Peer Reviews through Digital Media

After this was mentioned in class, I wanted to find out a little bit more about how content that is not peer-reviewed can still be considered a reliable source of information.

I came across this article, which talks about the new system of peer-reviewing when content is published instantly.

“In the case of social platforms, the metric that drives discovery is how much interaction there is with your content on the social platform in question. Examples of such interaction include the numbers of followers you have and the number of times your content is shared, liked, commented on, [and] viewed.These metrics show how much interest there is in your papers, and how widely they are read right now, and thus provide a sense of their level of impact.”

Courtesy of birgerking from flickr.com

Personally, I’m not sure I’m ready to accept this as a reliable peer review. While something may be popular and getting lots of likes and shares on Facebook (we’ve all see, or even shared, those Huffington Post articles), that doesn’t mean it is ready to be cited in an academic paper.  While it’s great that ideas and content can be published instantly, they still need to take the next step to phase three of academic blogging to be taken seriously.

So, what are your thoughts? Can something be considered a reliable source if it is getting a lot of attention online? 

E-books or Printed Books?

The future of publishing is in e-books, at least that’s what I keep reading. However, my professors in editing and publishing hesitate to make that same claim. And, after doing a bit of research, I can see why. Yes, publishing electronic content has become very huge; people can download this content onto their smartphones or tablets and take it with them anywhere.  

Most of the users who read e-books will still buy physical copies of books as well. I, too, am one of those people. I have a Kindle Fire, and I love that I can purchase books without needing to go to a bookstore, which is great because the nearest Barnes and Noble is thirty minutes away from my house. That being said, I don’t buy a lot of books on my Kindle. I get the public domain books because they are free, and I will occasionally buy a bargain book when the price is right. However, when it comes to a book that I know I will want to read again or lend to friends or family members, I will buy the printed book. I know some people that will only buy the physical copies of books. And, despite the convenience of e-books, they will never consider letting go of their physical books or trying a device such as an e-reader.

This article from the Wallstreet Journal reported at the beginning of the year that brought up a good point: e-books are just another format. They serve a different purpose from the physical copies of books. So, just because there is a large, growing market for e-books, that doesn’t necessarily mean that the market for printed books will shrink and disappear for good. 

Digital Text, Plato, and Dynamic Expression: A Vlog

Some of my classmates have posted some great info on XML code and the potentialities of digital text on our respective group blogs. Here's a post that explains the basics of XML, and you can access all the blogs through http://mobydigital.blogspot.com. Okay, now watch the video  :)

Here's the link to Wesch's video! https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=NLlGopyXT_g#t=192
And here's Dr. Burton's original blog post: http://mobydigital.blogspot.com/2013/09/michael-weschs-machine-is-using-us.html

[Transcript below]