This article was inspired by Hontas Farmer's recent article and the subsequent comments: Science 2.0 - Darwinian Selection Of The Best Paper.
I call Poe because Wikipedia's article on Science 2.0 is so far removed from reality that I think it was intended for Uncyclopedia and somehow got mis-filed.
 | The neutrality of this article is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved. (April 2010) |
Science 2.0 or research 2.0 takes its cue from the technologies of web 2.0.
Research 2.0 is a term coined in 2006 by Ray Poynter to signify market research. Science 2.0 and research 2.0 do not belong on the same page in the same Wikipedia article. Chalk and cheese!
... sharing is at the heart of Science 2.0.
- data: For instance, we can share experimental data, so that colleagues can verify our analysis or add their own. Or we can share attention metadata for recommendation algorithms: when we develop new such algorithms, we can compare them more easily if we have a reference set of observations – much like the Netflix challenge.
- services: In an open research infrastructure, we can mash up common
services for a specific purpose. We can configure feeds to remain informed of new publications or events that are relevant to us. Or professionals and amateurs alike can take pictures of the sky remotely through services for remote telescope operations.
What's with the 'we' crap? Does it imply 'we scientists' as opposed to 'you laypeople'? That's not science 2.0, it's elitism 1.0 ! And elitism 2.0 !
I don't see Wikepedia articles on geomorphology which include phrases such as 'we geologists', so why allow it within the science 2.0 topic? The more so since Wickedpedia won't allow Hank Campbell to say something like: "I invented science 2.0 and own the legal rights."
I wonder what would happen if Wikipedia wrote that "Coca-Cola, or lemonade, is a drink made of ingredients which vary according to where you buy it." The law on legitimate satire doesn't apply to a site like Wikipedia which has a publicly stated policy about accuracy of content.
Michael Nielsen emphasizes that that (sic) researchers constantly run into new subproblems. Researchers often have a small group of trusted collaborators with whom they exchange questions and ideas when they are stuck. Unfortunately, most of the time even collaborators aren’t that much help. They may point the researcher in the right direction, but rarely do they have exactly the needed expertise. One of the goals of Science 2.0 is to scale up this conversational model, and build an online collaboration market to exchange questions and ideas, a sort of collective working memory for the scientific community.Nearly, but not quite right. The implicature is writ large in this paragraph: there is a 'scientific community' and then there is everyone else.
I don't want to bore my readers to death with this, so I'll cut to the chase.
You, my reader, whatever your formal qualifications or lack thereof, are a part of the science 2.0 global community of citizen scientists.
You don't have to pay to read my
If I write a piece of unmitigated BS on any scientific topic then I am sure that you, dear reader, will be the first to jump on me from a great height. Others will join you, not because of your reputation or credentials but from the joy of peer review - science 2.0 style.
Oh yes! Science can be fun!
There is a major difference between Wikipedia and scientificblogging.com - here, we don't hide controversies. Even if I don't like a specific rational comment because I don't agree with it, or because it is rude - it stays. If I kept only comments that agreed with me and deleted the rest, that would be intellectually dishonest - and I would almost certainly be banned from the site.
Wackypedia, by refusing to accept error corrections 'from the horse's mouth', is in danger of gaining a reputation for intellectual dishonesty.
I leave you with this not entirely unrelated thought:
“The object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid.”
G.K. Chesterton
Oddly,
is presumably the one who asked me to re-document all the work I had to do with the USPTO to show it was my trademark. Oddly, Science 2.0 was easier to register than Scientific Blogging, even though it is the name of the site, because Scientific Blogging had only existed for under 3 years at that time whereas Science 2.0 I had used a lot longer.
I just felt it strange that someone on Wikipedia wanted me to show documentation to prove I should have input on Science 2.0 (and you read my comment there - it was pretty laid back) ...
... when it took no credentials at all to create the original article.
The first decade of the new millenium has generated a terrific sense of entitlement among younger people - there have been two conferences that have tried to charge a fee using Science 2.0 in their titles this year and in both cases I have asked them, since they are charging (people doing things for free I don't care about) a fee, to show they have licensed it by putting a link to this site. And in both cases they opted to remove it - it seems they only want to use things they can get 'for free' to make money for themselves.
Even Wikipedia is likely controlled by marketing people for other companies - the editor before (perhaps the banned one?) had placed us first under EXAMPLES after my comment on the discussion page and someone since moved us down to 16th, meaning we get virtually no value out of being on the Wikipedia page at all.
And nothing I have ever written on Science 2.0 is under the REFERENCES. But Scientific American, Science and Wired are somehow all in the top 5 'references' on the topic, despite doing no Science 2.0 ever, that I am aware of.
edit: as a curiosity I wondered what they wrote about Web 2.0 and, to highlight how prevailing usage can pollute fact, I confess I thought Tim O'Reilly invented the word (though I knew CMP Media had the trademark) but it turns out Wikipedia says it was someone named Darcy DiNucci in 1999. So accuracy or not, I may be a huge trivia footnote if a big media company puts on a Science 2.0 conference and drags out a court case while they get rich. I assume DiNucci has not made a penny at it while I know O'Reilly has done well.