I've been reading a lot about the state of scientific publishing. Some people seem to think it's in trouble, but I see signs of health from the various innovations people are trying. Some interesting examples include the use of openreview.net to open up reviews and give credit to reviewers, and the decision by eLife to stop issuing rejections, but open up the process instead. There is an interesting critique of the eLife decision by @MarkHanson located here: https://mahansonresearch.weebly.com/blog/do-we-really-need-journals
It's a weird time for me to be working on a new journal publishing platform, but maybe it's the right time. I've always been bugged by the economics of journal publishing, and that's what got me started working on it. Maybe I should shift my focus to the social process of publishing. The death of #AcademicTwitter hasn't helped, and I don't think LinkedIn and #AcademicChatter on the fediverse have filled the need yet.
@tragiccommons I have vague ideas of a federated academic publishing model (primarily hosted by universities) on an OSS stack... but you're right there is evolution in publishing which may work better than revolution
On connecting with academics, you can also follow @academicchatter
Ever since I got back from my knee injury, I have been playing some pretty good hockey (hope I didn't jinx myself). Had another solid game in the net this morning, and we pulled ahead to win, 7-5. I didn't have a chance on a couple and a few more were very frustrating, but I felt good, anticipated the play, and made some nice saves. I'm thinking of getting new goalie pads but that's like a $1,000 investment and I wonder how much longer I can keep going?
I have been doing something pretty amazing, for me at least. Not only am I getting books read and reviewed, I'm actually cutting into my ridiculously long Currently Reading list. It's down to only 6 books! I wrote 3 reviews yesterday. Unfortunately, none of them knocked me out, but hey, they can't all be grand slams. You can find my reviews here:
If you're in London and interested in my work, please join me for my inaugural professorial lecture entitled 'Architectures of Care: From Data-Driven Design to User Empathy'
7 March 2024, 7pm at UCL
All welcome!
Good news for people outside of London: there is now an option to join my inaugural professorial lecture on 'Architectures of Care: From data-driven design to user empathy' online via zoom live streaming.
#NLI buys Bonar Law collection of historic maps https://www.rte.ie/radio/radio1/clips/22343003/#Maps#IrishHistory Audrey Whitty, Director of the National Library of Ireland, talks to RTE about the acquisition of 19,000 maps and prints of Ireland going back to the 16th century.
@IrishStudiesQUB First question asked in the interview was my first question:
'Any connection to the early 20th c UK prime minister, who was an opponent of home rule?'
Answer given was not entirely clear, but collection is named not for the UK prime minister per se, but rather for the collector, who happens to be the prime minister's 90-year-old grandson and namesake.
[…] ISRAELISM uniquely explores how #Jewish attitudes towards #Israel are changing dramatically, with massive consequences for the region and for #Judaism itself.
[…] Zimmermann is part of a growing trend of young American Jews who are no longer satisfied with the one-sided narrative marketed to them in Jewish communities, Jewish schools, youth movements, and Birthright trips, but are starting to examine it critically, shaking off the automatic identification of #Judaism with loving Israel, and taking action against the occupation and for Palestinian rights.
[…] In debates with Palestinian students, Zimmermann recounts in the film, she felt again and again at a loss. "I remember there were Palestinian students who stood up and said: 'You cry over being silenced and marginalized, but my uncles and cousins couldn't sleep for weeks when bombs fell over their heads in #Gaza,'" she says. "I was thrown into these conversations where people used words I had never encountered: 'occupation,' 'settlements,' '#apartheid,' and 'ethnic cleansing.' I always thought I knew so much about Israel, but suddenly when they mentioned all these words, I didn't understand what they were talking about. I felt embarrassed that we couldn't respond to their claims. Do we not have any successful counterarguments besides 'double standards' and 'antisemitism'? This really troubled me."
Are Mastodon users really happy with thread behavior? So, for example, this post had a lot of replies, but even if you look at it on the original instance you can't see any of them. You can see my reply to the post on my server, but it is no longer connected to the original post. So it is often impossible to read old threads (& of course even to see all replies on a current one).
But also: I know why the other frustrating thread behavior happens (that you often can't see all the replies to a thread because no one on your instance is following another instance, etc.). I don't know why this one happens? Why would a response become detached from a thread?