Retracting a paper identifying a link between climate change deniers and conspiracy theorists provokes more conspiracy theories, but it turns out the real impetus for retraction is disappointingly parochial and explicable.
Axiomatically more complicated than copyright, built to provide no legal cover, and possibly put in place by the technocrats in Silicon Valley, does Creative Commons make sense for the creative class?
A sense of gloom hangs over academic publishing these days. As library budgets are cut, and the fear of OA mandates cutting profit margins clouds publishers’ sense of their place in the world, what is it like to be a publishing professional in this era of climate change?
Scholarly Kitchen chef, Robert Harington asks “what do researchers want?” From those in mathematics to tumor immunology, from gerontology to Melville studies, the answer is often “to do my research in the best way possible.” Using a dose of pythonesque humor, this post chips away at this question, providing an interesting example of how the American Chemical Society is thinking through such issues.
Data sharing and publication is a topic we need to consider carefully, and weigh the risks, costs, and benefits, as well as the complexities.
PLOS has set a new policy, requiring authors to make all data behind their published results publicly available. This has been met with a great deal of controversy from the research community. Thoughts on why this policy and why now…
Editors keep allowing nonsense and gibberish to be published in their journals and conference proceedings. How many exposés and sting operations will it take before scholarly publishing begins effectively to police itself?
Despite the feeling that the factory has turned out just another from the same template, Gladwell’s new book turns out to be refreshing, surprising, and thought-provoking.
Alan Alda spoke at the AAAS meeting in Chicago on the theme of communicating science to the public. We often view the communication of science, be it in one’s own scholarly journals or in mass media, as somehow distinct and meaningfully different from other communication styles. However, Alda made the point repeatedly during his presentation that this should not be the case. One can accurately convey science with stories and an engaging style that not only brings the reader along in the discovery process, but also preserves the truth and validity of the underlying discovery. Alda made the point that “Communication is not something you add on to science, it is of the essence of science.” Publishers can help to improve how science is communicated; indeed it is at the core of what publishers bring to the process of distributing science.
A contemplation of constraints — how some have vanished, how others are needed, how new ones are emerging, and the benefits constraints deliver.
When does it make sense to call an Open Access policy a “mandate” — and when does it constitute unhelpful exaggeration?
Legal issues are an inevitable part of publishing cutting-edge information in a world as political as academic research. However, the role of publishers in these matters, and their important contributions, are often concealed within necessary discretion.
The “publish or perish” culture has created a major mega-journal. But are its boundaries and standards built properly to avoid becoming an enabler of that culture?
The European Union sets up a public consultation on copyright policies.
The Jack Andraka story develops further. SSP pages on Wikipedia are taken down by a disgruntled commentator. And Andraka’s draft paper gets a preliminary review, and both the reviewers and Andraka admit it’s less game-changing than the media has led us to believe.