Genetics Blogging is Illegitimate
Good bye, everyone. I’m outta here. It appears that all my work here at Genetics and Health is pointless and of no value whatsoever. Never mind that I produce original content day in and day out. Never mind that others believe in the value of my work. Never mind that Genetics and Health is a part of b5media, a global new media company. None of that impresses EurekAlert! to whom I applied for access to embargoed press releases.
When I was first told that my application did not qualify, I thought perhaps EurekAlert! did not know enough about my work. So I sent them this email:
Dear Eryn,
Thank you for your email. Could you tell me what documentation I can provide in order to gain access to embargoed news through EurekAlert!?
Would it help if I had my company’s Vice President of Operations vouch for me? I work for b5media, a global new media company and am the editor of the Science and Health Channel. My GeneticsAndHealth.com site is one of the leading genetics blogs online and I have been recognized by Forbes, Fox News, and Nature Genetics Reviews among other mainstream media publications.
Thank you for your consideration,
Hsien
And this was the reply I received:
I appreciate your email, Hsien, but unfortunately, the decision must stand. Our eligibility criterion does not include writing blogs of any kind. Feel free to re-register in the future, should your writing outlets expand.
Best,
Eryn
Major diss. Maybe it’s a sign that it’s time for me to get a “proper job.” Someone please validate me (and the hundreds and thousands of other science bloggers out there)!!
Update: Thank you to Steve at FreshYields, Bora at A Blog Around the Clock, Tris of Homely Scientist, Alun at Archaeoastronomy, and Reed at The Panda’s Thumb for your support. Reed’s also calling for all science bloggers to apply to EurekAlert! for access to journalist access. And no thank you to to Emma for the extra splash of diss juice.
Don’t miss my podcast in response to the whole situation and clarifying what I think is so special about science blogs. Also, see b5media CEO Jeremy Wright’s assessment of the situation.
Tags: blogging, science blogging, science, genetics, eurekalert, journalism, genome, dna, genes, health
Michael: Thanks for your comment. It’s always interesting to get opinions from all sides. I have never implied that all bloggers should get access to embargoed material but I was disappointed that I, a former PhD researcher working for a global new media company, was not able to. I believe that it is possible for there to be strict criteria applied to blogger access just as there is for other writers.
For what it’s worth, although I may be regarded by some, but not all, journalists to be a “hack”, I have published papers in highly regarded scientific journals and in lay magazines as well (just not on science and health). I agree with you that I am more staid than other bloggers out there since I obey many of the rules. Obviously, I don’t obey enough.
As for self-important and self-congratulatory, that’s what blogging is about, isn’t it?
Eurekalert! should review applications from bloggers just as it would any other bid for access. If someone can meet the same criteria as a freelance writer, for example, then they should grant access.
Just don’t see this as some sort of moral crusade. It isn’t. Do not align yourself with the majority of dimwits who blog because they can do nothing better. You only make it harder for the AAAS to back down.
Freelance applicants used to require backing from an editor who buys their words. What’s wrong with that? Why should they take my word for it that I am a famous science writer?
In your position I would approach the journals that you want to reach. They are, after all, Eurekalert!’s customers, and paymasters.
I have had my own qualms about Eurekalert! in the past. The least of their crimes is keeping out bloggers.
The AAAS has always been an “iffy” organisation. (Witness this weekend’s attack on their belated and dodgy input on climate change.) Forget about Science, their own journal, it is mostly fluff – albeit it well written fluff with a fine news section – the playground of a particular type of scientist and very narrow view of science.
The word “edit” is what distinguishes blogging, 99 per cent of which is dross, from science writing, which relies on first selling a story to an editor, and then battling it through the editing process.
I’m afraid that you hit the nail on your head with the comment “As for self-important and self-congratulatory, that’s what blogging is about, isn’t it?”
Yes. This is true. And it is why I would keep Eurekalert! closed to most bloggers. Vanity is not a good reason for gaining access to embargoed material.
I’d have to agree with Michael, this isn’t a moral crusade. But I wonder, does the science correspondent (if there is one) of, say, the English Daily Star or the American Weekly World News, get automatic access to Eurekalert?
Jeremy raises a point that I should have spotted, had I not already gone on too long.
On-line does not equal blogging.
So the many on-line news sources out there may well have access to embargoed material. I certainly hope they do at New Scientist on line, the BBC and so on.
I suspect that the AAAS is discriminating against bloggers, not on-line outlets.
The key here is that they are not just some sole nutcase, with an inflated view of their insights into the world, sitting in a room puffing out opinions.
The places Jeremy cites have the luxury of editors, which is why they have readers who take them a bit more seriously than your average blogger.
Another thing I should have picked up on is the suggestion that the label “former PhD researcher” somehow qualifies someone for access to embargoed material. Er, on what grounds?
Forget it. More important is the tag “working for a global new media company”.
Fight that case and you will have my support. But fight for every nameless ranter to get access to this stuff, and you are on your own.
If, as someone suggests, everyone who has posted here tries to sign up for Eurekalert! that will be a great reason for them to allow no one in.
Michael, I totally understand your points and respect your experience in science publishing and writing. The reason I bring up my PhD is to show that I’m not just some hack off the street with no understanding of science. I have a critical eye and know what’s real and what’s fluff (something that AAAS may have difficulties with, ha).
Regardless, this whole exercise has been very interesting. Whether or not I have access to embargoed material is irrelevant because I still have access to scientists themselves and can get a far more interesting scoop than regurgitating a press release. It does matter whether I have a PhD or not in this case because scientists know they’re talking to a peer. I just thought it would be interesting to see what’s behind the locked door and was surprised to find myself shut out. Woman scorned and all that.
When I first posted on this, nothing would have happened except a few rolled eyes if people thought it didn’t matter. But the fact that many have found it worth talking about shows that the the issue is important to some people, including you. Independent bloggers may never gain access to embargoed material but (professional) bloggers will be increasingly given greater access. Witness press passes to bloggers at trade shows and embedded bloggers in Iraq.
“Whether or not I have access to embargoed material is irrelevant because I still have access to scientists themselves and can get a far more interesting scoop than regurgitating a press release.”
So why go on about it? And why make the absurd statement that “all my work here at Genetics and Health is pointless and of no value whatsoever” because some jobsworth won’t let you into their club.
As have said elsewhere, only the lamest journalists need embargoed press releases.
By the way, anyone can get into trade shows. Try getting a free pass for an expensive conference.
Michael: I know you’re new here but a lot of what you pointed out was said in jest. I do have a sense of humor.
That’s absurd. Were it an old media company embracing blogs that were applying this would be a moot point. Clearly they are truly clueless.
You’re one of the nerdiest science writers I know (a compliment I assure you) so I’m baffled at their stance, but the writing on the wall is there. Bloggers are a force to be reckoned with…
65 comments… I think you struck a nerve.
The point is that not all bloggers should be allowed in, but just as they look at each application for the other media that applies, they should also review each blogger application on an individual basis. If the blogger has the same credentials as the typical scientific journalist, why can’t they be allowed access to embargoed material?
I don’t understand the comments about this being a moral crusade because I see it as someone who has the educational and scientific clout wondering why she is discriminated against simply because blogging is her medium.
Basically EurekAlert is saying that even if the Surgeon General applied for embargoed access, but listed that it was for his blog, he too would be denied. Silly.
Hey Robyn. I’m glad to see you here.
I agree Shannon. They should review each application and allow Hsien access.
Shannon wrote: “Basically EurekAlert is saying that even if the Surgeon General applied for embargoed access, but listed that it was for his blog, he too would be denied. Silly.”
Wrong example. Why should the Surgeon General have prior access to embargoed material? So that they can prepare a defence for things to be said about them?
Read what I wrote.
“Eurekalert! should review applications from bloggers just as it would any other bid for access. If someone can meet the same criteria as a freelance writer, for example, then they should grant access.”
Shannon also wrote “The point is that not all bloggers should be allowed in”.
That is now the line, but only after I suggested it.
At first the argument was “I AM AN IMPORTANT BLOGGER WITH LOTS OF DEGREES, I DEMAND ACCESS OR I WILL TAKE MY TOYS AWAY”.
As to the “65 comments… I think you struck a nerve.” Count their content. Not their numbers.
Were I over at Eurekalet! vetting an application, I would see the vapid and content free tenor of most of these messages as a confirmation of my original decision.
This is not the place to try to persuade the AAAS. Hsien should enlist the support of the people behind this bolt hole. Or possibly one or two Nobel prize winners.
Then again, any company can set itself up as a media giant in these e-days. I have never heard of b5media. They may be the next Google. Or they may be a couple of undergraduates whiling away the hours between bouts of binge drinking.
I have regular dealings with other start ups burning up venture capital cash. I know just how seriously to take them. The usual phrase to describe these things is “crash and burn”.
In a nutshell, it is the blog words that scares the AAAS. And with good reason given that 99% of all known blogs are crap.
Back to earning a living with this writing caper.
Robyn: Feel the force.
Shannon: I appreciate the support! I know you get it.
Karen: Access or no access, blogging goes on.
Michael: I’m honored you’ve spent so much of your valuable time here defending old media and EurekAlert! I shall also go back to earning a living with my writing as I have been doing for the past…13 years. But I know that pales in comparison to old guards like you. Cheers.
Michael,
Maybe you missed my point. By citing the Surgeon General I was simply saying that someone with all the medical criteria and clout in the world would be denied simply based upon the fact that he uses blogging as his medium to convey it. Based on what EuerkAlert told Hsien in their follow up email, they simply don’t see blogging as a legitimate way to convey scientific information.
I don’t see this post by Hsien as a tantrum to make EurekAlert change their minds. I see it as someone who was simply venting that she wasn’t taken seriously because she blogs.
I also think the amount of comments posted is simply due to many serious bloggers not being respected and it really has nothing to do with EurekAlert, science and what not. The nerve struck is with the bloggers themselves who have made all efforts to follow the rules of journalism and no matter how professional or how much education we have in our backgrounds, we are still seen on a level playing field as someone who is just writing about X or Y just for fun.
“By citing the Surgeon General I was simply saying that someone with all the medical criteria and clout in the world would be denied simply based upon the fact that he uses blogging as his medium to convey it.”
You should have cited someone in the media who blogs, rather than a scientist. Maybe that Huffington woman, who seems to be all the rage. Or someone on Slate.
There is good reason to keep things away from folks like the Surgeon General. It is called insider trading.
Papers in the journals can influence share prices. Newspapers have rules that disbar their writers from dealing in the companies that they write about.
It may be that b5media has similar rules, in which case Hsien would be covered. But that does not apply to most bloggers, many of whom run their own show.
Don’t forget, EurekAlert! is only the middle man in the chain, sitting between the folks with material they want to release and the hacks who are drooling at the mouth awaiting its arrival.
As I have said several times, the mistake is to make the case for bloggers to have access. Just as some freelance writers are allowed in while others are not, the same should apply to bloggers.
I’d give it a few months before the AAAS begins to mend its ways.
A good ally to have on board would be the NASW. If they are “blogger friendly” then the AAAS will take some notice.
In other words, engage your brains and make a sensible case.
Lousy thinking if they keep up this thing they’ll turn back to you, but until then that’s that. Good luck finding people who appreciate your work better.
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