Misinformation, Disinformation, and Scholarly Communication (Part 2)
How should we think about the problems of misinformation and disinformation in the context of scholarly publishing, research, and libraries?
How should we think about the problems of misinformation and disinformation in the context of scholarly publishing, research, and libraries?
How do the problems of misinformation and disinformation intersect with the concerns of scholarly communication?
How will the American Sunlight Project make it more costly for bad actors to spread disinformation — and what does this mean for scholarly publishing?
Could the failure of a journal to visibly correct known errors in a publication, thereby propagating false information, be considered disinformation?
What if even by saying “fake science” you inadvertently participate in a scam? What if this phrase legitimizes fraud, lies, and deceit? Let’s call it what it is – dupery.
Preprints play a crucial role in open science but offer an opportunity to be gamed. Fictitious authorship in preprints show that open science needs checks and we need to collaborate to govern Open Science.
How to address lies in the political life of a democracy? Education, information literacy, gatekeeping, and dialogue are not enough. Lisa Hinchliffe and Roger Schonfeld examine the issue.
Franklin Foer’s new book is a bracing account of the current information economy, the monopolies and motivations at its heart, and the weakening of democratized knowledge.
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.
Information warfare is both tactical and strategic, with much of its success stemming from the weakened economics of the current information economy. Scholarly publishers have experienced this in many ways, from Google Scholar to predatory publishers to pre-print archives — all answers to the calls for “free information” and all revealing tactical and strategic vulnerabilities as accuracy and facts become luxury items in the information war.
The age of information abundance may have fundamental flaws — barriers to entry that create false equivalence; dissemination tools that conflate fake information with responsible sources; self-reinforcing loops of conspiracy and paranoia; and social fragmentation that makes societal disruption more likely. What can be done? Here are a few ideas.