Group items tagged

"Self-publishing is at a stage analogous to the early days of Wikipedia, when users were reluctant to trust information contained in a communally written encyclopedia. It turns out that online democracy performs quite an effective self-regulating function. "

Good points in the article: There are several good reasons a novelist chooses to self-publish: 1. Because of repeated rejection. 2. To get the book to market more quickly. 3. To have more control over the process. 4. To receive a larger share of the book's earnings. 5. To attract the attention of a major publisher.

With digitization of publishing its now an option to self publicize especially for new writers who thing their work will never be acknowledged. But musicians are also using the self publicizing/promotion and later one it does pays on. I heard of Justin Bieber story of when the mother was busy posting you-tube videos.So its possible to go a "freenuim" way and start with e.g blogging and eventually build a fan/interest base

New startup that grew out of discussions among the IndieWebCamp folks. Provides a Tumblr-like open source tool (and hosted version) to publish content, then syndicate to other networks.

Gracias por compartir -- Thanks for sharing

Seen on Open Knowledge Foundation "Recently Brazilian government released the Kit de Dados Abertos (open data toolkit): The toolkit is made up of documents describing the process, methods and techniques for implementing an open data policy within an institution. Its goal is to both demystify the logic of opening up data and to share with public employees observed best practices that have emerged from a number of Brazilian government initiatives. The toolkit focuses on the Plano de Dados Abertos - PDA (Open Data Plan) as the guiding instrument where commitments, agenda and policy implementation cycles in the institution are registered. making it a state policy and not just a transitory governmental action. It is organizsd to facilitate the implementation of the main activities cycles that must be observed in an institution and provides links and manuals to assist in these activities. Emphasis is given to the actors/roles involved in each step and their responsibilities. Is also helps to define a central person to monitor and maintain the PDA. The following diagram summarises the macro steps of implementing an open data policy in an institution - See more at: http://blog.okfn.org/2014/10/07/branzilian-government-develops-toolkit-to-guide-institutions-in-both-planning-and-carrying-out-open-data-initatives/#sthash.kNvTB6nC.dpuf and http://kit.dados.gov.br/

"Part of the trending 'DIY Culture', the 'Maker' subculture refers to the ideology of cutting out the middleman and creating your own product or idea which can then be shared or improved upon. "

Canada's new anti-spam legislation (CASL) helps protect Canadians while ensuring that businesses can continue to compete in the global marketplace. On July 1, 2014 Canada's anti-spam law came into effect. I believe it's the strictest in the world. If you email anyone in Canada you need to make sure you comply with this new law. We had to take a number of measures at my company including ceasing all bulk emails until we get our new opt-in database populates; including a footer in all our emails that allows recipients to opt out of receiving emails from us, and company-wide training on CASL and what we need to do to comply. People can be personally liable for violating this law. I'm not sure if the government has any manpower to actually monitor and prosecute any violators but we will see. As a Canadian, I don't think my SPAM had decreased - I actually received more emails to 'opt in' to mailing lists. I have also noticed that almost every message I receive has an unsubscribe option at the bottom, something I've been taking advantage of. I am not sure how this will ultimately affect open knowledge or if it will but it has made me think twice about reaching out to people I don't know over email.

This is a project is a production that has come out of a graduate course at the iSchool at the University of Toronto that touches on information overload, literacy and their definition of "post literacy". It is touches on thee multiliteracy that was mentioned in the reading by Kapitzke, and goes beyond into headier stuff. Check out their Pinterest bibliography, and their new recent endeavor with a Beyond Literacy podcast.

Online discussions and post-publication analyses are catching mistakes that sneak past editorial review. This article describes the pitfalls with editorial review and pre-publication peer review, and advocates for post-publication crowd-sourced reviewing through social media platforms.

I think having a comments section is a great way to provide feedback on the information provided. Often when I read articles the comments section allows me to understand different perspectives and interpretations of the information.

This article, while not necessarily explicitly, managed to hint at what I find to be a source of problematic practices/outcomes in the academy, publishing, etc. That is, it is not necessarily that traditional peer review processes are ineffective at finding errors or misconduct, but rather it is when our processes and practices become so systematized that we can mindlessly or effortlessly engage in and reproduce them without our full, critical attention that they can produce problems. While I think there are good reasons to critique the notion of peer and "expert" culture within traditional peer review processes, an additional and separate critique is the problems that arise with systematization. The article implicitly addressed this when the author commented that current post-publication environments "provide a public space that is not under the control of journal editors and conference organizers." Yet, as White indicates, there exists skepticism of the value of post-publication reviews along with a simultaneous effort to build post-publication systems that have standards that put those questioning it at ease. The National Institutes of Health establishing requirements that potential post-publication reviewers must meet demonstrated this. That is, they are trying to figure out how to systematize post-publication. For me, what this article indicates is that we ought to figure out how to keep our academic and publishing processes "fresh," so to speak. This way we don't become so comfortable with our methods and practices that they allow us to simply go through the motions without fostering innovative and critical inquiry.

An alternative perspective on "openness".

The argument will be with us for a very long time. I think this is based on the side of the fence that one is sitting on. It is just like a case of what came first a chicken or an egg. The fact is Open has place to occupy in our learning space. The jury is still out there.

Thanks for sharing this well presented write up. Big question put forth is are we really getting the outcomes expected from the open society. Open vs. quality is a big issue. At times restricting access helps a great deal.

"So why do we have an emerging digital divide in society where one group has easy and instant access to new research often funded out of the public purse yet others face significant costs, delays or barriers to accessing knowledge?" "In the past, one might have expected society's 'critics and consciences' to be located in universities. Now many of these voices, including some who have retired, are outside these institutions."

"Research papers aren't always the easiest pieces of literature to read. Expecting Joe Public to understand all of these articles is simply unrealistic. Whilst they have access to the papers when they're open access, that doesn't mean they're always going to be able make good use of them. That's where social media has its time to shine. More and more scientists are moving to social media in order to promote their research and engage the public, as well as each other. Social media in itself offers the chance to reach out and make science exciting."

"Taylor & Francis carried out a worldwide survey, with the aim of exploring journal authors' views on open access. Having previously conducted a survey on open access in 2013, we have been able to see how authors' opinions have developed, and whether the discussion and debate on open access has helped to inform and shape views. With responses to both the 2013 and 2014 survey given side-by-side, you can easily see how attitudes have changed. Alongside this, the 2014 survey explores many new areas and gives a fascinating insight into authors' current perceptions of open access."

"Now, following criticism of its quality-control checks, the website is asking all of the journals in its directory to reapply on the basis of stricter criteria. It hopes the move will weed out 'predatory journals': those that profess to publish research openly, often charging fees, but that are either outright scams or do not provide the services a scientist would expect, such as a minimal standard of peer review or permanent archiving. "

Soon your face could be your calling card. An upcoming app for Android, iOS, and Google Glass called NameTag will allow you to photograph strangers and find out who they are -- complete with social networking and online dating profiles. Spot someone out and about that you want to identify, and you can capture their face using your device's camera.

Real Classes From Science to Art to Technology, edX offers simply the best classes from the best professors and universities. Check out the new edX Demo course. An Amazing Experience From our think tank to your screen- we help you learn through cool tools, videos and game-like labs, like our 3D virtual molecule builder.

Real Classes From Science to Art to Technology, edX offers simply the best classes from the best professors and universities. Check out the new edX Demo course. An Amazing Experience From our think tank to your screen- we help you learn through cool tools, videos and game-like labs, like our 3D virtual molecule builder.

BC Open Textbooks is an initiative started by the province of British Columbia in Canada. It is open textbooks adapted and created by BC faculty. It's difficult to tell which texts are complete and ready for use as Tony Bates incomplete text that I created another post about appears on the same page with complete texts (eg Chemistry, Biology Geography.) All the texts can be modified through Creative Commons licensing. This project has been creating concern for publishers who stand to loose business in BC and other provinces if the texts get adopted outside of BC. Initially, the project was focused on creating "a collection of open textbooks aligned with the top 40 highest-enrolled subject areas in the province. A second phase was announced in the spring of 2014 to add 20 textbooks targeting trades and skills training." Initially they looked for existing Creative Commons books they could adapt and they adapted 8 textbooks. From inception to fall 2014, 2244 students have used their open texts for a savings of $353,000 or $157 per student. The aim is to reach 200,000 students annually so they are at .6% and save each $900-$1500/year, still quite a way to go. Wondering how much this project is costing taxpayers, I googled and found this article http://www.ousa.ca/2013/04/24/textbooks/ which claims $600k-$1m/year. So the government has spent $1.2 - $2 million to save students $350k over the past two years. Still a long way to go to break even. In summary, 65 texts published, 45 adoptions, 2244 student users, for a savings of $353k to date. If this was a traditional textbook publishing company, they'd soon be out of business if they weren't already.

Thank for sharing, I believe that the conclusions that this article leaves us are not surprising, although yes very interesting. "Recently, the Babson Survey Research Group and Pearson conducted a survey of nearly 8,000 faculty members in higher education to find out more about how faculty are using social media. While we often post infographics showing trends or results from specific studies here at Edudemic, I found the results of this survey particularly interesting - perhaps because they were so different from what I expected." Julia Echeverria

You are so, so lucky. Here in South Africa, we are regressing, not even looking at online textbooks, but trying to reduce textbooks to only one per subject. The textbook crisis: http://mg.co.za/article/2013-08-23-00-south-africas-hidden-textbook-crisis and the regressive "solution" http://mg.co.za/article/2014-10-10-single-textbook-option-slammed. It is very frustrating for me, knowing all the possibilities, but not having any agency to get through to the authorities here.Llibraries are also failing horribly in advocating for the solutions that ARE available.

Good article on how to look for the best information the internet has to offer and be a discerning consumer. Also good for availability of academic publishing as an important public good.

It's a good reminder to all of us to pay close attention to where we are getting our information. The main points are take advantage of academic publishing via Google Scholar, get 2nd opinions, check multiple sources, be aware of the potential motives of the writer and their affiliated organization, and follow links/sources and fact check. Additional suggestions that I would add to the author's blog post include taking a close look at the writer's credentials, asking yourself who the intended audience might be, looking out for emotion-rousing words, and doing a link search to find out if other people have sited the article. It's also good to ask whether the web is the best place to look for that particular type of information in the first place.

"In a nutshell, Knowledge Unlatched would act as an intermediary between a global library consortium and individual academic publishers. The latter would approach Knowledge Unlatched with titles they would like to see published in Open Access. Knowledge Unlatched would then regularly send out a list of titles to libraries which would opt in to fund the unlatching, that is, the publication in Open Access, of certain titles. The titles so funded would be released with a Creative Commons licence by the publishers which retain the right to sell special editions and extra services around the titles. "