse
Trolls dominate for many reasons — economics, technology, our predilection for sordid entertainment. But they’ve chilled online discourse and damaged civil exchanges, even making some publishers reluctant to take full advantage of the potential of the Internet. Are we ready for v2.0 of commenting?
Independence Lost — Taxpayer Funding and Information Access Take a Dark Turn
We once assumed taxpayer-funding meant information availability. The new US government is now actively hiding scientific data, imperiling our understanding of the world.
Revisiting an Interview with Paula Stephan — Economics, Science, and Doing Better
Revisiting Kent Anderson’s 2012 interview with the author of “How Economics Shape Science”.
Revisiting a Book Review: How Economics Shapes Science by Paula Stephan
Revisiting our review of Paula Stephan’s book after her keynote talk at the SSP Annual Meeting.
Platform Diving — Top Journals, UX, and the Lure of Harmonization
A review of top journals in 18 fields show they are on a variety of platforms, suggesting cognitive burden for users which may be driving them to aggregated options with unified user experiences.
Detours and Diversions — Do Open Access Publishers Face New Barriers?
Open access (OA) publishing seeks to eliminate paywalls for users. It has largely succeeded, but new diversions and distractions built into the commercial Internet may create new barriers that will be harder to deal with.
Updating Asimov — How Do We Regain Control In the Digital Age?
Algorithms behave in ways even their creators can’t understand, yet they dominate how we share and see information. Do we need a “Three Laws for Algorithms”?
The Information Landscape — How Do We Tackle the Problems Caused by Silicon Valley?
Science’s historical progress can’t be assumed. It has to be reclaimed, re-established. That’s more difficult in a fragmented information space geared for extremism.