Category: RW announcements

In March, we asked Retraction Watch readers for some financial support. A number of you contributed and continue to, for which we’re very grateful.

One of the things we wanted to do with those funds was hire other writers, specifically an intern. So we’re pleased to introduce the first-ever Retraction Watch intern, Cat Ferguson.

Ferguson, whose first post will go live later today and who will join us in earnest next week, just graduated from the University of California, Santa Cruz’s Science Communication Program. She has already written for the New Yorker online, and for New Scientist, among other outlets.

Here’s what she had to say about writing that New Yorker piece: Continue reading Meet the first-ever Retraction Watch intern. And: Thanks, readers

Retraction Watch readers: We need help.

As many of our loyal tipsters know, the list of retractions and related stories that we can’t get to just keeps getting longer. And as we grow, we want to groom a stable of paid freelance — and perhaps one day full-time — Retraction Watch contributors.

So with that in mind — and knowing that it can be difficult for early-career journalists to gain experience in accountability journalism — we’ve decided the an internship is the first investment we’ll make with funds our generous supporters have sent us.

Continue reading Retraction Watch is hiring an intern: Here’s how to apply

If you were gathering references to write a paper, or just keeping studies in an online library, wouldn’t it be nice to get an alert any time any of those papers was retracted?

Well, now you can. We’re very pleased to announce that PubChase, a free biomedical literature search and recommendation tool, will now feature links to Retraction Watch posts. As PubChase writes in an announcement of the new initiative: Continue reading Want alerts about retractions of papers in your library? Check out PubChase

Ivan is on a public panel in Berlin at 7 p.m. on Wednesday night, November 2: “Science 2.0 – More knowledge, more transparency, more quality? How Web 2.0 has changed science.”

Joining him in the discussion, which will be in English, are: Continue reading Come see Retraction Watch in Berlin

If you’re a Retraction Watch reader in New York or St. Louis, come see Retraction Watch live. On Thursday, October 20, Ivan will be on a SONYC panel at Rockefeller University [please see update at end]. On the 25th, he’ll give a talk at the Danforth Center in St. Louis.

More info: Continue reading Upcoming Retraction Watch appearances: New York, St. Louis

This week’s episode of NPR’s “On The Media” features a conversation about retractions between Ivan and co-host Brooke Gladstone. You can listen online, or find a station that carries the program.

The show also includes an interview about retractions with Jonah Lehrer.

Earlier: Retraction Watch on NPR’s Science Friday. Listen here (with transcript).

It’s a nice way to celebrate our first anniversary this week: Ivan will appear today on Science Friday, the nationally syndicated NPR program hosted by Ira Flatow.

The segment, “If Science Takes A Wrong Turn, Who Rights It,” is part of the show’s first hour, at 2 p.m. Eastern. It will also feature Grant Steen, whose work we’ve covered.

You can listen online, or find a station near you that carries it, if you’re in the U.S. It’s live, so call in — you know we love hearing from Retraction Watch readers. It will also be archived on the site, so you can listen later.

Update, 5:15 Eastern, 8/5/11: Here’s that archived audio (top left corner).

Misconduct happens. So what can journal editors do find and prevent it?

While we don’t claim to be experts in working on the other side of the fence — eg as editors — Ivan was flattered to be asked by session organizers at the Council of Science Editors to appear on a panel on the subject. He was joined on the panel by:

• Science executive editor Monica Bradford
• Annals of Internal Medicine editor in chief Christine Laine
• American Association for Cancer Research publisher Diane Scott-Lichter
• Committee on Publication Ethics’s Liz Wager

Their presentations were chock-full of good tips and data. Bradford, for example, said that Science had published 45 retractions since 1997. And Laine recommended copying all of a manuscript’s authors on every communication, which could help prevent author forgery that seems to be creeping into the literature.

So we hope their slides will be online soon. In the meantime, Ivan’s slides are here (scroll down a bit so that the entire first slide, and navigation, are visible below the CSE banner): Continue reading How journal editors can detect and deter scientific misconduct

We’re pleased to announce that we now have a regular column in Lab Times, the bimonthly magazine for European life scientists.

The topic of our first piece is one that we hope resonates with Retraction Watch readers. Drawing on our experience chasing down retraction notices, we call for all such notices — as well as all corrections — to be open access: Continue reading Why all retraction notices should be open access: Our first LabTimes column