Meeting in the Middle
Over the last 4 months, I have attended many of the major publishing conferences and have learned quite a bit about the average attendee. I am going to cut to the chase and say that we publishing professionals are missing […]
Science Versus Religion, The God of the Gaps, Being "Less Wrong" and Two Favorite Neils (Gaiman and deGrasse Tyson)
Does religion impinge on scientific progress? And what about leprechauns? Neil Gaiman and Neil deGrasse Tyson discuss…
Deceptive Publishing: Why We Need a Blacklist, and Some Suggestions on How to Do It Right
Predatory publishing is a big and complex problem; so is calling out and shaming deceptive publishers by means of blacklisting. Is that something we should even do, and can it be done fairly, constructively, and helpfully? Yes, and here are some suggestions how.
You Keep Using That Word, I Do Not Think It Means What You Think It Means
A look at common terms that are improperly used to describe science.
Elephants and the Internet: Online Forgetting
Should kids be helped to delete evidence of indiscretion, or should they stop posting such evidence in the first place? Charlie Rapple considers the new iRights campaign
Optical Illusions, Legibility and How to Choose the Right Font
An entertaining lecture on the tricks of typography.
Advocacy, Analysis, and the Vital Importance of Discriminating Between Them
As the scholarly communication world becomes more complex and the issues we deal with become more politically and emotionally fraught, it becomes increasingly essential that we be able to tell the difference between anlaysis and advocacy. What markers can we look for to help us discriminate between them?
The Manuscript Submission Mess: Brief Notes from a Grumpy Author
Submitting articles for publication is a nightmare–there’s a plethora of platforms and interfaces, and they all seem to be awful. Can anything be done?
Ask The Chefs: What Did You Learn At This Year’s 2015 SSP Annual Meeting?
Last week was the Society for Scholarly Publishing Annual Meeting in Arlington. The Scholarly Kitchen Chefs talk about what they learned at the meeting and how it impacted them.
Guest Post: INASP’s Anne Powell — Availability Does Not Equal Access
INASP’s Anne Powell discusses the complexity of discovery, and the work INASP is doing to bring together tools, technologies, infrastructure and perhaps most importantly, relationships built on an understanding of the needs of users.
"Super" Outreach from the American Chemical Society
How much would Iron Man’s suit really weigh? This and other pressing questions answered by the American Chemical Society.
Stephen Hawking Sings!
Stephen Hawking teams up with the Monty Python troupe to record a new version of their “Galaxy Song”.
Guest Post: Emma Brink on Internships: Where Everybody Wins!
Emma Brink discusses her experience as an intern for a publishing house, how to find such a position and how it can help build your career.
Science: Out of the Box, Outreach Done Right
Johns Hopkins University’s science outreach video series offers a compelling way to tell the story of current research to the general public
5 Million Public Domain Ebooks in HathiTrust: What Does This Mean?
The HathiTrust archive now contains 5 million digitized books that are in the public domain and are freely available to all. Do we recognize how significant that is?