Connecting researchers. Crossing boundaries.
Valentine’s day is fast approaching and individual researchers may be seeking out new researcher collaborations, or romancing their ideas, or even getting themselves ready for a night in with those grant applications! Okay, so perhaps not the typical Valentine’s day. As you are already aware, from my fellow correspondent’s blog post … [Read more...]
Here at Piirus, we're all members of the research community ourselves, and we're always looking for new ways to help our members expand and strengthen their research networks. You can already join Piirus.com for free and use it to identify and connect with researchers who might become new collaboration partners. Now we want to help … [Read more...]
In this interview we hear from Miggie Pickton, Research Support Librarian at the University of Northampton. Miggie tells us about some of the challenges, themes and interactions involved in her work. What does your role involve? My job title is 'Research Support Librarian' and I lead the small (but perfectly formed!) library team … [Read more...]
As Piirus' blog and social media editor, I'm taking a look back on all that we've achieved in 2015, as we approach the end of the year and a well-earned, short seasonal break. We've published over 140 blogposts and our team has seen membership changes. We've been privileged to feature the perspectives of many different researchers on the … [Read more...]
Recently, I launched #Piirusvoices on Twitter, researchers from across the globe interacted and shared their best and worse research moments in their career, along with some great hints and tips to research success. It was a great discussion and collation of ideas from a range of individuals involved in different forms of … [Read more...]
Piirus member Ryan Anderson has completed Bachelor degrees in Science, and Psychology (honours). He is currently completing his PhD candidature in Psychology, and recently began a blog exploring the science behind love, sex and attraction. He also writes for PsychologyToday (The Mating Game). Here, we learn about a significant moment in … [Read more...]
What's a MOOC? - A "Massive Open Online Course", and I'm taking part in one called "How to Survive Your PhD" from the Thesis Whisperer: it's free and registration is open, so get in quickly! THE BASICS This looks like a really interesting course for anyone who supports researchers in their work. I don't have much time (this is … [Read more...]
In my last blogpost for Piirus in July, I reported on the Vatican Library’s new digitization project, which plans ultimately to make digital copies of the entire collection of 82,000 manuscripts, incunabula, and early prints available online. This is only the most prominent example in a growing number of institutions and libraries that … [Read more...]
I've long felt a bit conflicted on the subject of Twitter. I remember doing a workshop while I was a student at the University of Warwick, and we were being encouraged to embrace the micro-blog opportunities afforded by Twitter. Someone asked whether it was okay to tweet during conference presentations, and the facilitator suggested it … [Read more...]
Last week, in tips 1-6, Piirus member Dr. Alke Gröppel-Wegener shared some things she learned from putting together her first crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter. Here are some things to keep in mind once the campaign goes live, our tips 7-12. 7. The Notifications. Once the campaign is live, I found myself becoming obsessed with … [Read more...]
Do you know what people see when they search for you online? At Piirus we’ve created a free Digital Identity Health Check for Academics. Follow the simple steps to give your digital identity a health check, then use our top 10 tips to improve the visibility of you and your research: Create profiles on sites that rank highly in … [Read more...]
Dr. Alke Gröppel-Wegener, Senior Lecturer in Contextual Studies and National Teaching Fellow at the Faculty of Arts and Creative Technologies at Staffordshire University shares her experiences of a different route to publication on a project that was recently discussed in the Times Higher. For years I had a wanted to consolidate the … [Read more...]
Earlier this year Piirus took part in two events with jobs.ac.uk: a Google Hangout on How to be a Successful Digital Academic to Boost Your Career a workshop on Tools and Tips for Research Impact and ECR Employability Out of the talks and discussions at these events we gathered insight on the benefits and concerns of using social … [Read more...]