Behind the Scenes: Case study: Ideas4Science.com demonstrated that info pros and researchers
see value in an online community approach to exchanging ideas
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Case study: Ideas4Science.com demonstrated that info pros and researchers
see value in an online community approach to exchanging ideas By Fabian Kersten, Solutions Marketing
Manager, Elsevier, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
We at Elsevier believe that experts
such as information specialists and
researchers hold the solutions to
challenges that concern searching and
retrieving information in the vast amount
of data available. Input from experts
helps us develop more evolved and
sophisticated solutions to enhance
scientific practices.
Recently, Elsevier conducted a one-month
pilot called Ideas4Science which sought
to generate new and better ways of
interacting with scientific information.
Ideas4Science was an invitation-only
platform allowing information specialists
and a select group of peers to share
ideas and comments. To launch it, 65
people received an invitation with log-in
details. Then 34 invitees, including users
from the University of Western Sydney,
Indian Institute of Science and Karolinska
Institute, registered and participated on
the site.
We asked participants to come up with
ideas for solving these challenges:
Ideal World Scenario: What is the
ideal way to interact with all available
information in your field? How would you
like to interact with information and data
in the future to find answers to your
research questions?
Failure of Filters: Update and alerting
services are essential to staying on top of
your research, but it’s impossible to keep
up with everything. How can we keep
from missing out on what we really need,
without drowning in a flood of information?
Next Big Thing: Working on current
projects is hard enough, but how do you
find out what the next big thing is? Is there
an ideal way to utilize available scientific
information to identify trends and define
new research topics?
Ideas4Science.com attracted 83 visitors,
17 ideas and 16 comments. Following are
two of the ideas submitted.
S. Venkadesan, with the Indian Institute of
Science, suggested a data mashup to help
in searching for and retrieving information.
Here’s his idea: “Create a data mashup
that can harvest data from published
literature. The mashup should be able to
identify the requisite data queried, from
table captions and figure captions of
scholarly articles published. Currently all
this gets done the hard way, manually.
Now with mashups springing up as a part
of Web 2.0, I feel it is time to try this.”
Michael Gonzalez, with the University
of Western Sydney, suggested intuitive
and predictive searches with the power
of cloud computing. Here’s his idea:
“Researchers have profiles of research
interests and published works. Would
it not be prudent to develop a system
intuitive enough to examine your work
(current or past) and make suggestions on
directions or available data? Imagine being
able to submit your data and have related
research past or ongoing be shown along
with key contacts in your field. This would
also examine raw data and show trends
and possible gaps in the research area.
You can use cloud computing principles
to make the analysis more efficient as
well as the processing of raw research
data when idle.”
To honor Michael Gonzalez’s submission
of the best idea generated during
Ideas4Science, Elsevier has donated
US $1,000 to the Nobel Foundation.
Surveyed upon the experiment’s
conclusion, 90% of the responding
Ideas4Science participants agreed that
an online community approach is a
good way to exchange ideas and
were willing to participate in a similar
experience in the future. f.kersten@elsevier.com
New edition of
popular LC pamphlet
now available
Recently, Elsevier conducted a one-month
pilot called Ideas4Science which sought
to generate new and better ways of
interacting with scientific information.
