academia.edu

The moral right to distribute your own publications online

constantinakatsari July 7, 2010

A few days ago several academics commented (on facebook) on the state of our publication rights. It seems that the author comes up with an innovative idea for an article or a book, puts together a number of applications for funding or funds his/her own research, s/he struggles to find the evidence usually in distant countries, catalogues the available material, writes several drafts of the article, presents several papers in conferences. All in the space of five to ten years. Eventually, a publi... »

Academia.edu : Another Review

constantinakatsari July 3, 2010

When I am wrong, I do not hesitate to admit it. And this is the case with my views on the excellent site of Academia.edu . A few months ago I wrote a not so positive article on its operation. I was in Greece back then and the speed of the connection with the site was so low that I have not even managed to inspect its innermost pages. When I complained about it, some researchers answered that they never used it anyway and that they only checked out PHD Comics. At about the same time, the Academia... »

Academia.edu

constantinakatsari April 24, 2010

Usually I am in favour of internet platforms that allow researchers to share their material for free with the rest of the world. However, in the case of Academia.edu all my hopes have been shattered. The site is so slow I have never been able to see any of the papers that have been uploaded. In the advertisements of their site they repeatedly mention how many researchers participated and how many articles they share. How they managed to go beyond the Home Page is anybody’s guess. If any of you c... »