Die Nachmittagssession der Konferenz an der altehrwürdigen Royal Institution (so eine Art Urania) startete mit einer Parallelsitzung, an der ich beteiligt war.
Ich verpaßte also leider zwei Sitzungen, sollten diese anderweitig gebloggt werden, trage ich es hier nach: Breakout 4: Science in Second Life: a virtual tour Jo Scott Jo will take you on a tour of the key sites of relevance to scientists in the virtual world Second Life. A group discussion will then look at how useful such environments are (or could become) for disseminating scientific ideas and holding virtual conferences. Breakout 6: Communicating Primary Research Publicly Heather Etchevers, Jean-Claude Bradley and Bob O’Hara New web technologies afford unprecedented opportunities to share scientific data and results before official publication in a traditional journal. What are the benefits and drawbacks for a scientist to use these tools? Could the role of traditional publishers change as more scientists adopt increasingly diverse mechanisms to disclose research? How might this change the way science is done in the future?
Breakout 5: Science blogs and online forums as teaching tools Martin Fenner, Oliver Obst, Jeff Marlow: We will discuss the role that science blogs and online forums are having in teaching science today. In a panel discussion we will look at practical examples and examine their potential as well as their shortcomings. Die Sitzung fand im so genannten Georgian Room der RI statt (hat nichts mit Georgien zu tun, sondern dort soll King Georg II. gewohnt haben), ok – die Bestuhlung war etwas einfacher als auf dem Bild. Die drei Impulsreferate stehen als Powerpointfolien bei Slideshare zur Verfügung. (hier, hier und hier). Irgendwie haben wir es zum Schluß hin dann leider doch nicht mehr geschafft wie versprochen ein paar recommendations und best practices zusammenzustellen.
Farewell session: Embracing change: taking online science into the future Richard Grant, Cameron Neylon and Peter Murray-Rust. Moderated by Timo Hannay. Endlich mal ein Moderator nach meinem Geschmack, der verhindert, dass die Diskussion auseinanderläuft! Die Session fand im berühmten Faraday Theatre statt, hier ein paar Eindrücke:
- Peter Murray-Rust: „A blog has a life for it’s own. It should not go to the point where is it getting boring. A blog is about honesty, egalitarismus, neutral support, and has no predictable success. We have a duty to our readership, but should not feel guilty if not blogging for some weeks.“
- Cameron Neylon: „Blog could enhance or damage your carrer. It always about benefits and risks.“
- Richard Grant: „We make some vast assumptions on blogging, e.g. that it’s bad for our career. I think only natural scientist are worried about their career, not scientists from art or humanities. Quite a challenge is that faculty and dean never heard of blogs and it’s use for educational purposes.“
- Discussion: It’s a common feeling that if your not in the lab working on your bench your wasting time. 5% of the audience has experienced active hindrance from their boss when writing blogs.
- Scott Keir: „As part a part of the thinking process, blogging should be accepted in the science community, but should not be too perfect.“ Heiße Diskussion, ob Blogbeiträge zitierbar sind, ob Blogbeiträge Publikationen ersetzen können (Erstentdeckungsrecht).
- Murray-Rust meint: „Passionate lay person groups out there are in need of better access to science. For example patient health advocates, environmental change groups, healthy ethics groups. These groups need our help to go on. We have a responsebility to get facts out.“
- Auf die Frage „Who are the top ten scientific bloggers? How to measure the success of your blog?“ antwortet Murray-Rust: „You can’t. If you can, you’re lucky.“