New: Field of Science Science Blog Network
Edward Michaud
Monday, 09 March 2009 02:51 UTC
I’m starting a science blog network/magazine at Field of Science
If you are a science blogger (or are thinking of starting a science blog) and you’re interested in getting in on the ground floor, see this FAQ for more details.
I’m happy to answer questions here as well.
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How does your network differ from, or compare to, other networks or such as blogs.nature.com or nature network or scienceblogs? Is there a distinctive feature that can summarise each of the various science blog networks?
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The FAQ requires some special login, which sort of defeats the whole purpose of a FAQ. I don’t know how many people will want to get in on the ground floor without knowing what building they are entering.
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Hank: I’ve moved the FAQ back to the public forum. Sorry about that.
Maxine: There are too many differences to list so I’ll just cherry pick a few. Field of Science is not a subsidiary of a larger entity. So it’s about the blogs, as opposed to those other networks that are really only in the business of “blogging” because in this environment blogs are one of the best ways to advertise your product (i.e. their respective magazines, SEED or Nature). Anther very important difference is at Field of Science the science blogger owns their blog. The network is less like a corporate office suite where you’re given a cubical with a desk and a select few pieces of office equipment to make due with, and more like a convention center where you get to set up your own booth, large or small, and pack it with whatever devices you find useful—and should the day come that you find somewhere better to set up shop, you can take your booth(blog) and all its wares and move it to a new location because its your stuff, not some corporate entities. So those are two important differences whose implications I’ve only just touched on.
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I own my blog. So does everyone else on scienceblogs.com. I can pick up and leave and take all my stuff with me if I wanted to, but I don’t as the platform is good for me, and Seed give me and others 100% editorial freedom.
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Edward, I’m always a fan of more places for people to write but what makes yours actually different? Are Nature blogs only their employees? I thought they had outside people also (they used to, anyway).
ScientificBlogging has a million readers a month and no employees, unless I count as one, so it’s not some corporate behemoth with any big ownership. It’s all writers who retain their copyrights and have control over content, much like Bora and Scienceblogs. It’s just a common interface for people and the aggregation makes it easier for readers and compounds the audience a lot.
Do you mean your engine is better? Scienceblogs uses Typepad, for example, and that’s among the more popular multiuser platforms around. Discover blogs uses Wordpress, I started with Drupal and modified it. What does yours do better?
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I’m with Bora here. The so-called corporatism of SEED is apparent to me only in its absence.
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Well, good luck with it. My question is this: if your bloggers will be completely and 100% independent, why should they join your network rather than start a blog on their own?
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What a bunch of wet blankets! Good luck Edward. Rising tide and all that…
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Yeah, go for it Edward!
“ScientificBlogging has a million readers a month”
A million? I’ve never even heard of “ScientificBlogging”. Got a URL?
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I don’t think people are being wet blankets. If anything, Nature is being a pretty good sport about letting someone come in to their network and advertise a product. It’s kind of pushy, I know we wouldn’t allow it.
I read his FAQ and he seems to have an agenda against Scienceblogs (in blogging that is the big gorilla, so I get why they are a target, though his reasoning is a little flawed) but saying everyone (except him) doing science is ruled by some ominous corporate overlord is kind of insulting to all of us.
He basically has an overlay for blogspot.com sites, so from a money point of view it won’t help writers much. A person with a stand-alone blog using Adsense makes very little money because, to Google, they are still one person with a small site. On Scienceblogs (or us, or anyone else who does revenue sharing) instead of Adsense paying $.50 for a thousand views, the writers get $15-25 a thousand because the audience is all on one URL and very targeted. Money aside, being a loose coalition (similar to a site that just has a bunch of feeds from sites) won’t build up much of a culture. Scienceblogs, Nature, Discover, AAAS, ScientificBlogging, Discovery, etc. (I am sure I left a lot out) have nothing really in common stylewise but all have a unique culture that’s created because people feel like part of each family.
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