Links post

• ZooBorns has your canid puppy fix, with baby bush dogs, dingoes, and fennec foxes. The dingoes post has some interesting background on dingoes and explains how they are different from domestic dogs.
• Hands Off My Bone! (The Thoughtful Animal): review of an article about whether dog growls have different meanings to dogs.
• P ≠ NP and the future of peer review (Science in the Open): Science in the Open considers what the reaction of the mathematics community to a recent extremely high-profile paper means for peer review.
• Native American Project HSVMA Stipend (The Vet Gazette): a vet student reports on her experience working on a Native American reservation, providing veterinary services, spay/neuter, and outreach to grade school students.
• Science Bloggers: Diversifying the news (CMBR): review of a journal article about science bloggers versus political bloggers, and how they approach topics differently.

Links post

Links about science blogging

• The Nature of Science Blog Networks (Science in the Open): Reflections on what’s next for science blogging networks, since we seem to be all assuming that Scienceblogs.com is dead.
• It’s not information overload, nor is it filter failure: It’s a discovery deficit (Science in the Open)
• Science Blogging Networks: What, Why and How (Blog Around the Clock): More thoughts from the godfather of science blogging, Bora, on the post-Pepsigate future
• Some thoughts about science blog aggregation (Word Munger)

Links about medicine (sometimes veterinary)

• Orthopaedics vs anesthesia: “This work is fictional and any resemblance to reality is completely coincidental. No orthopaedic registrars, anaesthetic registrars or patients were harmed during filming.” Video.
• Position Regarding Dangerous Animal/Dog Legislation (Massachusetts Veterinary Medical Association): the MVMA’s position on breed-specific legislation (e.g., the proposed pit bull ordinance I have been posting links about)

Links post

• Following on the topic I posted about recently, the Worcester Animal Rescue League (a shelter in Worcester) has stated that if Worcester passes its proposed breed-specific legislation, the shelter will no longer accept any dogs from Worcester. They cite fears of rising surrender rates as a result of this legislation.
• Don’t be a dick (Thoughts from Kansas): analysis of a speech about the effectiveness of not being a dick
• The gut’s “friendly” viruses revealed. DNA sequencing reveals a new world of bacterial viruses in our intestines (Nature News): More on the ecology existing inside us.
• A Farewell to Scienceblogs: the Changing Science Blogging Ecosystem (coturnix): It is a novel. The best bits are at the end, so if you start to get overwhelmed, skip ahead.
  

Recommendations to bloggers participating in the ScienceBlogs.com diaspora

In the wake of Pepsigate (the appearance of a corporate blog by PepsiCo at the esteemed scienceblogs.com site), science bloggers are leaving scienceblogs.com in droves, citing conflict of interest.

I would really hate to see the loss of scienceblogs.com as a site where science bloggers come together. If they are scattered to the winds, I think that loss of community would be sad, especially in this time when science blogging is doing so well at finding its feet and beginning to significantly supplement traditional science journalism as a way to communicate science to non-scientists. Scienceblogs.com had begun some really interesting intiatives, like Ask a Science Blogger, that work best with a central authority.

What’s the right answer? The scene reminds me of a kerfluffle in the fanfiction community a few years ago. (Tell me I’m not the only science blogger who likes to read fanfiction!) The response of the fanfiction community was to come together and build their own organization (The Organization for Transformative Works, or OTW) and their own archive for their work (The Archive of Our Own, or AO3).

So, participants in the scienceblogs.com diaspora, if I had my way, you would all come together and find a way to continue your community through a non-profit effort. You don’t necessarily need to have all your blogs on the same site, as the fanfiction folks chose to do. You would only need a central place which organized your blogs. It would provide links to blogs that were good enough to be considered part of your group, just as people have to apply to join scienceblogs.com today. It would organize things like “Ask a science blogger” and have group RSS feeds. And it would be non-profit, so conflict of interest would not be an issue.

That’s my take on the matter. Good luck to all who are searching for new blog homes.

Links post

• Rebooting science journalism - thoughts from Timmer
• This is the title of a typical incendiary blog post
• Open Access to Scientific Publications: The good, the bad, and the ugly: "Open Access is a valuable goal, but the scientific community is overly naive about the whole business of scientific publishing."
• Depressing DNA: On genetic diseases and the future of pet-dom
• Rebooting science journalism - on blurring boundaries, money, audiences and duck sex
  

Links post

• Dogged Blog: Real blogs allow comments : Thoughts on what makes blogging different from “just publishing.”


• Dolittler: Oops...I did it again (and other tales of kittens past) : Philosophizing on whether veterinarians should continue to see clients who get pets from inhumane sources
  
  
• ZooBorns: Zurich Zoo's Wolf Pups : Baby wolves!
  
  
• Not Exactly Rocket Science: Who are the science journalists?