When I was in a meeting today, someone asked for proof that another person is an expert in his field; he requested that this proof appear in the form of a blog post, a wiki, or some sort of other non-peer-review format.
This got me to thinking about the credence that academia has come to attach to Web 2.0 technologies. Another friend of mine recently published an article on Code4Lib (Jason Thomale, google his name; he's brilliant); this created a stir in the metadata, cataloging, and coding realm, much of which was displayed in Web 2.0 technologies, and this all has resulted in professional acclaim for him.
Having grown up with the academic attitude of publish or perish, where peer-reviewed articles are the only valid publication means by which tenure may be judged, I am growing to enjoy this progressive trend.
There are obvious questions.
How do we trust information that is randomly posted online, with no vetting process, and can unvetted information be cited with the same weight and merit as peer-reviewed publications?
I am reminded of the Wikipedia incident in which a man representing himself as a PhD had posted assorted history or art (I can't remember which) information; the public was stunned when it developed that this man was simply an amusing amateur. Was his information any less valid because he had misrepresented his identity? If I remember correctly--and shame on me for not looking this up prior to blogging about it--his information indeed was accurate, contained few errors.
Identity and reputation online are built, and then the real world intrudes. If the real world doesn't jive properly with the online identity one has created, one can find oneself cyber-culturally snubbed. I've discussed online identity manipulation before, but what about online reputation building? Reputation gives credence to what one publishes online; since reputation is the most important currency in the online realm of cyberculture and Web 2.0, the aura of a good reputation can credit one's words more strongly than it can in peer-review publishing circles.
Audience, reputation, and online publishing.
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Brilliant Ana. Brilliant. It reminds me of my grandmother who would quote from the National Enquirer as if it were gospel. She said "they printed it didn't they?" meaning it must be true. People today, as cynical as those young hipsters like to think they are, believe what they see online. If you say you are an expert, they'll agree. Use proper grammar, punctuation and they believe. A fun social experiment would be to create a couple different blogs with different writing styles but discussing the same topic. Would people flock to the misssspellled and ALL CAPS or the grammatically correct? Would long words or short words make a difference. Twould be interesting. Or has it already been done?
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