Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-v2bm5 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-12T07:24:34.096Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

3 - The future's bright? Professional science communication in the age of the internet

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2010

Nicholas Russell
Nicholas Russell
Affiliation:
Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, London
Get access

Summary

Dr Esme Smith added the finishing touches to the Mark 6 version of her neuropeptide paper, pacing back and forth dictating and watching the words appear on her wall screen. Pausing, she passed a finger over her snazzy Hand Assistant to get the whole last paragraph on screen. Frowning slightly she read it through, glanced at her time bar, mentally rehearsed the chores she had to do before picking up the children (unusually Richard had to be in the office rather than the home console) and decided it would do. She swiped her finger again, checked the total sum in Euros, and sent Mark 6 into cyberspace.

She had put the first four versions on the private British science site, Impact One, but their charges were becoming excessive and the Nova Brainstem Foundation who funded her work refused to pay for it anymore. Impact One had a good reputation, most major players in her field were keyed in for on-the-hour alerts, and the Nobel Prize Winner submission index was high at 5.043, but she had become increasingly unhappy with the site, especially with the quality of review and post-review comments on the professional (peer) file. The Mark 1 version of the paper had been double blind (no one knew who had written it and reviewers were editor-selected and anonymous) but a reviewer had recognized who she was and used some hurtful put-downs. But overall she had scarcely altered the Mark 1 (Beta) paper and it appeared as Mark 2 under her name (with her Research Assistant and one of the Ph.D. students as co-authors). […]

Type
Chapter
Information
Communicating Science
Professional, Popular, Literary
 , pp. 28 - 39
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2009

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

,BMJ (1997). The electronic future. What might an online scientific paper look like in five years' time?British Medical Journal, 20 December, 315, 1692–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brahic, C. (2002). Open access in biomedical publication. Unpublished Imperial College London M.Sc. dissertation.Google Scholar
Brumfiel, G. (2004). Biomedical agency floats open-access plan. Nature, 9 September, 431, 115.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. (1999). US biologists propose launch of electronic preprint archive. Nature, 14 January, 397, 91.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. (1999). The writing is on the web for science journals in print. Nature, 21 January, 397, 195–200.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, D. (2000). All parties keen to press on with Europe-based science website. Nature, 27 January, 403, 347–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. (2000). Souped-up search engines. Nature, 11 May, 405, 112–15.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. (2000). Biology back issues free as publishers walk HireWire. Nature, 9 March, 404, 117.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, D. (2003). Wellcome to fund publication in open-access journals. Nature, 2 October, 425, 440.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. (2003). Who will pay for open access?Nature, 9 October, 425, 554–55.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. (2004). Britain decides ‘open access’ is still an open issue. Nature, 22 July, 430, 390.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. (2005). Joint efforts. Nature, 1 December, 438, 548–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. (2006). Open-access journal hits rocky times. Nature, 22 June, 441, 914.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. (2008). PLoS stays afloat with bulk publishing. Nature, 3 July, 454, 11CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Butler, D. and Wadman, M. (1999). Mixed response to NIH's web journal plan. Nature, 6 May, 399, 8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ewing, J. (2003). Open access will not be everyone. Nature, 9 October, 425, 559.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Giles, J. (2004). Trust gives warm welcome to open access. Nature, 11 November, 432, 134.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Beagle, HMS (1999). http://www.biomednet.com/hmsbeagle/61/viewpts/synoposis, Journals online. PubMed Central and beyond, visited 30 September 1999.
,House of Lords Select Committee on Science and TechnologyTenth report, http://www.pulbications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200304/cmselect/399/39903.htm (visited 25 October 2004).
Knight, J. (2003). Cornell axes Elsevier journals as prices rise. Nature, 20 November, 426, 217.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lawrence, S. and Giles, C. L. (1999). Accessibility of information on the web. Nature, 8 July, 400, 107–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
MacLeod, D. (2003). Publish and be free. The Guardian, Education Section, 17 June.Google Scholar
Marris, E. (2006). PS I want all rights. Nature, 13 July, 442, 118.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mellman, I. (2001). Setting logical priorities. Nature, 26 April, 410, 1026.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Nordling, L. (2008). Web journals ‘narrowing study’. Online publishing reduces academic research to little more than a ‘popularity contest’ critics warn. The Guardian, 28 October, Education Section, 8.Google Scholar
Ochert, A. (1999). Out of the morass. Times Higher Education Supplement, 8 January, 13.Google Scholar
Patel, K. (1999). Academics concerned about life science site. Times Higher Education Supplement, 3 September, 3.Google Scholar
Sequeria, E.McIntyre, J. and Lipman, D. (2001). PubMedCentral decentralized. Nature, 12 April, 410, 740.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wadman, M. (2001). Publishers challenged over access to papers. Nature, 29 March, 410, 502.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wray, R. (2004). Confused decision on science publishing. The Guardian, 9 November, 16.Google Scholar
Wray, R. (2006). Brussels delivers blow to Reed Elsevier. The Guardian, 19 April, 27.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×