Who We (And Now You, If You Signed Up) Are
1. Why do we exist? - In reading science on the Internet over the last few years, we discovered that many sites that featured scientists writing to the public weren't just interested in science; some sites claiming to be about science have political agendas while others only publish articles and findings that present one side of complex issues. So we set out to accomplish the following:
- We created a site where world-class scientists write articles and discuss issues without being filtered by size or editorial limitations, where there is no political litmus test and we can read great science directly from the source and maybe learn some new things.
- We created a site where everyone who wants to write about science can also do it, regardless of popularity or ideology. There are other places where scientists can write but writers are lost in a sea of 70 million random blogs. Everyone is here to read about science and we have 1,800,000 articles read per month so your audience is already built in. You can just write good articles and have fun.
- We created a site where you get paid to write science. We stay as financially transparent as possible by paying the bulk of the revenue generated by writers to the writers. The more you write, the larger your audience and the more you make. You can also donate it to charity. We keep a little bit to pay for the servers.
We simply could not find a science site that had everything we wanted so we decided to create it. Since this is a community, you help shape the culture also. As a part of the community, you can blog and eventually write feature articles syndicated worldwide, chat with friends and much more. We have incorporated virtually everything in social media we could find.
2. Who can write here? - Most of our writers are prominent book authors, research professors and post-docs but anyone can write here. The only restrictions are you have to write about science and you can't write blogs that are just self-promotion, advertising or links to your personal site - they'll be removed and your account deleted. We don't get into defining what is science and what isn't science, it's self-evident in most cases. Poems about your cat, for example, are not science but an article on information theory using your cats could be.
3. Since a lot of the writers are well-known book authors, they will already have an audience. How do I get one? - Each new blog that is published will appear on the front page for a short while. It will also appear on the Science Category pages. Well-written pieces become popular and they will remain in the front of the main page or category pages. Just write good content and people will start reading you. Like anything else, it requires patience and persistence. The easiest way to get discovered is to join disussions on other articles here or in other places because that leave a URL link to your column. We also have links to all the other social media sites on each published piece so readers can spread the word for you.
4. Do you censor any content? - No, though content moderation can occur, like if someone violates the Terms of Use. We're not interested in conspiracy tales or if you think the word 'theory' means something you just made up. We don't allow advertising, including other sites you write on, in the articles, or teasers that are just links to other websites in the articles. You can link to other sites or to books you have written in your bio section and your bio appears on everything you write. Articles will also be unpublished if they have spelling errors or are just jumbled thoughts and make everyone else here look bad. Being an open community does not mean it's open season for kooks. If you can't be bothered to spell check, it's unlikely to be important enough for a million people to read.
Obviously you can link to articles provided you obey copyright restrictions as spelled out in the Terms of Use.
Authors also have moderation ability over the comments in their columns so that might be considered censorship but we recognize that spam and trolling occur and allow authors to prevent that.
5. Do I retain my copyright? - Yes, you grant us rights regarding publication but you own your work unless through prior agreement with us.
Writing Science Blogs - The Basics
From the front page, you can navigate around and read everything you might like but if you want to jump in and start writing blogs, you need to go to your Dashboard. It's in the upper right, always there when you need it but otherwise not getting in the way.
The two graphics below show the layout of the front page and header and also the footer.
The toolbar is what you expect in any modern word processor. If you prefer to do your own HTML by hand, click "SWITCH TO PLAIN EDITOR" below the text entry box.
If you do a bunch of fancy stuff in a proprietary editor like Word, it will not go directly into our editor and you have to click SWITCH TO PLAIN EDITOR first. Microsoft does not play nicely with anyone else's tools so if you just copy and paste Word HTML into our editor it will look terrible.
If you want to add images or do LaTeX maths or video or MP3s, that is all on the editor toolbar:
The text editor screens above are for things you write that you want the public to see. Sometimes you want to write things only your friends can see...
For that, we have a Corkboard feature. If you've ever seen Facebook or Twitter, they do the same thing. A 'cork' is a short blurb or a link to something you want to share, but only your mutual friends can see it (so someone can add you to their friend list to know when you write new stuff but they can't see your corkboard unless you add them) - this is for things you want to share and talk about, but not with the entire world. Corks do not show up in google or your newsfeed but you will get email notification (if you have it enabled in Preferences) when someone writes on your Corkboard and they will show in your comment tracker in the upper right.
Because we're not just a site that talks at people and maybe lets them comment. We all interact too. Science 2.0 is about taking the Web back from people who want to lecture at others (or just sell dog food).
The Social Aspect Of Science 2.0
We're not just a magazine or a blogging site, we're also a community. If you came here from outside you saw some articles and comments and not much else. Under the hood it's a lot more fun.
Customize your profile
It's a lot more fun writing if people know who you are. Sure, you can throw an article up there and assume it will take off but you could be on Wordpress if that's your thing. If you're interested in science outreach, people have to know you are here.
The easiest way to look like a real person is to create a profile that's worth reading. The profile is what people will see when they click your avatar.
Farther down the page you will also see a Blogroll, Recommended Books, and Affiliations. Those work the same way; click Edit, add what you want, and you are done.
That covers how people will find you. You find them by either reading the front page or reading the comments, clicking on their profile and then adding them to your friend list.
You can also email them through the site. Note; non-members can email you through the site as well. If you do not want to get emails from anyone, disable it in your Dashboard Preferences.
You can also find new friends (and see who else is online at the moment) by looking at the avatars in the footer.
You can use the little arrow on the side to scroll over to the next page of avatars.
You see some of the avatars are highlighted in green. That means they are on my friend list. Your friends will also show up first on the left and then everyone else. If I am also on their friend list, it means we can also chat and you will see a 'MESSAGE' button appear if you highlight their avatar. See what I mean about hidden features? We're one big Science 2.0 onion of delightful complexity.
"Scientific Blogging"®, "Science 2.0"® and "The world's best scientists, the Internet's smartest readers"® are registered trademarks of ION Publications LLC.
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