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Interesting issues in the forums

By Dave Munger | March 12, 2008

ResearchBlogging.org users may not be aware that we have a growing community in our forums. There you can find help with problems with the site, discussions about the future of the site, and a space to talk about whatever you'd like.

If you haven't checked them out yet, I'd encourage you to visit and join the conversation. I'd like to highlight a few particularly relevant threads that have been brought up in the past couple of days:

If you haven't yet signed up for the forums, now's a great time to make your voice heard -- you can respond to these threads, or start a new one of your own. It's a great way to help shape the future of ResearchBlogging.org, or just to connect with others who are doing research, or would like to learn more about research.

Topics: Administration |

2 Responses to “Interesting issues in the forums”

  1. Wobbler Says:
    March 13th, 2008 at 1:04 pm

    ‘What constitutes a thoughtful discussion of peer-reviewed research? Is a snarky aside enough? What about just a rehash of the abstract?’

    Don’t you already have guidelines that cover this issue? Kinda funny though, was working on writing a blog post on this issue 2 days ago.

    ‘What should we do when posts aren’t thoughtful enough?’

    I doubt you can enforce it, either way, but may I suggest that “scientific” bloggers adhere to a certain blog format & style to increase its professional look, efficiency & effectivity? By borrowing a little bit from the journal paper format & style and preface every scientific blog post with at least 2 important elements, namely the Motivation (What is the added value of this blog post? Why should this post be interesting to the reader) and perhaps the Problem Statement (what specific issue(s) is this blog post going to address/solve?). A scientific blog abstract, if you will. If a blog post doesn’t have enough content for the blog author to bother describing the added value and the specific issue(s) it is trying to address, then that could be another indication of the quality of the blog post.

  2. Marc Says:
    March 28th, 2008 at 12:32 am

    I think it’s important to hold research blogging posts to some standard. It’s not enough to make a couple of comments then include the citation if the reader wants to investigate further. I think this is important because allowing people to use your icon when they write posts with very little substantive value devalues the icon itself. When I go to a blog and see your icon there, I immediately become interested because I feel I am going to get some original, intuitive feedback on peer-reviewed research, as well as a summary of the research itself. When I am greeted with three lines, it’s disappointing. If it’s allowed to continue, I imagine people will eventually not be as impressed by seeing your icon, and may not bother to read the article based on their past experiences. I think it’s important that the icon represents quality science writing on peer-reviewed articles–seeing it should give people confidence that the article they are about the read has been composed with careful thought and consideration.
    I think you should set up a system whereby if posts are reported for not being thoughtful enough by other members, you review them. If you tend to agree, you should notify the poster. A certain number of offenses, however, should result in taking away the priviledge of using the icon.
    I don’t have any problem with reviewing articles that are in press, but if an article has simply been accepting with no press date yet, I think maybe we should shy away from that. How could one verify the information?
    I really love this whole concept and what to do as much as I can to make it run smoothly.
    Thanks,
    Marc Dingman

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