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Peer Review and Scientific Publishing in Times of Web 2.0

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Abstract

The second half of the twentieth century brought major changes in the society and consequently in the different areas of the sciences. The growing number of universities after the second world war, the post-war industrial growth and later digitalization transformed the sciences present until then, enlarged the scientific community and the number of scientific publications. In the last couple of decades, the creation of web 2.0 brought new possibilities for knowledge co-production, interaction and exchange between all interested parties in research. The goal of this paper is to explore the possibilities for (extended) peer review and quality control on the internet, primarily blogs and social media, which could contribute to the standard peer review process and open the sciences to a wider audience. We are wondering if these processes could also raise the quality in science and lead to the democratization of knowledge production. We argue that changes in science also have an impact in reshaping the society and bringing democratization in knowledge production.

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Notes

  1. Margolis and Resnick [10].

  2. McQuail [11].

  3. Bentivegna [3].

  4. Stromer-Galley [16].

  5. Cammaerts and Carpentier [4].

  6. Funtowicz [8].

  7. Ravetz and Funtowicz [13].

  8. Walker [18].

  9. Idem.

  10. Solomon [10].

  11. Funtowicz [8].

  12. Idem.

  13. Pickard [12].

  14. Arms [1].

  15. Pickard [12].

  16. Idem.

  17. Arms [1].

  18. Idem.

  19. Daniels and Feagin [6].

  20. Pickard [12].

  21. Van Rooyen et al. [17].

  22. Idem.

  23. Solomon [15].

  24. Debate [7].

  25. Chang [5].

  26. Solomon [15].

  27. Idem.

  28. Daniels and Feagin [6].

  29. Idem.

  30. Idem.

  31. Arms [1].

  32. Idem.

  33. Idem.

  34. Hermida [9].

  35. Brumfiel [3].

  36. Idem.

  37. Idem.

  38. Pickard [12].

  39. Singer [14].

  40. Arms [1].

  41. Bentivegna [2].

  42. Daniels and Feagin [6].

  43. Ravetz and Funtowicz [13].

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Acknowledgments

The author thanks Prof. Silvio Funtowicz who contributed to this paper with his valuable comments and by sharing his knowledge with the author.

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  1. Joint Research Centre, Institute for the Protection and Security of the Citizen, European Commission, Via E. Fermi 2749, 21027, Ispra, Italy

    Lucia Vesnic-Alujevic

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  1. Lucia Vesnic-Alujevic
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Correspondence to Lucia Vesnic-Alujevic.

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Vesnic-Alujevic, L. Peer Review and Scientific Publishing in Times of Web 2.0. Pub Res Q 30, 39–49 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12109-014-9345-8

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