Monday 25 April 2016

Algorithmic accountability in scholarship: what we can learn from #DeleteAcademiaEdu

Algorithmic accountability in scholarship: what we can learn from #DeleteAcademiaEdu The controversy surrounding Academia.edu highlights the flaws and limitations of existing scholarly infrastructures. Jean-Christophe Plantin explores the intersection of algorithms, academic research and platforms for scholarly publications. He argues that there is a need to develop a values-centred approach in the development of article-sharing platforms, with suitably designed algorithms.

Monday 4 April 2016

Research gets increasingly international Big US report documents increases in international collaboration and Chinese science output.

China’s share of global science and engineering publications has pulled within a percentage point of those from the United States, according to the latest research statistics published by the US National Science Foundation (NSF). The agency's report, released on 19 January, also underscores the rising importance of international scientific collaboration. Between 2000 and 2013, the percentage of publications with authors from multiple countries rose from 13.2% to 19.2%. Interestingly "The 2016 Indicators report changed the metrics by which it measures publications. Instead of using the Thomson Reuters Science Citation Index and the Social Science Citation Index, the NSF went with Elsevier’s Scopus database. The change was made to try to get a more accurate view of global trends, says Carol Robbins, the NSF senior analyst who oversaw the bibliometrics portion of the report. By using Scopus, the 2016 analysis was able to look at roughly 17,000 journals, compared to the 5,087 included in the previous report two years ago."

Research evaluation should be pragmatic, not a choice between peer review and metrics

Responding to the growing momentum of movements, such as DORA and CoARA, Giovanni Abramo argues for a more nuanced balance between the use o...