20% Is All You Can Hope For?!
I knew he was right when I found myself printing it out. Jakob Nielsen has a new report on how much users read online. The report is only 1,068 words long, but this is apparently beyond the point most readers […]
A Twitter Experiment
Life is an approximation of reality. What we know and what is possible are two different things. Experiments help test and bridge the gap. With that spirit, I’m experimenting on this blog with Twitter now. You can find a link […]
Rockefeller Press Policy Leaves Open Questions
This is a bit off-topic for this blog, but of interest to scholarly publishers, and I found myself doing a lot of thinking and digging about this for some reason. The announcement by Rockefeller Press that they will leave copyright […]
Impact Factor Inflation — What Causes It?
Impact factors have been increasing by 2.6% per year, on average. While this is lower than most economies’ inflation rates, it’s indicates a growing economy. But is the growth caused by supply or demand? In a draft paper from the […]
Wikidemia — Scholarship and the Internet
“Wikidemia” is a term I hadn’t heard before I read this very interesting roundtable discussion from the UPenn Department of Romance Languages. At the heart of the discussion is the notion that scholarship without the Internet and its collaborative tools […]
Exploit Your Cognitive Surplus!
Image via Wikipedia One question I’ve been asked consistently since I’ve started writing this blog for the SSP is, “How do you find the time?” In some cases, it’s said with wonder. In some cases, it’s stated with what I […]
The Printed Wikipedia — A Prediction Comes True!
A recent news report from Germany confirms an idea I’d been toying with for a couple of years (apparently along with a few other people) — that printing online content can be a good business. To quote from the Associated […]
MLA Seeking Conference Bloggers
The Medical Library Association (MLA) is seeking 15 bloggers to cover their conference in Chicago, May 16-21. As an incentive, the MLA is offering its bloggers free wireless access at the hotel throughout the conference. As the MLA puts it: […]
Is the Age of Anti-Plagiarism Software Upon Us?
Last Friday, the Chronicle of Higher Education ran a story about the emerging anti-plagiarism software marketplace, with CrossRef’s CrossCheck spotlighted. It’s a good story that broadens nicely upon the CrossCheck angle. Defining plagiarism is potentially fraught with difficulty, but it […]
Will Texting and Twitters Kill Email?
There are many signs that email is threatened as the primary mode of communication between individuals. From record levels of spam (96.4% of all email is spam, some claim) to its incompatibility with cell phones, email is threatened with being […]
Zemanta – Augmented Authorship Arrives!
In the book, “The Design of Future Things,” Donald Norman observes that automation is a dangerous goal because pursuing it usually passes the point of diminishing returns. In contrast, augmentation of human effort (e.g., bicycling as augmented walking, writing/drawing/painting/composing as […]
“Noteworthy” Copyright Case in Florida
The Chronicle of Higher Education recently covered a “noteworthy” copyright case in Florida. Why the air-quotes? The intellectual property at stake is literally class notes, more or less. A professor who recorded his lecture notes in both written form and […]
Blog-based Peer Review Experiment: Mixed Results
An experiment in having a book peer-reviewed online has concluded, and the results are detailed in the Chronicle of Higher Education. The book entitled “Expressive Processing: Digital Fictions, Computer Games, and Software Studies,” examines the importance of using software design […]
Journals: Salvation through Conversation?
The mainstream media may be registering the revolution, but is it too late? A recent New York Times story reveals in all its glory how younger readers parse news through social media. One focus group participant is quoted saying, “If […]
New Sources for Book Publishers?
A new book publishing venture called Fractal Press seeks to anthologize blogs and publish the resulting books using print-on-demand technologies. An interview with co-founder Navanit Arakeri can be found on Joe Wikert’s Publishing 2020 blog. Arakeri will start with personal […]