Some of the most interesting science thoughts and links from around the web:
Public Attitudes to Science workshop — Scicommbobulate
“The workshop was organised by the market research company Ipsos MORI, who on this occasion has been commissioned by the Department of Business Innovation and Skills to try to establish what members of the general public think about science, scientists, and science policy in the UK. According to the information pack I was given “These studies are the Government’s primary mechanism for assessing progress in reaching its objectives for public confidence in the sciences, public attitudes towards media coverage of the sciences and perceived responsiveness to public concerns”.”
Kill the post-embargo publication window — Not Exactly Rocket Science
“A lot of the stories I write are embargoed […]. However, even after the embargo lifts, there is often a time gap before the journal in question actually publishes the paper and before the DOI listing works. For some journals, this time is negligible – Nature and Science, for example, reliably have their papers up within minutes or hours of the embargo lift. For others, it can be much longer. PNAS is the most obvious example – I’ve waited for up to two weeks before the paper actually went online after it made the news. The record so far is several months for a Journal of Zoology paper.
It’s very important to realise this because at the point when most journalists write their pieces, there is no paper to link to.”