Faithful readers, welcome to our new digs here at Discover. And stalwart fans of Discover, welcome to Cosmic Variance. We are thrilled to hear that our change in color scheme portends the Death of the Blogosphere. Who knew we had such power? Blogs are yesterday’s news, anyway, but we’ll putter gamely on for a while, just to keep up appearances.
To any new readers who might wander by, feel free to poke around a bit to get a feeling for the place; the archives are accessible from the sidebar, and we also have an About page. This is an extremely bloggy blog, in the sense that we are guided by whatever we want to talk about at the moment, rather than any externally-imposed idea of what should be talked about. Everyone should read one of the following two paragraphs, but not the other one:
One of the features of Cosmic Variance is that we are all working scientists, whose main activity involves doing research. We try to bring some of the excitement and inside scoop of the research process as it occurs. True, we change things up now and then with non-scientific posts, but that’s the price you must pay to attract the eyeballs of the common folk; the meaty posts about the glory of Science will always be a mainstay (and you can even use equations!).
One of the features of Cosmic Variance is that we are all working scientists, but we are also human beings. We try to highlight the human side of the scientific enterprise as we explore the wider world of ideas. True, there are occasional technical posts about some point of current scientific contention, but that’s the price you must pay to keep your academic credibility; the playful, discursive, interdisciplinary excursions will always be the fun part of the blog.
Hope that makes everything clear.
There may be some shaking-out process as we complete the transition over to the new site, so let us know if things work less effortlessly than usual. (Some of the last few comments might have been lost — sorry about that.) We’re happy to have found a new home.
November 10th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
Look, you can even leave comments. O brave new world, &c.
November 10th, 2008 at 6:17 pm
So does this make me famous, or are the comments’ bugs not yet eradicated?
November 10th, 2008 at 6:21 pm
Hmmmm… i dunno Sean, this does make me feel a little queasy to come to, the whole corporate first page, esp. after reading several of the followup comments to your last post. But — i’m gonna give it a fair shake. if you all can say all you want the same, and we can too, and it’s better supported (we do of course want you to become a millionaire off this venture), then maybe it’ll be ok, just like physics grad students who take the DOD fellowship and never build even one bomb..! ;->
-M
November 10th, 2008 at 7:15 pm
I had just discovered your (old) blog and am wondering about this move. I can’t help but think that some discussions won’t be allowed and certainly nothing that might alarm your host, or your host’s advertisers.
Plus that nice purpley glow is gone…
November 10th, 2008 at 7:34 pm
Most of the editorial staff at Discover are Republicans and/or Satan worshipers. And all of the companies that buy advertising on this site are fronts for child-prostitution rings.
Feel better?
November 10th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
Congratulations on your move. I think all the paranoiacs (which might, or most likely wouldn’t, include me) might feel better if you would post exactly what the terms of the agreement are. Discover would have no objection to your posting a photocopy of the agreement, would they?
November 10th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
I guess this is just part of the “change” that is in the air.
Best of luck in your new cyberhome.
e.
November 10th, 2008 at 8:26 pm
I really miss the old color scheme! Sorry. I just had to say it.
November 10th, 2008 at 9:15 pm
Hey. I’m the Web editor at Discover (known by Phil as “The Hive Overmind” and by our logo as “DISCOVER”). We’re not going to limit what happens CV, and the bloggers are welcome to comment on just about anything, as long as it’s not reeally offensive. Of course you can always cook up some hypothetical debate about what that really means, but suffice it to say we’ve never censored any blog content so far, and we stand behind everything on CV now. We dig the blog the way it is, and want it to keep it going.
For the record, our editorial staff is run by Satan himself, and our servers are powered by burning sacrificial animals. But the animals are raised, transported, and even slaughtered in a very resource-intensive manner, so the process is nowhere close to carbon-neutral.
November 10th, 2008 at 9:30 pm
My eyes! The white! It hurts us!
November 10th, 2008 at 9:51 pm
Yes, the white background is not consistent with the “Cosmic Variance”, it is too uniform!
November 10th, 2008 at 10:05 pm
Congratulations to CV and to Mr. Guccione the Junior. Now can we dim the lights, light up a little “medicinal” and relax to a fly 80′s beat ? What’s with the bright white ?
November 10th, 2008 at 11:31 pm
The whole thing about affiliating with Discover Magazine makes no difference to me, but can you please do something about the color scheme? The old blog was a lot more aesthetically pleasing.
November 10th, 2008 at 11:37 pm
Ack, the ads! It burns, it burns! Ze goggles, zey do nothing!
November 10th, 2008 at 11:50 pm
[tex]D=N(e^{\lambda t}-1)[/tex]
November 10th, 2008 at 11:50 pm
Since I am agnostic to your choice to move to the Discover site, I will hone in on a practical request: Could you put the “November 10th, 2008 by Sean in Cosmic Variance ” text at the beginning of the post right after the title? Or at least the “by Sean” part? I enjoy knowing who authored the post as I read. I know I can always scroll down first, but that’s not very user friendly, plus I don’t want to accidentally read any spoilers.
I look forward to more great work by the Cosmic Variance crew.
November 10th, 2008 at 11:53 pm
Was that me or the new host that failed in the comment above?
November 11th, 2008 at 12:22 am
Did no-one else install adblock plus on their firefox? It’s wonderful, it really is.
I don’t think there’s a plugin to customize blog colourschemes, but I’m sure its on its way.
November 11th, 2008 at 12:26 am
Advertisements. :-/
November 11th, 2008 at 12:44 am
Earthlings,
Suddenly I am transported (and not by teleporation. Yet) via the interwebs to ‘scover mag! ! !
Having resided at CV for quite a few months, and having sent the odd comment here and there, I am suddenly (and with not realising, cos that’s what happens sometimes) faced with a white screen, and other stuff hanging around it, like, which is ace and totally kewl.
Good idea hitchin with, ‘scover folks, ok, just that, the white screen is hard to read.
Just nipping out to get my dark glasses…
Claire
November 11th, 2008 at 1:40 am
Love CV. Not leaving CV. Have no problem with CV’s affiliation with Discover – it might even be a good thing (thanks to ad-prevention on Firefox, because those really are rather large).
But,
as my betters have said before me,
guys: white?
Ack!
(Also, I agree that I’d really appreciate the author taglines at the top of the posts, if such things are at all possible.)
November 11th, 2008 at 5:26 am
Hi Sean and all
Congratulations! Definitely, correct decision in the long run. Blog portals have so much more page impressions than stand alone blogs, the price to pay is however that blog portal readers tend to be not so interactive as readers of a stand along blog. I wonder how much amount of comments/post will be affected by the move. I bet you will see a decrease. Hope I am wrong.
Probably, the important part of the deal is that you are no longer in control over ads appearing on your pages, but CV did not have much ads anyway, so it looks like you did not loose anything here.
Cheers
November 11th, 2008 at 7:41 am
Well, I’ve clicked on ad for Nova. My first clicked web ad ever.
November 11th, 2008 at 8:14 am
I’ve resigned to the fact that it has happened, and I know from Bad Astronomy that the original design is gone, never to return…
Having said that, I hope you can still have the author of the blog displayed near the title. Not that I skip contributions by certain individuals, I just like to know whose post I am reading. Another feature I would like to see is a search facility within this blog. Bad Astronomy has it, so it is possible (and probably already on your to-do list).
November 11th, 2008 at 8:28 am
Sean and Amos,
Your comments regarding (non) censorship are hilarious, greatly appreciated and reassuring.
Since I’m not a scientist, so my “contributions” are few and probably superfluous. Nonetheless, I enjoy CV quite a lot.
Amos, c’mon … let CV have a css file that changes the look a little … you know you can. It’s the WHITE! In spite of my name … it’s the WHITE!
November 11th, 2008 at 9:59 am
Nice! One of my favorite blogs, now under the umbrella of one of my favorite magazines! Congrats guys.
November 11th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
I’d like to second the complaints that the author is not listed at the top of posts.
November 11th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
Cosmic Variance is dead! Long live Cosmic Variance!
(The Cosmos hath given, the Cosmos hath taken away. Blessed be the variance of the Cosmos.)
November 11th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
Congratulations! I hope this move marks the beginning of a public revival of interest in science and technology.
Discover editorial staff:
For the record, our editorial staff is run by Satan himself, and our servers are powered by burning sacrificial animals.
You really, really need a technology upgrade and a new boss.
November 11th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
Can you get your new Discover overlords to add a “Posted by: ” line at the top of the post, so we don’t have to look at the end to know who we’re reading?
November 11th, 2008 at 4:41 pm
Also: in Firefox on Mac OS X, if I don’t have my browser window sized to fill almost the whole screen (1024×768), the text is being displayed right up against the left edge of the browser window. A few spare pixels there would be nice. (This could be a browser rendering issue, but I suspect it’s something poorly designed about the page.)
November 11th, 2008 at 4:44 pm
I’ll pile on with the others and request that the post author’s name goes at the top with the title. Otherwise, I wish you all happiness in your diggs.
November 11th, 2008 at 6:25 pm
I can only agree with previous commenters with regards to the color scheme and post author’s name, although i’m sure we’ll all get used to it regardless…
Also thanks for the tip boreds – adblock plus works like a charm.
November 11th, 2008 at 8:05 pm
Miss the CMB but its not the end of the Universe. Oh it has advertisements, I never noticed, I thought everyone used Adblock.
Well as long as the RSS feed keeps working I’m happy.
November 12th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
Discovery: fine (I, for one, welcome our new corporate overlords)
ads: fine (its how things work now)
new design: unspeakably bad
For shame on that last part. Seriously; the old CV was distinctive. This look, to put it in plain internet speak, sucks.
A lot.
You should change it.
November 12th, 2008 at 3:26 pm
oh, I can’t use adblock, I work in a highly technical web development environment and Adblock borks some things in strange ways. But, I don’t care.
November 12th, 2008 at 5:34 pm
Lab Lemming, we’ve uncovered the problem with LaTeX. The procedure is no longer to begin with [tex] and end with [/tex]; it’s to begin with $latex and end with $.
So $latex y = e^x $ becomes
$latex y = e^x $.
November 12th, 2008 at 7:33 pm
$latex D=N(e^{\lambda t}-1)$
November 12th, 2008 at 7:34 pm
Woo-hoo!
November 13th, 2008 at 7:10 am
Aesthetics matter.
November 13th, 2008 at 7:56 am
A third for getting the author’s name at the top of the post.
November 13th, 2008 at 6:00 pm
[...] καλύτερα πολυμετοχικά μπλογκς στο χώρο της φυσικής, το Cosmic Variance, γλίστρησε εν μία νυκτί στην μοχθηρή άβυσσο της [...]