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Porn Destroys the Moral Fabric of America. Or not.

Great research from the indispensible Radley Balko about the alleged link between pornography and rape, teen pregnancy and other bad things. With the attorney general cranking up the porn prosecutions and the religious right foaming at the mouth about the easy availability of porn on the internet (I happen to agree that porn is too accessible online, but not with their solutions) causing every imaginable evil, one would think that the last decade, with the internet becoming ubuiquitous, we'd see increasing rates of such things. In fact, the opposite is true. As Balko points out, sex crimes…

Sugata Mitra: Can kids teach themselves?

Speaking at LIFT 2007, Sugata Mitra talks about his Hole in the Wall project. Young kids in this project figured out how to use a PC on their own -- and then taught other kids. He asks, what else can children teach themselves? In 1999, Sugata Mitra and his colleagues dug a hole in a wall bordering an urban slum in New Delhi, installed an Internet-connected PC, and left it there (with a hidden camera filming the area). What they saw was kids from the slum playing around with the computer and in the process learning how to use it and how to go online, and then teaching each other. In the…

An evening of old fashioned rural American entertainment

Oh, dear…today is the day the clown from Answers in Genesis is speaking at the elementary school in Morris. I guess I'll be going, even though Terry Mortenson is a goats-on-fire flaming moron. Here he is in all of his pursed-lipped pretentious glory. Anyway, I'll be attending his 6:00 lecture — "Dinosaurs: Have You Been Brainwashed?" — and the 7:30 exercise in idiocy — "Noah`s Flood: Washing Away Millions of Years". The schedule is online; I may get more than my fill today, so I don't know that I'll go to any of the Monday events. It's a disgrace that such a fool was invited here. I will…

Tidbits, 29 July 2009

All of today's tidbits are from one blog! Well, all but one. David Rosenthal on digital preservation. I had this bookmarked to blog about, but… Chris Rusbridge beat me to it, saying everything I would have. Yes, online-versus-offline. Yes, research data in uncommon, niche, and/or proprietary formats. Yes, metadata! And yes, thinking for ourselves. Semantic Web of Linked Data for Research? In all honesty, my reaction to "Linked Data" can be summed up in Chris's question mark. I am not a fan of RDF, I remain to be convinced that even small, constrained Semantic Webs are feasible given how…

Cornell Provost's Series Lecture Now Online

My Cornell University Provost's series lecture given on September 20 was quite a memorable one. I was only waiting for video to go online to provide more information about the event, and now it has. So: Follow the link to view my talk (30 minutes plus) and then the responses from expert panelists--Kurt Gottfried of the Union of Concerned Scientists; Steve Hilgartner of Cornell's Science and Technology Studies Program; Ted Lowi, John L. Senior Professor of American Institutions, Government Department, Cornell; Jon Shields, University of Colorado; Ron Herring, Government Department, Cornell;…

The Multiple Languages of Science(Blogs)

Page 3.14 asks, in a poll which you should all go participate in, which language should ScienceBlogs branch into next? I voted that the next ScienceBlogs should be in Chinese, due to their up-and-coming science programs as well as the massive amounts of people who could stand to benefit from educational blogs in Mandarin. However, you have the inevitable down-side of censorship in China itself. My parents (who live in Suzhou) cannot read my blog, or any ScienceBlog here, due to censorship. Why? I have no idea. The other angle is that China is seperated by many spoken language barriers, but…

Mediterranean jellies.

In browsing through my photo library, I stumbled on pictures from my last trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium of a jellyfish I haven't blogged yet, the Mediterranean jelly (Cotylorhiza tuberculata). I consulted the Monterey Bay Aquarium Online Field Guide and discovered that it isn't listed. That hardly seems fair! Luckily, Wikipedia comes through in the clutch. Cotylorhiza tuberculata is sometimes called the fried egg jelly, a name that didn't make a lot of sense to me. Do you eat many fried eggs with dangly purple bits? Me neither. If anything, these jellies put me in mind of…

Telegraph refuses to correct misrepresentation

The Telegraph is hanging on to its lead over the Australian. After publishing a story by Richard Alleyne that misrepresented the work of Ian Fairchild, they have not corrected the story and not published Fairchild's letter of correction. But that's not all. Ben Goldacre reports: Worse than that, Prof Fairchild has tried to post comments on the article which flatly misrepresents his own research, twice, but his comments have been rejected by the Telegraph's online comment moderators, while 23 other comments have appeared. It's quite hard to understand both the intellectual and moral reasoning…

Redoubt Hut webcam back online - and a new ash column spotted!

The Hut webcam at Redoubt that has a great view of the hydrothermal vents near the 1989-90 domes - and the area where the current eruption is likely to be sourced - is back online. So far, we can see what looks like lahar deposits on the lower left-hand flanks of the volcano in the stream channels (likely formed by the melting of the Drift Glacier) and ash deposits all over the snow. Also, depending on the light and clouds, you can definitely see an ash column coming from the volcano. Also, AVO is reporting that at 7:41 PM (Alaska time), a new ash column was spotted on radar reaching 60,000…

ScienceOnline2010 - interview with Ivan Oransky

Continuing with the tradition from last two years, I will occasionally post interviews with some of the participants of the ScienceOnline2010 conference that was held in the Research Triangle Park, NC back in January. See all the interviews in this series here. You can check out previous years' interviews as well: 2008 and 2009. Today, I asked Ivan Oransky from Reuters Health and Embargo Watch to answer a few questions. Welcome to A Blog Around The Clock. Would you, please, tell my readers a little bit more about yourself? Where are you coming from (both geographically and philosophically)?…

ScienceOnline2010 - interview with Fabiana Kubke

Continuing with the tradition from last two years, I will occasionally post interviews with some of the participants of the ScienceOnline2010 conference that was held in the Research Triangle Park, NC back in January. See all the interviews in this series here. You can check out previous years' interviews as well: 2008 and 2009. Today, I asked Fabiana Kubke, who came to the conference all the way from New Zealand, to answer a few questions. Fabiana writes on Building Blogs of Science which is syndicated on SciBlogs.co.nz Welcome to A Blog Around The Clock. Would you, please, tell my readers…

ScienceOnline2010 - interview with Andrew Thaler

Continuing with the tradition from last two years, I will occasionally post interviews with some of the participants of the ScienceOnline2010 conference that was held in the Research Triangle Park, NC back in January. See all the interviews in this series here. You can check out previous years' interviews as well: 2008 and 2009. Today, I asked Andrew Thaler from Southern Fried Science to answer a few questions. Welcome to A Blog Around The Clock. Would you, please, tell my readers a little bit more about yourself? Where are you coming from (both geographically and philosophically)? What is…

Just a few more days left to vote for the Kavli Video People's Choice Awards

Which is the coolest science video? You tell us! Cast your vote now for the Kavli Video Contest People's Choice Award! Just a few more days to vote! Just check out all the great science videos online, and then you rate them! And be sure to give your favorite a 5 stars rating. Voting for the People's Choice Award is fast and easy !!! First, you need to register and log into the SciVee site http://www.scivee.tv Then view all of the Kavli science videos here Click the star rating you prefer under each video that you review. A "Thank You for Voting" notice will appear and your vote will be…

The videos are in! Now it's time to vote for your favorite! The Kavli Video Contest People's Choice Awards!

Which is the coolest science video? You tell us! Cast your vote now for the Kavli Video Contest People's Choice Award! Just check out all the great science videos online, and then you rate them! And be sure to give your favorite a 5 stars rating. Voting for the People's Choice Award is fast and easy !!! First, you need to register and log into the SciVee site http://www.scivee.tv Then view all of the Kavli science videos here Click the star rating you prefer under each video that you review. A "Thank You for Voting" notice will appear and your vote will be recorded toward the total for the…

The videos are in! Now it's time to vote for your favorite! The Kavli Video Contest People's Choice Awards!

Feb/March Food Storage and Preservation Class

Are you gearing up for the new garden season and thinking ahead about what to do to make your garden work all year long for you? Concerned about the rising price of food and looking for ways to feed your family through tougher times? Want to get in on the fun and wonderful flavors of home preserved food? Concerned about how to adapt your storage or preserving to special diets? Want to make the most of your farmer's market? All of the above? I'll be teaching a six week online, asynchronous (ie, you don't have to be online at any particular time) class on food storage and preservation…

Jobs: SR. SCIENCE NEWS WRITER

The Duke Medical Center News Office is seeking a Sr. Science News Writer to be responsible for planning, developing, implementing and analyzing strategic comprehensive and diversified media relations programs and tactics. Through direct support of Duke Medicine strategic objectives and the associated strategic plan, the Sr. Science News Writer accrues value to the Duke brand through local, regional and national news exposure. The ideal candidate will have a Bachelor's degree in Journalism, English or a related discipline and at least 5 years of extensive media relations or science news…

New Media and Science Communication

The Science Communication Consortium presents: DISCUSSION ON THE ROLES OF EMERGING MEDIA OUTLETS IN COMMUNICATING SCIENCE Thursday, JAN 31st, 7-8:30pm Mount Sinai School of Medicine, East Building Seminar Room (1425 Madison Ave at 98th St, NYC) A discussion of how science is communicated effectively - and ineffectively - through emerging media outlets, such as blogging, podcasts, online multimedia, and more. Blogs, podcasts, and other new media outlets have changed the way people learn about scientific info, and shortened the shelf life of these stories. This immediacy of information…

Science Blogging Survey

There is a new online survey up, designed by some of my SciBlings, about the background and online habits of science bloggers and science blog readers (not just scienceblogs.com, but all science blogs). Please take a minute to respond: This survey attempts to access the opinions of bloggers, blog-readers, and non-blog folk in regards to the impact of blogs on the outside world. The authors of the survey are completing an academic manuscript on the impact of science blogging and this survey will provide invaluable data to answer the following questions: Who reads or writes blogs? What are the…

Two Years of Blogging

In early October two years ago, we had a party. During that evening, a journalist friend helped my wife set up a (pseudonymous, s3kr1t) blog on Blogspot which persists to this day. I didn't catch on immediately. I'd been a BBS aficionado since the late 80s, regularly spending an hour or two a day conversing on-line. But after two months of reading my wife's blog, I started to feel that maybe blogging might be something for me too. After all, I was already writing on-line anyway, but for a small audience of longtime BBS friends who didn't necessarily share my obsessions. Also, the BBS format…

POTW Returns

If that last post did not satisfy your need for brain food, then let me mention that as of today the Problem of the Week returns. This semester's theme: Fun With Arithmetic! What's that? You don't like arithmetic? Well, let's see if you're still saying that at the end of the term. In general I try to choose problems that are accessible even to people in lower level classes. I go for things with a brainteaser quality to them, as opposed to problems that require knowledge of calculus or something higher. Also, I'm perfectly aware that solutions to just about any brainteaser are readily…

A brief message from our founder

Dear Reader, We launched Seed and ScienceBlogs because we believe that science can change the world and science literacy is how we get there. In the pages of our magazine we've tried to capture the ideas and issues fueling this cultural shift. Online we've aimed to foster a lively and spirited conversation about where it's all heading. Now, we invite you to share with us directly your perspective on the state of science, and your opinion on how we can improve our own efforts to raise science literacy. The survey should take about 20 minutes to complete. As a special "thank you" for…

The Hormone That Helps You Read Minds

We've long accepted that hormones can make you amorous, aggressive, or erratic. But lately neuroscience has been abuzz with evidence that the hormone oxytocin -- which also acts as a neuromodulator -- can enhance at least one cognitive power: the ability to understand what others are thinking. In this week's Mind Matters (the online blog seminar on mind and brain I edit for Scientific American), Jennifer Bartz and Eric Hollander, two leading researchers in this area, write a review commentary describing a recent paper on oxytocin and "theory of mind" and describe how oxytocin seems to…

From the crazy part of Minnesota

Minnesota State Representative Tom Hackbarth is a Republican. How can you tell? By his deranged behavior. A security guard at a St. Paul Planned Parenthood clinic called the cops last week after he spotted a Republican state lawmaker with a loaded gun in the parking lot. But the pol says he was only "checking on" his online girlfriend, who he thought may be on a date with another man -- a claim police have not been able to corroborate because the man did not have a phone number or address for the woman. Because that's how married (but putatively in the midst of a divorce) Republicans look…

Monday brainteaser.

This is our third teaching day of the semester (which started last Thursday), so of course, WebCT's servers decided that it would be a good time to freak out. (The official description: ... experiencing network latency within our VA2 data center that may be affecting your Blackboard environment. This may result in increased latency and/or packet loss when trying to access your hosted Blackboard system. But you can't tell me that this doesn't amount to the servers freaking out, especially as they are still "working with our Infrastructure team to determine the cause and to work towards a…

Zombie Lurch

Last Sunday, about a hundred zombies lurched through downtown Sydney. In an interesting coincidence some zombie facts have lurched through a column by Ruth Lea: And, interestingly, global average air temperatures, which are regarded as more reliable by climate scientists, have not changed over the past 20 to 30 years. Oh look, it's the satellites don't show warming zombie. Dead for quite a while now, still staggering around in global warming skeptic writings. And indeed it is, as there seems to be little scientific agreement that mankind's fossil-fuel burning is the major reason for…

Meet Bill

Meet Bill, He was born prosopagnosic and he has an online "book" all about his condition. I haven't had a chance to read much of it but it seems pretty interesting. I was born with a condition that makes it difficult for me to recognize faces. There is a small part of the brain that is dedicated to that job, and though it is small, when it comes to recognizing faces, it is very very good. In me, that part doesn't work, making me blind to all but the most familiar of faces. To help you understand this, let me compare it to two conditions you are probably more familiar with. People who are "…

At times like this I wish I had TV

Many of the details of the 2005 Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District case are common knowledge among science bloggers and online communities concerned with evolution, but I have to wonder how many people really know about the background of the case? Fortunately, PBS will be airing a new documentary about the important case called "Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial" on November 13 (next Tuesday). PBS has issued a press release about the upcoming show and has a whole website full of resources related to the show, but I think PZ has some even more interesting news. In a review in…

ScienceOnline'09: Interview with Glendon Mellow

The series of interviews with some of the participants of the 2008 Science Blogging Conference was quite popular, so I decided to do the same thing again this year, posting interviews with some of the people who attended ScienceOnline'09 back in January. Today, I asked Glendon Mellow of the The Flying Trilobite, to answer a few questions. Welcome to A Blog Around The Clock. Would you, please, tell my readers a little bit more about yourself? Who are you? What is your (scientific) background? I'm yet another Canadian atheist artist-illustrator recovering goth-punk who blogs about incorrectly…

#scio12 Reset

Last week, I attended the Science Online 2012 Un-Conference in Raleigh, North Carolina. You've probably heard of it. This is a fairly new conference, having run for only the last few years, and was masterfully run and organized by Bora Zivkovic, Anton Zuiker and Karyn Traphagen. Most of the attendees are science journalists, writers, bloggers, and/or actual scientists. The "formal" sessions are, or at least attempt to be, topically-focused group discussions led by one or two individuals. The topics covered at this conference vary from year to year, but generally deal with science…

Tell 'em it ain't so Bora!!!

By now most of you have read Online Journalism Review, which deigns to character moi as: ...And there are several blogs, such as Afarensis and Gene Expression, that tend to stay away from cultural and political commentary altogether. Well, Mr. Science and Politics might have something to say about that! To be fair, this is an issue of sampling bias...I haven't posted too much on politics here on this weblog, so if you sampled on any given day one might surmise that this wasn't a particularly political blog. And I agree it isn't, at least explicitly, though we all have political opinions…

Am I evil?

Sometimes I get into an online discussion with someone on another blog, and the person will assert a point, without any quantitative or qualitative supporting data. My normal tack is to demand that they offer some evidence to support their assertion, which usually results in irritation and annoyance (e.g., "I don't have an infinite amount of time to look stuff up, what do you think I am, a nerd?"). But sometimes I follow another tack, I just plainly contradict what the individual asserted without any evidence from my own end, and simply say "my impression is contrary to your impression."…

Links 1/26/11

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays this blogger from links. Science: Leapin' Blennies Science Online 2011: Even when we want something, we need to hide it. CloVR: A genomics tool for automated and portable sequence analysis using Virtual Machines and Cloud computing Solar car speed record smashed Other: The Blue Collar Life Beacon Hill: It's Time for 2 + 2 The Data Shows that State "Beggar Thy Neighbor" Policies Don't Work. NYT: "You Think Houses Are a Slow Sell? Try a Yacht" (the last sentence is brilliant) Mass Supreme Court to Consider Whether Buyers Out of Faulty…

Sedalia noticed

When we hit that poll at Sedalia the other day, the newspaper noticed — they actually have a news story on their poll being crashed. Richard DeFord, The Sedalia Democrat interactive systems manager, said Saturday's online paper had 25,118 page views, Sunday had 22,096 and as of 4:40 p.m. Monday had 70,939. If views continue at the current rate, DeFord said, it will reach 90,406 before the night is done. DeFord said Monday's views indicate the story is viral, or hasÂ become popular in a short period of time. Of those views, many originated from as far away as London, England; Sydney and…

Around the Web: The Fallacy of Digital Natives, Beats vs obsessions, Data-gathering apps and more

The Fallacy of Digital Natives Beats vs obsessions, columns vs. blogs, and other angels dancing on pins Data-Gathering via Apps Presents a Gray Legal Area Coup at Environmental Journal? (journal editorial board quits when journal changes too much under new admin) Challenges in Digital Humanities 10 Questions To Distinguish Real From Fake Science Fit for Purpose: Developing Business Cases for New Services in Research Libraries Ten Things I Didn't Learn in Library School, Academic Edition ("You will spend more time in meetings than you can imagine.") Measuring Engagement (With Books) (ebooks…

Inventors, Entrepreneurs, and Makers of All Things Technical and Scientific Will Find Amazing Ideas and Tools to Make Their Dreams Reality at USA Science & Engineering Festival

The USA Science & Engineering Festival hosted by Lockheed Martin offers a special appeal for budding entrepreneurs, inventors, engineers and programmers who will find the ideas, tools and resources to help them make their dreams a reality. "The Festival is a fantastic place for technical experts of all kinds to learn about the amazing advances that have been made in technology to help them make product prototypes from 3D printers, find designs online for parts and components, and meet an array of experts to help them bring their product ideas to life," said Larry Bock, serial…

ScienceOnline2010 - introducing the participants

As you know you can see everyone who's registered for the conference, but I highlight 4-6 participants every day as this may be an easier way for you to digest the list. You can also look at the Program so see who is doing what. Kevin Emamy develops and runs CiteULike. You can read my interview with Kevin from a few months ago. At the conference, he will participate in the Online Reference Managers session. Rhitu Chatterjee is the Multimedia Science Journalist and Podcast Host at The BBC/WGBH/PRI's World Science. She is on Twitter and at the Conference she will do a demo of World Science.…

Covering Science in Cyberspace

Science journalists and science communicators who attended the Knight New Media Center Best Practices: Covering Science in Cyberspace seminar in March 2007 collectively wrote a blog during the meeting: Two dozen prominent science journalists and science communicators were invited to participate in this special conference with three goals: 1) Identify the critical issues facing science journalists in the digital age; 2) identify innovative forms of multimedia story-telling and presentation of complex issues online; and 3) identify "best practices" for coverage of science issues on digital…

Animalcules 1.9

Welcome to the June edition of Animalcules! Apologies for the lateness; I only had a few minutes to get online yesterday, and that was mainly devoted to checking email and making sure there were no crises that needed my attention. So, without further ado... From the Scientific Creative Quarterly comes a humorous entry: Prokaryotes of America Unite. Almost makes me feel bad. (You also may want to check out Scientific Creative Quarterly editor David Ng's new blog here at Scienceblogs: The World's Fair. Jennifer over at Science Matters has a nice post discussing background information on…

Phase-Response Curves to Melatonin

NBM found an excellent online article (which I have seen before but I forgot) depicting Phase-Response Curves (PRC) to injections of melatonin in humans, rodents and lizards. Note how the shape is roughly opposite to that of a PRC to light pulses, i.e., at phases at which light elicits phase-delays, melatonin produces advances and vice versa: The lizard PRC was actually constructed in our lab, about ten years before I joined. The article, though, gives the wrong reference to this: Underwood, H. and M. Harless (1985). "Entrainment of the circadian activity rhythm of a lizard to melatonin…

Sign a Petition to Protect Boreal Birds

One of the world's largest intact forest ecosystems -- the breeding grounds for many of the world's warblers, ducks and other migratory birds -- is in big trouble. Oil and gas, timber, mining, and other industries are destroying vital habitat for birds and other wildlife in Canada's boreal forest. Canada's boreal forest spans more than 1.4 billion acres and provides vital breeding habitat for many of the world's birds -- including nearly 40% of North America's ducks, geese, and swans. Lynx, grizzlies and wolves also make their home in the boreal forest. And it is one of the world's largest "…

Antiquity's Winter Issue

The on-line version of Antiquity's winter issue (#322) was published just the other day. Here are some highlights (links to abstracts, papers then hidden by a pay wall): A pair of "ornamental trousers" found in an exceptionally well preserved 1st century BC grave in the Tarim basin in Xinjiang. These fancy pants were apparently made out of a pictorial wall hanging looted in the 2nd century from a Bactrian palace. An Early Neolithic Linear Pottery ceremonial centre on the Middle Rhine in south-west Germany whose voluminous causewayed enclosure ditch is full of cannibalised human bones and…

Joint statement by Rive and Friis-Christensen on "The Great Global Warming Swindle"

An interesting pointre TGGWS comes my way: We have concerns regarding the use of a graph featured in the documentary titled "Temp & Solar Activity 400 Years". Firstly, we have reason to believe that parts of the graph were made up of fabricated data that were presented as genuine. The inclusion of the artificial data is both misleading and pointless. Secondly, although the narrator commentary during the presentation of the graph is consistent with the conclusions of the paper from which the figure originates, it incorrectly rules out a contribution by anthropogenic greenhouse gases to…

My Brush With Fame?

Those of you who've been reading Starts With A Bang since this last summer may have seen this article I wrote -- The Math of the Fastest Human Alive -- about Usain Bolt's world record in the 100 meter dash. Little did I know what type of interest this would generate. A few weeks after I wrote it, I found that my article was reprinted -- verbatim -- in the St. Petersburg Times, and then was featured in MacLean's. And I thought that was going to be it. And then Esquire Magazine called. I'm featured on page 133 and 134 of this month's (April 2010) issue, and you can read the article online…

NASA Telescopes Help Solve Ancient Supernova Mystery

A mystery that began nearly 2,000 years ago, when Chinese astronomers witnessed what would turn out to be an exploding star in the sky, has been solved. New infrared observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, reveal how the first supernova ever recorded occurred and how its shattered remains ultimately spread out to great distances. The findings show that the stellar explosion took place in a hollowed-out cavity, allowing material expelled by the star to travel much faster and farther than it would have otherwise. "This supernova…

Fornvännen’s Spring Issue On-Line

Fornvännen 2016:1 is now on-line on Open Access. Anton Seiler on a weapon grave with fragments of a Vendel helmet found at Inhåleskullen near Uppsala. Some of the metalwork is interestingly decorated in Salin's Style III/E and must be late additions to the assemblage. Rune Edberg and Johnny Karlsson on the bone skates of Birka and Sigtuna. Almost none are long enough for grownups! Anders Nord and colleagues on the pigments used on Medieval stonework in churches on Gotland. Sabine Sten and colleagues on a wide range of studies done on the bones in Holy King Erik's reliquary in Uppsala…

Links for 2011-12-04

The 45 Most Powerful Images Of 2011 The year in photojournalism. How Beer Saved the World | Watch Free Documentary Online Did you know that beer was critical to the birth of civilization? That's right - beer. Scientists and historians line up to tell the amazing, untold story of how beer helped create math, poetry, pyramids, modern medicine, labor laws, and America. If you think beer is just something cold and filling to drink during sporting matches or in the kind of bars that you probably shouldn't order wine in, then, boy, are you ever in the dark. It turns out beer is responsible for,…

Anthro Blog Carnival

The forty-eighth Four Stone Hearth blog carnival is on-line at Tangled Up In Blue Guy. Archaeology and anthropology, and all about various aspects of Hrodgaud of Friuli! Hrodgaud or Rodgand was Duke of Friuli from 774 to 776. Probably he was already duke under Desiderius, even if some Frankish sources, such as the Einhardis annales, say that Charlemagne put him in power after the Siege of Pavia. Submissions for the next carnival will be sent to Brutha Carl at A Hot Cup Of Joe, not to the old submissions address. The next open hosting slot is on 22 October. All bloggers with an interest in the…

On the Nature bloggy hubbub

I've been scarce around these parts and hope to get a Friday Fermentable up before midnight. However, I just wanted to share the following on the last couple of days discussions about Nature Publishing Group's various pronouncements on the importance of science blogging, especially their mention in Nature Methods of ScienceOnline'09, an unconference I co-organized this year with founders and online science visionaries, Bora Zivkovic and Anton Zuiker. Bora has the main stories and DrugMonkey adds commentary and his own personal experiences. But leave it to Anton Zuiker to capture the whole…

Gore's Brilliant "Wall" Advertising Strategy and His Back Stage - Front Stage Problem

Repower America's lastest advertising campaign to promote their new online feature "The Wall" is brilliant. The ads and the social media initiative vividly portray the diversity of support for serious climate action while also framing the relevance of the issue in ways that transcend the traditional ideological divide. As I wrote in a paper this spring at the journal Environment, the Repower campaign is a stark contrast to the dominant message of Inconvenient Truth which may have unintentionally reinforced the partisan divide on climate change. Gore, however, also faces a major…

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