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Interview
Crowdfunding Questions With Petridish.org Co-founder Matt Salzberg
Jul 9th
A few weeks ago I was approached by the folks at Petridish.org, asking if I’d be interested in doing a post on their science crowdfunding site. I’m fascinated by crowdfunding and think that it has a huge amount of potential, both as a means of funding science, and as a means of incentivizing science communication - in a world where the public funds your research directly, you have much more incentive to communicate with them about your work. Since I didn’t know much about Petridish.org at the time, I asked if one of their founders would be interested in doing an interview with me instead. Below is that interview, with Petridish.org co-founder Matt Salzberg. More on Matt can be found at the bottom of this post.
I have yet to try crowdfunding myself, but if you have any experience with Petridish or any other crowdfunding platform (or thoughts on which platform(s) will eventually succeed and pull away from the rest of the pack) I’d love to hear about it in the comments.
1. Simple question: what is crowdfunding?
Crowdfunding reflects the power of the internet to pool the collective actions of many small participants to make a larger project happen. In the case of Petridish.org, we help scientists and researchers raise funding for their projects from people who are passionate about their work.
2. Could you describe what Petridish.org is, and how it works?
Petridish.org is the largest crowdfunding website devoted entirely to science and research funding. Researchers post materials about a project they want to launch, and contributors on our site can donate to those projects in exchange for rewards and other tokens of appreciation.
Typically, researchers set a goal and a deadline by which they hope to raise the money. If they reach the goal by the deadline, then the project is successfully funded. If they don’t reach the goal, no money changes hands.
3. What gave you the idea for starting Petridish.org?
Before starting Petridish.org, I worked at a large venture capital firm and became interested in the power of the internet to transform the way things were funded. One website, kickstarter had become very successful in raising money for art and creative projects. I wanted to bring that power to science funding, which is an interest area of mine and is an area that desperately needs new models for funding.
4. Can you give a rough idea of the % of projects that have been funded so far, and how much funding has been received by researchers (either the average amount or the total across all projects)?
We’ve done significantly in excess of $100,000 of transaction volume since launching earlier this year. 80% of all of our projects have been successfully funded.
5. There have been a number of crowdfunding science websites in the past few years (Microryza, SciFlies.org, Science Donors, MyProjects, Open Genius, #SciFund Challenge, etc), many of which seem to have trouble taking off. What makes Petridish.org different and/or more likely to succeed?
There are a few things that make us different. First, we’ve focused on building a high quality, fun web experience for contributors. Aside from our focus on design, we hand select only the most interesting and impactful projects to feature on our site, including those with great videos, pictures and rewards. Many of the existing sites focus exclusively on the experience for the scientist raising money- we cater to both sides of the marketplace.
Second, we only do “all or nothing” funding. We do this because it protects the scientist from having to do a project without sufficient funding and it protects contributors who wouldn’t want to donate to a project that doesn’t have enough funding to go through. It also encourages people to really pull together to promote a project, since a project won’t happen without enlisting the support of others as well.
6. The crowdfunding science initiative that I’ve been most impressed with is the #SciFund Challenge, since they’ve partnered with Rockethub to bring their projects to a wider audience, and also done a lot of work to promote science communication. How are you bringing people to Petridish.org to see the projects that are listed there?
We do extensive web marketing activities to help the projects get funded. We have presences on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest, which helps drive people to our projects. We also have a weekly newsletter that sends the projects to thousands of our supporters. And we’re building relationships with larger media companies for regular press coverage. The all or nothing mechanism also really incentivizes people to share the projects and enlist their friends to help the project get funded.
Get To Know A Scienceblogger: Jonathan Eisen
Jul 28th
Jonathan Eisen, PhD
Today we have another post in our Get To Know a Scienceblogger series.
Jonathan Eisen is a professor at the Genome Center at the University of California (UC), Davis and holds appointments in the Department of Evolution and Ecology in the College of Biological Sciences and Medical Microbiology and Immunology in the School of Medicine. In addition to his research, Dr. Eisen is also a vocal advocate for “open access” to scientific publications and is the Academic Editor-in-Chief of PLoS Biology. He is also an active and award-winning blogger/microblogger at The Tree of Life and on Twitter. You can learn more about him here. The info in this biography and the picture at left have been taken from Jonathan’s blog, which uses a Creative Commons Attribution License.
What is the topic of your blog?
Many threads woven together
Open science and open access to scientific literature
Microbiology and microbial diversity
Genomics and evolution
What was your primary reason for starting a blog?
Sharing with others fun things I was doing — got sick of sending out lots of email messages and wanted a better way to share …
How often do you post, and roughly how much time goes into each post?
Varies - no system. I post when I have time and have something interesting to post about. Maybe 2-3 x / week. Some posts take five minutes some take 4 hours …
How do you fit in time for social networking?
I view it as a fundamental part of my job as a scientist and an educator. I use social networking to follow the literature, to do outreach, to communicate with colleagues, etc.
Have there been any benefits to blogging, either personally or professionally?
Lots. See http://phylogenomics.
Have there been any downsides to blogging, either personally or professionally?
#1 issue is when I write something that is too obnoxious and regret it later. I have done this maybe 3-4 times and have learned to try and write about ideas without criticizing individual people too much.
What piece of advice would you give other scientists in your situation who are considering moving into social media?
Don’t be afraid. Spend as much time or as little time as you want on this. These systems are tools, no more or no less. You decided how to use them just like you decide how to use a microscope. But like a microscope they can be really useful - so consider experimenting with them.
What have been the most effective ways of promoting your blog?
Twitter …
Were you surprised by anything blog related, either good or bad?
Not really … it’s all pretty straightforward. Main surprise I guess is how many people read my blog …
Any other information that you think people would find useful?
Blogs, twitter, facebook, etc are all just computer programs. They are neither good nor bad. They can be used well or poorly.
—
Thanks Jonathan!
Get To Know a Scienceblogger: Dirk Hanson
May 19th
Dirk Hanson - Addiction Inbox
Today we have another post in our Get To Know A Scienceblogger Series.
Dirk Hanson is a freelance science writer and business journalist with more than 30 years of professional experience. He has written for numerous magazines and trade publications, and is the author of three books including The Chemical Carousel which received an Independent Publisher Book Award in the Health/Medicine/Nutrition Category. His current area of coverage is the neuroscience of drug addiction. Dirk currently maintains a popular blog on drugs and the science of substance abuse called Addiction Inbox, serves as senior contributing editor for the new health web site The Fix, and has contributed phenomenal articles at BrainBlogger. You can learn more about Dirk and his books at www.dirkhanson.org.
What is the topic of your blog?
Addiction Inbox covers articles and health studies about drugs, addiction, and alcoholism, with an emphasis on the most recent scientific and medical findings. And anything else I find interesting related to drugs and the brain.
What was your primary reason for starting a blog?
I kind of jumped and got pushed simultaneously. I was finishing a book about scientific research on drug and alcohol addiction. Print outlets were in disarray, authors and editors were clueless, and I wanted an online platform from which to continue the conversation and to serve as a point of contact for the book. But the blog grew slowly and steadily and took on a life of its own. I’ve been an online journalist ever since.
How often do you post, and roughly how much time goes into each post?
I’ve gone slightly against the grain on this one. My posts are longer and less frequent that many bloggers—although this is a tendency throughout the science blogging community. I sometimes put up 1,200 word posts or longer. I try to put up something new every 3-4 days—which, from the old-school blogging perspective, is an eternity, not to mention a slow and painful death. Happily, I found out that a sort of bastard hybrid—call it long-form blogging—works for me, and allows for more in-depth posts, which I like. How long does it take to write a good blog post? From about 20 minutes to maybe three days.
How do you fit in time for social networking?
I think at least some of it comes out of time that was previously eaten up by the telephone and television. And in my case, since I earn part of my living online, I just make sure to make time for it. I admit I never expected to be drawn into the world of Facebook and Twitter through my blogging activities, but that is, in fact, what has happened. As a journalist doing the bulk of my nonfiction writing on the net these days, I’m pretty deeply involved with those two media at the professional level on a daily basis.
Have there been any benefits to blogging, either personally or professionally? More >
Get to Know a ScienceBlogger: Dr Yoni Freedhoff
Apr 28th
Dr Yoni Freedhoff - Weighty Matters
Today we have another interview in our Get To Know A ScienceBlogger Series. Today’s interview is with Dr Yoni Freedhoff, a family physician and founder of Ottawa’s Bariatric Medical Institute (a “multi-disciplinary, ethical, evidence-based nutrition and weight management centre”). His blog Weighty Matters is extremely influential in the area of weight management and policy (especially here in Canada) and has inspired many other obesity researchers and practitioners to enter social media, including Peter and myself. Enjoy the interview!
To learn more about Yoni please check out Weighty Matters or connect with him on Twitter.
What is the general subject of your blog? What is a “typical” post for you, both in terms of length and in terms of the topic.
Exposing what I see as truths behind nutrition, weight management, health policy and advertising. My typical post finds a study, a policy or an advertisement that’s trying to pull a fast one and calls it out. Length wise, I’d guess an average would be 400 words.
What was your primary reason for starting a blog?
I’ve been blogging for a relatively long time. Started out in 2005 and did so because a friend of mine who’s a PR expert told me I should. I think it was his nice way of asking me to shut up. I think he told me something along the lines of , “you seem to have a lot to say, why don’t you start a blog?”.
How often do you post, and roughly how much time goes into each post?
I post 6 days a week. Time really varies. I’d say most posts take 10 minutes. The more detailed posts can take hours.
How do you fit in time for the blog?
I’m not sure. I write quickly, so that doesn’t hurt. Sometimes, if I know it’s going to be a very busy few weeks, I’ll tee up the two weeks posts in their entirety before the busy time hits.
Have there been any benefits to blogging, either personally or professionally?
Get To Know A ScienceBlogger: Kevin Zelnio
Apr 20th
Kevin Zelnio - Deep Sea News
Today we have another interview in our Get To Know A ScienceBlogger Series! Today’s interview is with Kevin Zelnio. Kevin is a marine biologist and writer. He has studied the ecology and evolution of animals living around underwater volcanoes and described several new species of anemone and shrimp. Kevin is the assistant editor for Deep Sea News, where he contributes articles on marine science. He is now a freelance writer and independent scientist and consultant living in beautiful coastal North Carolina. Outside of science, Kevin is a songwriter and enjoys spending time with family in the long-leaf Carolina pines!
To learn more about Kevin view his CV, send him an email and follow him twitter!
What is the general subject of your blog? What is a “typical” post for you, both in terms of length and in terms of the topic.
Deep Sea News covers the Earth’s largest environment! I serve as the assistant editor there. While we traditionally covered news, research and basic facts of the deep-sea, we’ve branched out in the last couple years to really encompass the whole ocean. Guess the deep-sea wasn’t big enough for us. We cover everything from conservation issues to new tech, nautical history and collect commentary and posts from our colleagues to add new voices to marine science blogosphere. The latter is the is part of a new initiative of ours called the Scientist in Residence. Each month highlights a new voice who ideally writes a post per week about their research area. We’ve had an algal oceanographer and a theoretical marine ecologist. Next up is another marine ecologist and sea tech! More variety is on the way too. Typical posts do not exist and vary widely from a quote and link to something of interest to long drawn out researched article.
What was your primary reason for starting/joining your blog?
Craig McClain started Deep Sea News in 2004 at blogger to collect news and new research in one place. As founder, Craig serves as chief editors and DSN is his baby. He has nurtured it through thick and thin into a marine science powerhouse. I joined in 2007. I was a graduate student in a deep-sea lab at the time and started regularly commenting on the blog. He invited me to start a guest post column on the blog - From the Desk of Zelnio - which I enjoyed. Inspired, I went off to found The Other 95% after that and made it very successful pretty quickly. About 6 months after that Craig asked me to come onto DSN permanently with him and Peter Etnoyer. I had been blogging for about 8 months then (which is like 8 years in blog years) and had settled into a voice and rhythm that seemed to resonate with people and provided enjoyment for me.
I think in hindsight, I really took to blogging quickly because I have a lot of passion and enthusiasm for science and the work I do. I needed an outlet. I am a naturally outgoing and social person and need to talk about stuff and share new things I find out! For my personality types, blogging is a natural fit. I recognized that this was an effective outreach tool too. Deep Sea News was pretty established, they got in early in the science blogging game and had a built in audience for me so I could reach people immediately and they appreciated getting their science served ‘salty’.
Get To Know A Science Blogger: Daniel Lende
Apr 14th
Dr Daniel Lende - Neuroanthropology
This post is part of our series profiling individuals who have successfully used social media as a platform for science communication. These individuals cover a broad range of academic disciplines, and we hope that they will be a useful source of info and motivation for others who are considering moving into social media, or for those who are already online but simply looking for some new ideas.
Today we interview with Dr Daniel Lende of Neuroanthropology. Daniel is Associate Professor in Anthropology at the University of South Florida. He trained in medical, psychological, and biological anthropology and public health at Emory University. His main research interests are substance use and abuse, the intersection of anthropology and neuroscience, behavioral health, community-based research, and public and applied anthropology. He has done fieldwork in both Colombia and the United States. You can reach him at daniel . lende @ gmail . com, or follow him on twitter at daniel_lende (bio from PLoS Blogs).
What is the general subject of your blog? What is a “typical” post for you, both in terms of length and in terms of the topic.
Neuroanthropology covers the intersection of anthropology and neuroscience, with an additional focus on developments in the sciences of the mind and in important news and controversies within anthropology. We generally write three types of post, shorter post that focus more on “news” and might be 500-750 words, a medium post from 800-2000 words (including our weekly round ups), and a long post, which goes from 2000 words and well on up.
What was your primary reason for starting/joining your blog?
My colleague Greg Downey and I founded Neuroanthropology.net as a way to discuss research and develop ideas based on our interests in neuroscience and anthropology, which proved useful since we were living on separate continents that point after several years of being colleagues in the same department.
How often do you post, and roughly how much time goes into each post?
We post several times a week. A typical post (short or medium) can take from 1-3 hours to craft, sometimes longer depending on the length of the post.
How do you fit in time for blogging and social media?
I often do social media in “down time” - early in the morning, right after lunch, if I need a break from writing or teaching. For blogging, writing is writing - so I generally fit it into my schedule whenever some topic catches my eye and I decide to write a post.
Have there been any benefits to blogging, either personally or professionally?
Get to Know a Scienceblogger: Patrice Brassard
Apr 12th
Dr Patrice Brassard of Le Physiologiste
Do you ever wonder how people get into online science communication? I certainly hope so, because over the coming weeks Peter and I will be introducing a new series interviewing science communicators about their experiences promoting science using social media. These individuals cover a broad range of academic disciplines, and we hope that they will be a useful source of info and motivation for others who are considering moving into social media, or for those who are already online but simply looking for some new ideas. If you would like to share your own experiences communicating science through social media feel free to do so in the comments, or to introduce yourself to us via Twitter or email (saunders [dot] travis [at] gmail [dot] com).
Our first interview comes from Dr Patrice Brassard, an assistant professor of Kinesiology at Université Laval in Quebec city, Canada. His main research interests are the integration of cardiopulmonary and cerebrovascular physiology in patients with diabetes at rest and during exercise, and the impact of mental work on the cardiovascular system in healthy subjects. His blog is titled Le Physiologiste and for the past two weeks he has also been guest-posting at the blog network Scientopia.
1. What is the general subject of your blog?
Initially, the general subject of Le Physiologiste was supposed to be…physiology :-). However, I started by sharing my experiences as a junior faculty member. It is important to mention that when I began to read science blogs, I was very interested in these kinds of posts from bloggers sharing similar research and teaching issues than mine. The other collaborators at Le Physiologiste are graduate students and are sharing their experiences as well (in English and French). A couple of weeks ago, we finally decided to include posts where we are actually discussing physiology, mostly in French.
I would like this blog to become a place for graduate students, researchers and professors in physiology to debate about hot physiology topics.
2. What was your primary reason for starting a blog?
The primary reason for starting my blog was that, to my knowledge, there are no valuable French blogs/websites discussing published literature in integrative/exercise physiology…however, I soon noticed that it would be easier to start blogging in English, because I was already exchanging with bloggers in that language.
I still have that goal of discussing and debating physiology research in French…Our blog remains a work in progress for the moment!
3. How often do you post, and roughly how much time goes into each post?
Blogging and the Law: Copyright
Mar 9th
How do you blog without getting sued? It seems like a very simple question. I know lots of science bloggers, and as far as I know none of them have been sued for blog-related material. And yet, the fear of legal action is a very real one for many science bloggers, myself included.
For most bloggers, there seem to be two areas where we are both fearful of breaking the law, and incredibly ignorant about what is/is not illegal. These areas are copyright and libel. Adrian Ebsary first brought up this issue in a comment on our ideas and suggestions page, and he has helped me to come up with a list of interview questions on both of these important topics. Today we will look at copyright, with interviews from John Wilbanks and Michael Geist.
As VP for Science, John Wilbanks runs the Science project at Creative Commons. He started and ran Incellico, an early-2000s biotech semantic database company. He has also been a semantic web fellow at the World Wide Web Consortium, a member of the project on mathematics and computation at MIT’s Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, a manager at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard, and a legislative aide in the US House of Representatives.
Michael Geist is the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-Commerce Law at the University of Ottawa. He performed his Bachelor of Laws (LL.B.) degree at Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto, Master of Laws (LL.M.) degrees from Cambridge University in the UK and Columbia Law School in New York, and a Doctorate in Law (J.S.D.) from Columbia Law School.
Before the interview, just one more thing to get out of the way - a brief disclaimer from John Wilbanks:
“First, I need to state that Creative Commons is not a law firm, that I am not a lawyer, and this is not legal advice. Please make sure that this is the first thing posted out of this interview and retained on all copies of this interview“
As always, people are more than welcome to share the content in this blog post as they please. But if you choose to do so, please ensure that the above disclaimer is included (for the record, Adrian and I aren’t lawyers either). I should also point out that Michael and John answered these questions separately, via email, which is why their answers sometimes overlap (they weren’t simply ignoring each others’ response).
Now the interview!
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SoB: In general, what line in the sand distinguishes far use from copyright infringement? In other words, when discussing someone else’s work (journal article, blog post, photo, etc) what is allowed and what is not?
MG: Simply discussing work is fine. Copyright protects expression, not the ideas themselves.
SoB: What is permissible when discussing a paper that uses a Creative Commons license (e.g. PLoS Medicine), and how does this differ from discussing of a paper with a more traditional copyright (e.g. the New England Journal of Medicine)?
JW: It’s important to realize that the CC license has to do with copying and distributing a creative work, not talking about the creative work! Thus, there is no difference in discussing a PLoS article from a NEJM article. The ideas in each article themselves are not copyrightable, only the way the ideas are expressed through the grace and flow of the styling and writing, and so forth. This is known as the idea-expression dichotomy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idea-expression_divide) and is essential to understanding the role that CC licenses play. But we can all talk about ideas.
Fair use is an exception and limitation to copyright in the United States. It can be relied on by anyone for certain uses of a copyrighted work, whether or not the work is licensed under a CC license. There is no bright line about what is fair use or not, however, and whether it applies depends on the particulars of the situation.
Now, when discussing a paper, it is plausible that one might want to quote passages from the paper or display a table. These are uses that one might believe to be fair use (and I certainly believe so) but it’s definitely the case that some traditional publishers (who don’t use CC licenses) have brought copyright claims against bloggers and writers who have made such quotes and displays (my favorite such ludicrous story is that of Shelly Batts, see http://scienceblogs.com/retrospectacle/2007/04/when_fair_use_isnt_fair_1.php). The benefit to CC licenses, however, is that even if fair use doesn’t apply, a publisher that uses CC licenses would see this kind of quoting and displaying, generally, as a Good Thing, as evidence of increased impact (PLoS actively tracks its articles in the news!). To repurpose a famous quote from software, quoting and display is a feature of online open access, not a bug.
