Thread by @cesifoti

You published a paper and want to share the news with others. Should you:

A. Humble brag in a post saying something like: I am honored our paper is now out in Journal X.
Or
B. Write a thread communicating your results.

I am strongly in favor of B. Let me explain. 🧵/

In science, but also in the wider society, you can find cultures that discourage bragging. Unfortunately many scientists confuse communicating with self-promotion, and hence, censor by sharing their findings in ways that don’t communicate. /2

Posting that a paper got published doesn’t communicate (you can say that of any paper). Also, it misses the point. After all, we don’t work to get published, we work to generate knowledge. Publications, talks, & even posts, are all part of a larger communication ecosystem. /3

Papers are great for legitimacy & for documenting detailed results & methods. They are not so great for disseminating the gist of a project or idea. Different forms of science communication serve different purposes. They are complements when used correctly. /4

Also, and I cannot stress this enough, as scientists we work to generate knowledge for everyone in society, not just other scientists. This is not a simple normative ideal. It is an idea with practical implications. There are tons of smart & creative people outside academia…

that are also in social media trying to harvest knowledge. But finding leads to interesting new things to learn (which is what a post can do), is hard when post say: “I am honored, here is a link to a PDF.”

Scientific impact requires reducing the friction needed for others to learn about new findings. We want scientific ideas to get to people in hospitals, non-profits, governments, the technical teams of companies, executives, etc.

These people (and most scientist too) don’t care that you got published. They care about what you have to say. What is the point. What is the contribution. Why they should learn more & what they can talk to you about.

When we understand that we are working on the creation of knowledge & ideas, not papers, then we see that writing a post, or a private note in a lab notebook, are all pieces of a larger puzzle: the puzzle of creating knowledge in a collective social effort.

So please, please, make the effort to communicate your results. I understand that twitter sometimes feels like a stream of diarrhea, but there are many people here swimming & sifting through this disgusting stream in search for leads about what to learn.

As an example, here are a couple of gems that I found recently, where researchers do a great job at trying to communicate their findings. /END

https://twitter.com/alisawuffles/status/1482575649654988800?s=21

https://twitter.com/emma__templeton/status/1483808455706169349