Wired Science Blog Network Launches!
September 14, 2010
crossposting from DM on Scientopia:
Wow. Wired Science has launched a blog network of six writers that looks fashioned in the mold of the Discovery Magazine blog stable. Look who’s joined up.
Wired Science Blog Network
Pretty good lineup, mostly ex-Scienceblogs.com authors, looks like- Brian Romans of Clastic Detritus is the only one of the six to not previously have blogged at the Sb, as far as I know.
There’s a couple of things that jump out, in addition to the WOW! factor of such interesting writers being pulled together. @KateClancy observed:
Wow, only one woman in the new Wired Science Blog network… it’s like we just don’t do science or write about it…
@KateClancy another trend in new science blog networks is that there aren’t any scientists in them, just journalists.
And naturally, your most humble narrator noticed that the lineup is kinda….pale.
Perhaps these are issues they might care to address with any subsequent recruiting they might do….
DrugMonkey 
September 14, 2010 at 2:39 pm
Looks like Dan MacArthur of Genetic Future is moving there as well: http://scienceblogs.com/geneticfuture/2010/09/genetic_future_is_moving_to_wi.php
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September 14, 2010 at 3:19 pm
I’ve been to busy with the personal stuff to ever get back to the lack of diversity I mentioned at Scientopia.
Can I say not surprised by the lack of diversity there either. Rebuttal will include:
“Oh but wait this is just friends who like each other.”
“its nothing to do with popularity, just a community of shared interests.”
“we asked 1 person, they said no. not our fault”
“we’re working on it”
“we cant’ find anyone”
blah blah blah…
s
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September 14, 2010 at 3:42 pm
Or it could just be they’re just representing the sex division of their readers:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/intersection/2010/09/13/what-girls-arent-reading/
We all know that men wouldn’t want to read the writing of a women and does anyone seriously believe that more female writers might actually bring in more female readership? 🙂
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September 15, 2010 at 7:21 am
Thanks for the link, DM. And I agree with your initial feelings about the lineup – when I first saw the image you posted above, I thought “Really? Mostly male and pale again?” Even though I think WIRED picked a great crop of bloggers for their launch, I was disappointed by the lack of diversity (as others have pointed out, a recurring theme on science blog networks) and I, too, hope that subsequent recruiting will help to even out the present imbalance.
My only objection to the concerns posted above is the comment from @myrmecos stating that there aren’t any scientists in the new blog networks. In the case of WIRED Science blogs, this isn’t true; a look over the profiles in the launch post shows that about half of the new bloggers are active researchers and/or professors. (Hell, I even missed the launch of the network because I was at the museum cleaning up a 65 million year old crocodile skeleton to study and eventually publish on.) Many networks are recruiting science journalists – people that editors probably already know and have been following – but the assertion that there are no scientists on new science blog networks is bull.
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September 15, 2010 at 11:05 am
“noticed that the lineup is kinda….pale. ”
Yeah, they should recruit some dark people.
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September 19, 2010 at 4:50 pm
It’s cause they’ve been in the lab for so long. I’m too pale as well, and I’m a scientist in California.
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