good summary! - Björn Brembs

"for the first time in recent memory, there was disagreement about something fundamental. I view this as an extremely positive sign that out community is starting to grow and incorporate people outside of our core group. In fact, if there’s no disagreement, it’s probably a sign you’re doing something wrong." -- amen to that. - Bill Hooker

I just want to add that I have no vested interests in this, other than growing the community, so my vision of how to best to handle this probably won't amount to much in the end, but I do think I laid out some of the issues that need to be considered and hopefully one of the people who actually gets paid to work on this stuff will benefit from having these issues laid out clearly for them. - Mr. Gunn

Yeah, that's one argument for not consolidating comment threads here, too. - Mr. Gunn

Really great, Mr. Gunn! Impressively thorough w/ links and everything. - Steve Koch

I think for me two things greatly impact my public comments, the first positive, the second negative: (1) "Recognition." Even just a "like" is a reward. Even when I occasionally (right?) am a jackass it's good to get negative feedback. (2) "Fear." I definitely am way more reluctant to post a comment directly on a PLoS article. I would estimate something like 3 orders of magnitude higher barrier for me. I think it's basically this: Published comments in journals are almost always negative and lead to formal, but sort of nasty arguments between the original article authors and the people challenging the article. I haven't read this link, but I think it's what I'm talking about: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi... When I contemplate commenting on a PLoS article, this is what I have in mind. So, of course, I never comment because I never feel like I have my ducks in a row for that kind of battle. In contrast, when I comment on friendfeed, I feel like it's much less formal and thus I blather on freely. - Steve Koch

Here's a question: are my fears justified? I suppose it depends a lot on what the PLoS authors and readers expect. Do they expect anything yet? Why should they? Can we, now, in the next few months dictate what those expectations are via a concerted effort to comment on articles? Is that a dangerous experiment to undertake? I think it would be nice if comments on PLoS articles were much, much less formal than comments on Science and Nature articles. I've noticed in myself that I'm much more willing to comment in a formal environment on something that I'm not expected to be an expert on. Thus, I do have an untapped potential to comment on PLoS articles slightly outside my area of perceived expertise. Should we band a few of us together and pick out a few articles to make some comments on, using the PLoS site instead of FF? In terms of an experiment, it would reduce the effect of the "community" factor aka "I want to comment where I'm heard" factor. - Steve Koch

To be more succinct: As part of a test effort, I'm willing to read a few PLoS articles and make comments over the next few weeks. - Steve Koch

To be differently succinct: I'd like to be part of lighting a fire, but I don't want to be blamed for burning the whole place down. - Steve Koch

LOL, Steve, I don't think any level of engagement you engender will be a bad thing. My understanding is that there are two classes of comments: critical comments coming from people who have their ducks in a row sufficiently and which are left at the publisher's site, and more impressionistic and off the top of the head comments made as part of a discussion occurring in a different community which are aggregated and displayed at the site. The second type may be a bridge to the first, but the challenge is to do it in such a way that people don't feel like their comments are taken out of context. - Mr. Gunn

One thing that strikes me is that this is playing out again the debate around re-use licensing. There would be benefits (and risks) in having a clear license attached to every comment (which goes along with citeable comments). I think it is also important to make a distinction between "republishing" and just linking. I'd hoped to be able to explore that with Ian York but I didn't get in fast enough - Cameron Neylon

You linked to your own blog here: http://ff.im/2BWiz which if you go to http://friendfeed.com/genereg... is the 4th item down, directly below this discussion here. In other words, you blew your own cover. Now, why did you do that? If you want to remain "anonymous" you'll have to try a little harder than that. Because I'm a nice guy, I'll remove the link, but I take it the point has been made. If someday you decide that having your CV/blog rank highly in a google search for your "real name" is a good thing, I'll also be happy to put the link back. - Mr. Gunn

Mr. Gunn, The link to which you refer does not say that this is _my_ blog. Please let me decide where I want to put my name, and where not. Please remove my name from your blog post. - genereg

So the fact that the headshot is identical is just a coincidence? - Mr. Gunn

Please understand, I'm not trying to be rude, I just think you didn't think things through all the way. Of course, I'll be happy to remove it, but please understand that you have absolutely no right nor ability to control how and where you're talked about online. It all comes down to the politeness of the people involved, and you happened to get lucky with me, but what about the next time? - Mr. Gunn

One more thing I should mention - since the article has already been picked up by the 200+ feedreaders and post aggregators which receive content from my blog, I won't be able to change it there, nor will those services be notified that I made changes on my end, so you will still see the old versions floating around. I can't do anything about that. - Mr. Gunn

this is really interesting - like Steve said, there are carefully thought out critiques that you want to bring to the attention of the authors, there are off the cuff responses, and there might even be troublemaking comments - playing devil's advocate or whatever. i'm pretty sure i wouldn't want to comment on the article's page unless i had carefully read and thought through everything, but a quick - this is interesting in friendfeed is fine for off the cuff - Christina Pikas

second interesting thing - is when you go to aggregate all of the traffic about a certain article, you probably shouldn't just mash the various venues together, bcs each has its own norms and expectations (when someone is saving something for themself or their future self, the description they use will be different than when they are sharing it with a known or unknown audience) - Christina Pikas

third interesting thing (and now I'm hijacking this feed instead of comps preps) - identity on the internet. People develop personas and identities on the web - maybe as a trouble maker, maybe as a thoughtful commenter - that don't necessarily correspond with the way they want to be seen elsewhere. you should be able to sign in to comment with this persona - it may be much better established than your "real" identity - and not have to use the name on your drivers license - Christina Pikas

oh and to genereg's point, just because you can google or look in research databases and tell where I work 40-60 hours a week doesn't mean that I ever link to it - i don't want to borrow from my place of work's authority when i'm trying out ideas online. If you ask, I'll tell you where I work, but I don't link to it on the web in things like ff delicious my blog, etc - Christina Pikas

genereg, I sense that you're feeling a little irritated about this, and that's understandable, but let's make one thing clear. The comment in which you linked to your own blog with your CV and picture right there is directly below this one on your comments page. You even linked to your blog from your comment on my post that you signed as genereg. That didn't give me the impression that you were trying to keep things separate, so I apologize for getting the wrong impression, but surely you can understand how I did, right? I mean, I like to rank high in a google search for my name, and I sorta assumed everyone does, especially people who post their CV on their blog, and since you've posted a link from here to your blog multiple times, the fact that you're trying to keep the two separate was pretty easy to miss. - Mr. Gunn

"I mean, I like to rank high in a google search for my name, and I sorta assumed everyone does" -- obviously not, at least not in the context that people can't control. I like this discussion as this is a continuation of the test case of how the things should work in the science 2.0, and why it doe not work actually. For example, I have a specific name under which I write poetry and fiction, and this name never interferes with my science publications. Correspondingly, online activities have nicknames. Obviously there should not be something like someone is doing favor to someone. There should be strict rules, otherwise these scientific collaborative projects will not work - genereg

"Genereg," I can wholly see why you'd like to keep your online identity separate from your legal name: You're being ridiculous! More than that, you're doing so at the expense of Mr. Gunn (aka William Gunn) who deserves way more respect than you're giving him. Without a doubt he's done many favors for you and you should appreciate his measured responses. - Steve Koch

Genereg, you are way out of line here. There is nothing in netiquette, scientific ethics or the law that says Mr Gunn must link to you in the manner of your choosing. You have no authority, no right whatsoever to insist on any particular action by Mr Gunn; you can *ask* him to remove the name and if he chooses to, he can go along with your silliness; that's it. I'm frankly astonished at Mr Gunn's tolerance. - Bill Hooker

You are still leaving comments which link your nickname straight to your blog; you insist anonymity will solve everything; you tell us "there should be strict rules" governing online conduct. Pace your own boasting, it's pretty clear that you do not understand the web at all. - Bill Hooker

The netiquette directly states that it is rude to disclose the name of the person who is using a nickname and is not disclosing the name himself. - genereg

If, however, that was done by mistake (like it was in this case), the person who disclosed the information without permission should do everything possible to remove it from the public sourses upon request. these are my forum rules, explicitly written. however, they are based on the general netiquette - genereg

See there: you don't listen. You're paying no attention to anyone else. Your blog is directly linked to your comments on Mr Gunn's entry. In that same comment thread, he explained to you why this is so; if you don't understand the explanation read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki.... - Bill Hooker

Googling "genereg blog" takes you to genereg's blog, with his name, CV, etc... - Michael Nielsen

Michael, I know. And it's Ok like this. Whoever who whants hurt me, go ahead :) - genereg

Michael, not to mention that putting this information here is, although not against netiquette, is... not very good... Because we were not discussing each other, we were discussing concepts. Not associated with our names. - genereg

"putting this information here is, although not against netiquette, is definitely agains scientific ethics" -- then you should make a formal case against me. You have my real name; go ahead and complain to the office of research integrity. I'm unemployed right now, so you will have to go to the federal office and see whether there is some action they could take on your behalf: http://ori.dhhs.gov/ Either that, or stop talking about "scientific ethics" as though it's a topic about which you know anything. - Bill Hooker

Bill, unfortunately, there is nothing written about "scientific ethics" in Science 2.0. We still have to write it... - genereg

When you accuse me of a breach of professional ethics, hell yes I take it seriously. One minute you are howling about the law, the next it's "don't take it personally". Oh, and nice try with the after-the-fact edit there (s/definitely/probably). - Bill Hooker

Bill, publishing my name not associated with my FF account was definitely against professional ethics. You still don't see why? I don't see, who is accusing you in something, and how you are connected to this issue, which we have already perfectly resolved with Mr. Gunn. - genereg

@genereg - we have an expression at work - "move away from the hole". - Graham Steel

@Graham, thanks. I did not expect that level of aggression towards these ideas actually. The idea of removing the mandatory registrations seems quite good, and I do not have any competing interests, just interested that Science 2.0 really worked. Obviously don't want my name to be associated with such an aggressive discussion. That was one of the reasons why I asked to remove my name from the blog post. I still believe that the registrations should not be mandatory for online commenting. - genereg

Aggression? What aggression? You're the one casting aspersions and making accusations, then backing down when fronted -- slimily at that, with your after-the-fact editing. (Floor's yours -- I've blocked you so won't see anything more from you.) - Bill Hooker

Bill, I I don't see where you have been accused by any of the participants in this thread. - genereg

enough. one person thought to attribute comments to another person, thought, because of something posted on the blog that it was desirable to link to the name (to give credit, which is a GOOD thing). the other person did not want real name linked, thought it violated netiquette, and it has since been removed. further discussion is not likely to be productive, IMHO. - Christina Pikas

@Mr. Gunn: Most probably the misunderstanding was because I have sent you two private messages asking to remove my name, I did this before posting in public, and did not get a response from you, and after your first reply, I had the feeling that you are not willing to remove my name. In any case, I am sorry if that went wrong, and have to say that your blogpost is very nice. I was actually very busy all the day (which might also explain my tone), and did not have time to read your post before. - genereg

"I've blocked you so won't see anything more from you." that the real freedom of open access and open science- and these guys are real representative, how can public should trust your voice on these matters, no matter how true you are when you become personal you are dangerous to your cause. great work keep up guys, I guess BioGang has disregarded more to their cause than any one else. - Abhishek Tiwari

Let's be scientists. There are different points of view and let's express them as scientists should do. I think Bill reacted by mistake to a phrase out of context. At least what he quotes, was not said in a conversatin with him. - genereg

Concerning the way how the name not associated with a given online identity appeared without permission on an article with which a given online identity holder did not want to be associated, may be this is more at the level of scientific rather than internet understanding. In science, it is considered as a good tone to ask a person before mentioning him in an article. I personally was shocked to see this name without permission on such an article. Furthermore, just because someone has put this name on this article, I have spent the whole day in the internet. Now, even more, someone is asking me about the article that I did not write. I have just written a one-page response for him. I actually don't have time for that, and it is a little bit annoying. Of cause it is understood that Mr. Gunn did not do this on purpose, and there are no accuses. - genereg

Anyone else seeing the irony in this thread? It's pretty hilarious. I think this discussion exactly highlights the chasm seen in science v the internet. I think genereg is being ridiculous, BUT I can see the same reaction coming from some of my colleagues. It all depends on how liberal you are with internet use and your on-line identity. - Brian Krueger - LabSpaces

Brian, you are right that this case is representative. Please do not use personally offensive words such as "ridiculous" because we are discussing important concepts, not the persons. We are all interested to learn how the things should work in Science2.0, and we are all professionals here. To summarize, the name not associated with the given online identity was figured out through non-public discussions not related to a given discussion. Then without permission of the holder of that online identity, the name was associated with that online identity. This name could easily belong to an absolutely unrelated person. Furthermore, without contacting the _name_holder_ or the _online_identity_holder_, the name was used without permission in a controversial article, and the online identity holder did not want to be associated with that article. Normally, even when a journalist is conducting an interview, he is asking for a final approval of the person, whose views he has represented in the article. Also, normally, scientists ask for a permission to mention a name of another scientist in their article submitted for publication (e.g. as personal communications). We are discussing science-online, not just a usual chat-forum stuff, don't forget. - genereg

Didn't really mean that as a shot at you. I'm just really liberal with my feelings on information sharing on the internet. It's nearly impossible to regulate your "privacy" on the web, so doing so, to me, seems ridiculous. That's all. - Brian Krueger - LabSpaces

genereg, you've created that problem, nobody else. It's your poor management of online identities that allows for potentially ambigous links between them (or in other words, your approach of pseudo-anonimity makes stealing your identity associated with your real name possible). As you repeat over and over again, we are professionals, and Mr. Gunn did his best to reveal a name of a professional that made a contribution to science-related discussion. It was his right to do so and wasn't against any scientific ethics. - Pawel Szczesny

Pawel, let's call this a test case, not a problem. What would you say if your colleague includes in his article your idea which popped up in a conversation (even a public conversation, say, a conference), correctly citing your name, but not asking your permission to do so? Would you then say that it was his right to do so and wasn't against any scientific ethics? You know, some people even require permissions for using their names in the acknowledgment section... This is not so simple... We do need rules online, and we do need well-defined options for privacy protection when commenting online. - genereg