A few years ago the University of Oslo used to print its own telephone book. Some professors didn’t like that everyone could find them so easily, so they demanded to not be listed in the book. The campus is a pretty big place, and without a telephone number and address it could be really hard to find these people. Hence, they could go on with their research undisturbed. Nice!
The anecdote comes to mind as I’m searching for relevant literature for Project Undercurrent, which is now going into a more active phase. So how do you find the most interesting and relevant texts – articles, books, blog posts, texts of any type that might be of interest – about blogging/personal publishing and its relationship with journalism? I know the old, hard way – try to identify the seminal works in the field, check the authors’ sources, find new must-reads there (a process described by University of Chicago sociologist Andrew Abbott as an ape swinging through the trees. Via Daniel Drezner). There’s also the requirement to locate and read what your local scholars have been doing on the subject (even if you end up not being overimpressed by them, you should at least know their work). I am dutifully doing these things, and have indeed found interesting recent writings on journalism, for example work done for the Norwegian Power and Democracy research project.
There is however a structural problem with this established system of knowledge distribution. The web has something to do with it, and with the web, Google. With Google Scholar you suddenly have a very tempting possibility to bypass the old system, or swing through the trees at supersonic speed, if you like. The results you’ll get aren’t good enough yet, or should I say complete enough, but I still believe many people searching for thoughts and inspiration on a subject, at least those not about to write doctoral theses, will start with Google Scholar, or even the regular Google. Being visible there will then tremendously increase a scholar’s real impact factor, if not her academia-sanctioned impact, especially if the article/paper is immediately available in full text.
Cue the ongoing debates about the availability of research literature. The Open Access movement is gaining momentum worldwide, and the visibility effect of Google Scholar will only accelerate the process. It won’t be fun not to be found – hiding from the telephone book may have worked for some, the punishment for hiding from Google will be more severe. It took me much less time to find the fine Into the Blogosphere collection of articles than I had to spend to locate the University of Oslo’s Media Department project Participation and Play in Converging Media (where a blog was created in 2003, but has never been updated). The University of Minnesota is on another continent, the University of Oslo next door, but invisible.
A media studies classic from the 80’s is called “No Sense of Place”. The title was even better than the author could have imagined.
“Knowledge environments”- be it religious authorities, academia or professions – have a strong tradition in trying to keep what they know a secret. The basic assumption has been “why share the knowledge we have and risk losing our greatest asset?”. There’s no profit in sharing the recipes for Coca Cola or AIDS medicines.
The printing press and then the internet revolutionised the distribution of knowledge/information. I feel fortunate to be a student in the internet age – the net culture ethos of “we’re all in this, let’s share and build together” has had a remarkable impact, and there’s a lot of potential for further accomplishments. From protect and divide to share and level. The project confirms my belief in what the human kind is capable of.
Not that people don’t try to find ways to use the new media to restrict access to information. Like academic papers are hidden in inaccessible journals, a lot of information about my university is locked up behind a gate called “Studentportalen”. Even developments in my own department (Infomedia) can be hard to keep track of (a bit ironic given that media and information is its field). When I wonder what’s being researched and what the other students are doing I don’t expect to find much information online. New tools such as blogs have problems breaking through in the academic environment – our professors don’t blog. In the only case I can remember the blog stranded after just one post that read something like “I guess I have to try out this new thing they call blogging. I doubt it is for me, it seems like yet another way to fill the internet with garbage”. The reigning attitude will probably change but it’s a slow process.
In my research I’ve had great pleasure of using a tool called Watson. Watson is “looking over my shoulder” while I’m writing. With his “Artificial Intellect” he analyses what I’m writing about (content) and searches the Internet for simular articles. By keeping an eye on what Watson is coming up with, I find new sources to my research. You should try it out (www.intellext.com)