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The (Possible) Postdoc Union Boom
Could postdoc unions be the next big thing in collective bargaining among academics? Recent filing at University of Washington could be beginning of a new round of organizing.
Expertise in Sciences and the Decision of What Is Publishable: A Noble yet Endangered Task
Expertise in Sciences and the Decision of What Is Publishable: A Noble yet Endangered Task
How is a scientific article accepted for publication in an academic journal? What is the role of peer reviewers? Where does the system go astray?
The End of an Error?
What would the world be like without formal peer review?, asks Fields medallists Timothy Gowers.
Idea Farming for Open Science: Sharing Wider Scientific Outputs Will Stimulate Ideas, Discoveries and Outcomes
Idea Farming for Open Science: Sharing Wider Scientific Outputs Will Stimulate Ideas, Discoveries and Outcomes
Ideas and data can interact, and our work can certainly benefit from the bad ideas that, in the short-term, do not seem to directly benefit discovery.
Not Just Available, but Also Useful: We Must Keep Pushing to Improve Open Access to Research
Not Just Available, but Also Useful: We Must Keep Pushing to Improve Open Access to Research
Could the real open access please stand up? If more research was published according to true open access principles, we'd see better application of evidence for everyone's benefit.
Many Junior Scientists Need to Take a Hard Look at Their Job Prospects
Permanent jobs in academia are scarce, and someone needs to let PhD students know.
How Science Transformed the World in 100 Years
We need to be more concerned than ever about how society uses scientific discoveries, says Venki Ramakrishnan, President of the Royal Society UK.
Collaboration and Concerted Action Are Key to Making Open Data a Reality
Collaboration and Concerted Action Are Key to Making Open Data a Reality
How to make widespread open data a reality.
Share Your Data
An analysis of a collection of open-access datasets quantifies their benefit to the scientific community.
Criticizing a Scientist’s Work Isn’t Bullying. It’s Science.
The New York Times Magazine story on Amy Cuddy brings up extremely important problems in science. But we cannot equate criticism with harassment.
A Radically Open Approach to Developing Infrastructure for Open Science
A Radically Open Approach to Developing Infrastructure for Open Science
Hindawi’s CEO, Paul Peters, explains the problems inherent in proprietary solutions for Open Science infrastructure and presents a proposal for how things can be done differently.
Dearly Departed Languages
Why Greek and Latin medical terminology is better off dead.
As Tech Companies Get Richer, Is it 'Game Over' for Startups?
Young firms struggle to compete as deep-pocketed companies like Facebook and Amazon clone products and consolidate their power.
Making the Monograph Sustainable
What can be done to preserve the monograph.
Federal Funding: Stifled by Budgets, Not Irrelevance
The threat to US science does not come from scientists' assumptions, their commitment to investigator-initiated research or the research community's failure to tackle problems of public concern. It comes from an unrealistic system of draconian budget caps that stifle investment in the future.
Mapping the Adjacent Possible
Imagine a connected online web of scientific knowledge… tightly integrated with a scientific social web that directs scientists’ attention where it is most valuable, releasing enormous collaborative potential.
Give Researchers a Lifetime Word Limit
Brian C. Martinson imagines how rationing the number of publications a scientist could put out might improve the scientific literature.
Does Science Need Mavericks or Are They Part of the Problem?
Staid and conformist, science risks losing its creative spark. Does it need more mavericks, or are they part of the problem?
Academe’s Prestige Problem
Professors and aspiring professors are complicit in perpetuating a rigged system.
Retracting Bad Science Doesn’t Make It Disappear
When a scientific paper is retracted, it can produce long-term aftershocks.
Open-Source, Commercial, Non-Profit, For-Profit: What Power Have You Got?
Open-Source, Commercial, Non-Profit, For-Profit: What Power Have You Got?
Non-profit is not synonymous with good, and for-profit is not synonymous with exploitation.
The Absurdity of the Nobel Prizes in Science
They distort the nature of the scientific enterprise, rewrite its history, and overlook many of its most important contributors.
How Fair Is It for Just Three People to Receive the Nobel Prize in Physics?
How Fair Is It for Just Three People to Receive the Nobel Prize in Physics?
Alfred Nobel didn’t foresee the current era of mega scientific collaboration.