Comments on: Reflections from ScienceOnline 2010

By: Tamara Krinsky

Tamara Krinsky — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 08:10:10 +0000

Marion – Can you send me the transcript as well? Would love to see what you’re talking about. Find me at ScienceLush.com. Thx.

By: Marion Delgado

Marion Delgado — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 05:03:48 +0000

re sci and entertainment. The thing alan alda is doing and talking about sounds more promising than most of what they’re talking about. I sent Sheril a transcript.

By: Kevin Z

Kevin Z — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 03:04:47 +0000

It was nice to see you in the audience Chris. What I think was one the most important point of the Broader Impacts session was the need for a multilayered approach to outreach. we can’t apply a one size fits all approach. I think that is why Karen and I’s approach to Darwin and the Adventure was very successful in South America. We had print media interviews in Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina and Chile. Made the evening news in one station and an entire half hour news special at another station in brazil. Plus blogging and tweeting. There will also be more scientific reports/papers coming out of it to reach that crowd. There is always more we could have done or tried to do. But that was the intent of the session, to get a brainstorm of what needs to be done. But we clearly need some metrics to measure the effectiveness of different strategies. This will require much sleuthing in other areas of the scienceverse. Cheers!

By: Tom Levenson

Tom Levenson — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 22:55:50 +0000

It was a good meeting and a great pleasure to reconnect with you, Chris (odd, given our offices for the year are maybe three hundred yards apart, but there it is.

Conversations to be continued in 02139, but for now, I agree w. all of your observations. More generally the “educate” the public model in frequent but not universal play at the conference makes some assumptions not in evidence, IMHO.

As noted, further exchange needed, eh?

By: Miriam

Miriam — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 21:49:26 +0000

Lovely to see you again, Chris, and to finally meet Sheril! And interesting points re: Broader Impacts. We entirely agree (and I’m pretty sure we said this in the session) that just throwing up a website is an ineffective way of publicizing research. I love the idea of some kind of centralized Broader Impacts clearinghouse – but who will decide what gets highlighted, and who will do all the work of putting it together? A governmental agency like the NSF? Some kind of academic center?

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 21:23:35 +0000

Good to see you at the conference.

I have very mixed feelings about the idea of “certifying” blogs. However, there are two reasons to do so: 1) it will help in our efforts to develop the right message and to control the results of people’s internet “reserch” and 2) it is a form of self-policing that one could argue we are not doing enough of.

This does not obviate the potential problems it creates, and it may well be that those problems outweigh the benefits. I simply don’t know much.

While I agree that bloggers should be promoting the excellent institutional structures you mention, it simply is true that a certain number, and it is a growing number, of people do pay attention to blogs. Some of this number may be people who are somewhat distrustful of the mainstream institutions.

By: Scicurious

Scicurious — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 19:52:50 +0000

Good to see you, Chris! We’ll hang out more next time. Excellent point on #2, even if you have experts deem some blogs good or bad, others are going to call those experts into question (for better or worse). But is there a way to prove credibility on the internet other than just taking a long time to build up a reliable brand?

By: Paul Shin

Paul Shin — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 17:02:09 +0000

Excellent points Chris!

I for one am glad to help with point #2- as Chair of my (local) Southern California American Chemical Society (SoCal ACS or SCALACS) section- the ACS being the world’s largest scientific organization- my main goal is to promote scientific literacy at all levels. I am so impressed that it is not actually scientists who are leading the charge in scientific literacy! We scientists need to step up and and partner with those who recognize what’s good and right with science. Unfortunately, some socially important science has been highjacked by unethical people. I pledge to do my best to bring to light this problem to my fellow chemists and as many other scientist colleagues as possible. Thank you for leading the way in this imperatively important issue!