Posts

Academic Productivity app review: Buffer

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This is a series of review posts focusing on apps and tools which may help people navigate the digital landscape and the masses of information out there. I focus on tools which might help academics and those that work with research, especially those that will save people time. This post lists more tools and tricks.  Buffer  sells itself as 'Social Media Management' application and that is pretty self explanatory about what it does. You can schedule posts, post from multiple accounts simultaneously and generate statistics such as the number of clicks on a link and audience size, allowing you to refine you content, post at the best times and generally be better and more active on social media with minimal effort. I am finding Buffer incredibly useful and enjoyable to use. It was really simple to integrate it into my posting and social media use and has allowed me to better manage my posting schedule and saved me lots of time. I've been using Buffer for just over

Integrating social media into researcher careers

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Following my post on measures of success on social media I read a paper on 'A critical evaluation of science outreach via social media: it's role and impact on scientists' published on the F1000 website which is well worth a read. The authors come to a similar conclusion my previous blog post, that the measurement of social media success needs to reach beyond simple number metrics in order to fully understand how beneficial (or not) social media channels are to academic researchers for outreach and their careers. The paper suggests three important elements which would allow the integration of social media for outreach (SOSM) into a scientists career which are: 1) It must be valued (by research funders and by universities) 2) It must be measured (the jury is still out on what this would look like) 3) It must be manageable I agree with the three elements but would also suggest that the efforts on social media must also feedback into the research to be truly usef

Creating effective social media networks; why it isn't all about numbers.

In my current job I help researchers engage with the public about their research work. I talk with them about how they might engage with particular groups of people or how they might think about structuring a public talk. I especially like talking with people about different ways they can engage and how they might think about using online tools and social media to engage with others about what they are doing. This post is about maximising the potential of social media networks for engagement and measuring success online. It isn't all about the numbers.... The first thing I ask is, 'why do you want to do this?' Followed closely by, 'who is it you want to engage with or reach?' This second question is so important. It's no use chatting to fellow researchers and tweeting links to scientific research papers if you want to speak to people outside of the research field about their views on nature. Tailoring content and building the right network of contacts is so i

The Age of Discovery (How old are people when they do their best scientific research?)

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Science is an extremely competitive field, getting research funding requires an excellent track record and researchers judge themselves against their peers. I wrote a blog post about the number of publications scientists are 'supposed' to have per year in order to be competitive on fellowships and grant applications a few years ago. I am surprised at the number of people that find that post by  searching for 'How many research papers should I have?'  . It's a worry or thought most researchers have throughout their careers. There is of course no magic number and there's a need for a track record of quality publications vs a quantity of publications. The ultimate accolade for a scientist is being awarded a Nobel Prize and I came across an interesting infographic about the age of Nobel Prize winners (when they completed their prize winning work) and also how that relates to the age at which they wrote their PhD dissertation. I have included it at the bottom of t

Can Research Groups communicate as a collective rather than as individuals?

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Image courtesy of  jscreationzs  at FreeDigitalPhotos.net I'm speaking to more and more research groups about how they can get online and share their work via social media. I used some of the thoughts and diagrams from 'An introduction to social media for Scientists' published in PLOS Biology 2013 to illustrate some of the thoughts, barriers and journeys to engaging online in a short talk I gave.. I'm looking to speak to more people and read more case studies about how collective research groups have shared their science openly online - rather than the science being communicated by single individuals -  which I see to be more commonplace. Research rarely exists in isolation so I see more groups moving to this collated model. Communicating as a group is, in theory, easier than as a single entity as there is potentially more to discuss and potentially less onus on one individual to provide all the narrative. That said, it is more difficult for people to com

Academic productivity app review: Habit RPG

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In my previous post I asked people to share which digital tools and apps they use to help them work faster (and smarter). Lots of them sounded useful and interesting so I thought I would try some of them out and write some short reviews. @java7nerd recommended HabitRPG . The habit changing app that turns your life into a COMPUTER GAME. The aim of the app is to help you ditch bad habits and pick up good ones. The app sounded like great fun and perfect way to help me get more into a work/life balance (by that I mean not sitting at my desk when I should be at the gym). I signed up and tried it out. The app is FREE (whoop), easy to use and fun to look at. It takes some setting up as you decide what tasks you want to set where (and decide on which points to reward yourself). The app works by assigning points for tasks which accumulate until you earn enough for a reward. Points do get taken away for bad habits though.... As you can see on this list you can include anything you

Which digital tools do you use to make your life easier?

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I've been thinking this week about all the apps, tools and plug-ins that I use to make my digital life easier. I use a variety of tools to catch up with digital conversations, save things for later and to make sure I don't miss blogposts.  I also use them to manage my own digital footprint so I can update blogs and twitter when I am away from my desk and laptop. There are lots of options out there so I want to collect a round up of what people use and for what. I'm particularly interested in hearing from researchers. 98% of the tools I use are free and I am reluctant to pay for something new without a really good review first. New tools are launched on a what seems like daily basis and older apps and tools get changed, removed and updated frequently. Here's a run down of what I use (and for what). I would be really interested to hear from others about what they use and how it makes your life easier! - Twitter - I use twitter.com from my desktop and laptop and