Science of Blogging
Science, meet World
video pussy wet pissingWho uses Twitter? Less than 3% of internet users do so regularly.
Dec 15th
Everyone is certainly talking about it. Most companies, news agencies, and entrepreneurs have Twitter accounts. Although I’ve been on Twitter since early 2009, most of my real-life friends and colleagues only vaguely understand what Twitter is and how it can be used.
Thus, I shouldn’t be surprised that only 8% of internet users in the the US report using Twitter, according to a recent Pew survey.
However, of those 8% of internet users who happen to use Twitter, only a third (36%) use the service regularly by checking for material posted by others on a daily basis or multiple times per day. I guess (if I lived in the US) I would be included in this rather small fraction of regular Twitter users.
On the other hand, 42% of Twitter users check the site less than every few weeks, or never.
Thus, in effect, less than 3% of US internet users are regular Twitter users (2.9%).
Despite the discouraging statistics, I’ve certainly have had no trouble finding interesting people to connect with on Twitter. More >
To be or not to be a pseudonymous blogger
Dec 13th
Editor’s Note: As a follow up to Scicurious’ excellent post on how to start a science blog, today Sci discusses the pros and cons of authoring a blog under a pseudonym. As one of the most recognizable pseudonymous science bloggers, Sci knows a thing or two about the topic. And take it from me - Sci takes her pseudonymity very seriously. When we met at a conference last year, she continued to go by Scicurious. To this day, I have not the slightest clue what her real name might be. I certainly would have slipped up by now.
Sci has a pseudonym, and while it’s fine sometimes with other bloggers, many real life people discount me because they think I am “anonymous” and cannot be serious. Keep in mind that pseudonymity and anonymity are different things. While anyone can be “anonymous” and their voices will change all the time, a pseudonym is a fake name that is constant through time as one or more specific people with specific voices. This means that you can, over time and with quality work, build up the trust of people who read you, and develop a reputation online as your pseudonym.
There are often good reasons for being a pseud. Many people assume that those writing under a pseudonym must be cowards, trolls, or otherwise untrustworthy. While this is true for some pseuds, not all pseudonyms are equal, and with time you can recognize those who work to build up reputations under their pseudonym. The reality is that there are lots of good reasons to be pseudonymous, from worries about people not taking you seriously, to professional considerations. Sci is a pseud because I don’t want animal rights activists coming after the real life work I do, not to mention the work of my colleagues, just because I’m supportive of carefully performed animal research (yes, I’ve gotten death threats, and I’m by no means the only one). More >
Science Bloggers: Diversifying the news
Dec 8th
Editor’s Note: When we said we wanted Science of Blogging to pick the brains of the best and brightest in the online science world, we weren’t kidding! Today, I’m excited to share a wonderful post by fellow Canadian, Colin Shultz. Colin is a science journalist, who regularly discusses fascinating topics on his blog and is uber-active on Twitter. In fact, Twitter, is how Colin and I connected. Today, Colin discusses the notion that science blogs may be a key supplement to traditional media in reporting science to the public.
So you know that old, sorry debate about science journalism versus science blogging? The one where the mainstream media are the legitimate suppliers of news about the world, and bloggers are resigned to being snarky commentators?
Or how about the one where blogging creates an echo chamber, where the diversity of sources withers, leaving people in a pool of ideology-reinforcing consistency.
Well have I got some news for you!
These arguments may not only be patently illogical, but rather, the opposite might be true.
In a recent study in the journal Journalism Studies, Gina Walejko and Thomas Ksiazek, both PhD students at Northwestern University, compared the sources that traditional journalists, political bloggers, and science bloggers each turn to when producing their posts. More >
8 Tips on Starting a Science Blog
Dec 6th
Editor’s Note: We could not be more delighted to have Scicurious, one of the top science bloggers out there, share her plentiful wisdom on how to start a science blog. Scicurious is a fellow ex-ScienceBlogs blogger, and now runs a fascinating blog called Neurotic Physiology over at the Scientopia network. All of Sci’s posts are brilliant and engaging, and her “Friday Weird Science” series can not be missed. Here’s Scicurious!
So You Want to Start a Science Blog?
Good for you! No doubt you are looking forward to huge amounts of flattery and fame, millions of hits, and a whole line of merchandise with your face plastered all over it.
Well, maybe those goals are a bit lofty.
Nonetheless, Science Blogging is important. It’s a great way to increase communication between scientists and the public. It’s a good way to do outreach and get more people interested in science. It’s an excellent way to learn to analyze papers and get feedback on your analysis in a public forum. And it’s a really good way to improve your writing skills!
But of course, everyone wants to know where to start. In my case, I pretty much just started a blog, and learned as I went. School of hard knocks and all that. But there’s no reason that you should have to do the same, and starting a blog doesn’t have to be uphill through the snow both ways.
Over the years, I have collected some tips on blogging and things to think about as you get started. And Peter has been kind enough to let me share them with you! More >
Can you trust a science blog?
Dec 2nd
I recently came across a new editorial in Analytics Chemistry by Royce Murray entitled, Science Blogs and Caveat Emptor.
The main thesis of the editorial is that you can trust peer-reviewed literature, you can trust mainstream science news, but when it comes to science blogs – caveat emptor.
Murray states the following:
“I firmly believe that [peer-review] has served science well and that the scientific literature has provided generally reliable information and vast benefits to society over the centuries to the present and will continue doing so into the future.”
Thus, the past, present and future of science communication is in peer-reviewed journals, which he encourages should be judged on quality using tried, tested, and true measures such as journal impact factors.
When it comes to science blogging, Murray is much less romantic in his views:
“I believe that the current phenomenon of “bloggers” should be of serious concern to scientists.”
Bloggers should concern scientists, because, presumably, these two groups of people are separate entities. Scientists who also blog apparently do not exist.
Next, Murray gives away a bit of how distanced he is from the subject matter he is discussing.
“Bloggers are entrepreneurs who sell “news” (more properly, opinion) to mass media: internet, radio, TV, and to some extent print news.”
Over the years I have come to know numerous science bloggers, many of whom are also practicing scientists, and I’m not sure any of them would be captured by this definition.
As a scientist and a science blogger, I have yet to “sell news” to mass media. Fingers crossed, though. More >
Working with your Public/Media Relations office: A primer for researchers
Nov 29th
Editor’s note: As I video-blogged last week, our post on why scientists should blog got bounced around the web a good bit and resulted in a number of generous mentions on other blogs (check the trackbacks to view). Among these mentions was Andrew Careaga’s Higher Ed Marketing blog, a wonderful resource on all matters related to marketing and public relations in higher education. After a brief exchange via Twitter, Andrew graciously agreed to provide a post for Science of Blogging on how researchers can work with the public relations or media department at their host institution to get their research across to a wider audience. As the first official guest contributor on Science of Blogging, here’s Andrew.
* * *
Peter’s excellent case study on why scientists should blog led me to share my perspective on this subject. As a public relations/communications professional working in higher education, I think it’s fantastic that Peter shares his ideas by blogging. I wish more researchers would follow his lead. Frankly, it would make the media relations aspects of my job easier and probably more enjoyable.
The way I see it, researchers who blog about their work provide a public service. They’re sharing their knowledge with a broader audience than the readership of scientific or academic journals. (A very good Tufts University feature about academics who blog illustrates the value from their perspective.) And by responding to blog comments and exchanging ideas with other bloggers (as I’m doing here), researchers are able to interact with people beyond their disciplines.
Ideally, the media relations folks on college campuses are valuable partners for scholar-bloggers who want to get their research ideas out to the public. PR folks should not serve as personal publicists for certain faculty members – although most of us in the PR field know of a few professors who would love it if that were the case. Rather, we are partners in disseminating scholarship. We can do so not only by publicizing faculty research, but also by talking about the researchers’ own public-service blogging, and by pointing journalists and others to the researchers’ own blogging efforts.
So, how can researchers work with media relations staff? Here are a few suggestions. More >
How to Promote Your Science Blog: ResearchBlogging.org
Nov 26th
One of the most difficult aspects of starting a new blog is attracting readers. For the first few months after Peter and I started our blog on obesity research, we averaged 5-10 hits per day, at least half of which were due to the two of us refreshing the site on different computers! This can be incredibly frustrating, since you are putting a lot of time and effort into creating valuable content that few people are able to enjoy. Luckily there are a number of tools that you can use to attract new readers right from the start, with one of the most important being ResearchBlogging.org.
Research Blogging is a website that aggregates blog posts that discuss peer-reviewed research. The blog post must discuss the research in a relatively in-depth fashion (e.g. the post must do more than simply summarize the abstract), but this is something that many science blogs do on a fairly regular basis. If you discuss peer-reviewed studies on your blog, then you simply need to register your blog with Research Blogging, and then insert the Research Blogging citation code into each blog post which discusses a peer-reviewed journal article. For example, on our obesity blog roughly 1/3 to 1/2 of our posts discuss the results of a peer-reviewed paper, and so we include the Research Blogging code on each of those articles. These posts then get advertised on the Research Blogging main page, as well as the sidebar of the Scienceblogs network (Scienceblogs and Research Blogging are both owned by SEED media group). This is huge, as Scienceblogs is one of the most popular science websites in the world. So by signing up for Research Blogging, you are basically getting your work advertised for free, on a tremendously popular website that caters to people who like to read about science.
That’s a pretty great deal! More >
Thanks and Future Direction: SoB Vlog 01
Nov 25th
Just a quick message to say thanks and to discuss where ScienceofBlogging is heading.
Peter
Why all scientists should blog: a case study
Nov 23rd
I started blogging about 2 years ago.
At that time I was 2 years into my PhD and had a respectable number of peer-reviewed publications to my name.
I should have felt supremely proud to have joined the elite circle of publishing scientists.
Unfortunately, despite the publications, I longed to feel that any of my work was making an impact beyond the traditional boundaries of academia: peer-review publications and scientific conferences.
As I was not a full-fledged PhD with a ton of experience, my opportunities for media appearances and invitations to give presentations around the globe were appropriately limited.
So, with my good friend and colleague, Travis, I started a blog.
Our first post may have been read by a total of 6 people – assuming our girlfriends (now fiancées) and both sets of parents read the link we sent via email.
Fast forward to 2 years later, and our little blog is now hosted on the freshly launched PLoS Blogs network.
I have just published the final study from my PhD in the prestigious journal, Diabetes Care.
Despite the wonderful journal, presentations at international conferences discussing the work, and a message that I thought was rather important to the field, the work was met with complete silence. More >
How building your online social network may affect your offline social life
Nov 20th
One of the main reasons drawing people of all ages online is the prospect of connecting and communicating with others. This need for connecting online is the impetus behind the immense popularity of Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, YouTube, and countless others.
In the realm of online vs offline social networking, an interesting question often arises: As one’s online social networks grow, does that person also become more popular offline?
There are generally two schools of thought on this issue, broadly promoted by the cyberpessimists and the cyberoptimists.
You can almost guess what I’m about to write next, right?
Cyberpessimists believe that being social online results in being anti-social offline. The premise makes sense; we only have so much time to dedicate to socializing online or off. Thus, as the time socializing online increases, our face-to-face exposure with contacts may diminish.
The cyberoptimists assert the opposite: online social networking actually supplements rather than displaces offline social networking.
So who’s got the right idea?
Maybe neither according to a recent study by Pollet and colleagues in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking. More >
