Spaced Out ::

It’s Impact Factor time!! All the movers and shakers will be looking through the citation reports from Thomson Reuters to see how the different publications are performing and find out who’s up and who’s down!! Yet again it’s very pleasing to report an increase at the Journal of Maps, this time going from 1.19 to 1.44. As I said last year, the 1.0 boundary is a watershed as that is the point at which there are more citations than articles published. This year’s editorial summarises this performance showing that the big change was an extra issue which increased the articles from 62 (2014) to 72. Given the in-built lag in the 2 year Impact Factor I would ordinarily expect a decrease so what this shows is that we have a “rising roll” of incoming citations. In short - excellent performance. Downloads finished the year on 33,000, up from 26,000.

And don’t forget to look at this year’s “Best Map” winner which is available for free download from Taylor and Francis.

Well, just when you thought the Finch Report had had the last word in open access publication and access to government funded research… we find that the government itself is, errr, withholding access to government funded research! Yesterday Sense About Science published its report entitled Missing Evidence.

Yes its true, but rather than a pre-designed political malfeasance to withhold information and evidence what the report has found is

“weak rules and chaotic systems. It turns out that we don’t know what has become of millions of pounds of government-commissioned research. Government itself doesn’t know: some departments have no idea how much research they have commissioned, whether it was published, or where it all is now.”

Not surprisingly then the recommendations are for a standardised central register, clear definitions of “external research” and prompt publication. All very sensible and it is desirable that we both bring government into line with the rest of the sector and, more importantly, make evidence openly available in a timely manner that can inform public debate and so democracy. It is part of the checks and balances of open government allowing elected officials to be held accountable for the decisions they make.

Following on from my earlier post from Sense About Science, the government have now suspended implementation of the anti-lobbying clause for further consultation. Whilst not removed (yet), this is good news and allows researchers to set out a sensible case.

A small milestone with a paper from my PhD (Smith, M.J. and Clark, C.D. (2005) “Methods for the visualisation of digital elevation models for landform mapping.” Earth Surface Processes and Landforms, 30, 7, 885-900) hitting its century of citations - yes 100! Bringing flashbacks just looking at it again!!!

Yes, believe it or not the government wants to STOP scientists from influencing Parliament when they have funded research. As SenseAboutScience note:

you will be as worried as we are about the government’s plans to add a new anti-lobbying clause to all public funding, to prevent it being used for ‘activity intended to influence or attempt to influence Parliament, Government or political parties, or attempting to influence the awarding or renewal of contracts and grants, or attempting to influence legislative or regulatory action’.

Yes, there is a rationale…

It follows a report in 2014 that government funds go to some groups who use them more to influence policy than to do what they’re intended for. That may be true. But you need only give a moment’s thought to the breadth of this new clause to realise that in an attempt to get rid of a small irritant, the government is causing far more damage. This is not the behaviour of a government at ease with itself. It is defensive and paranoid.

… but it’s daft and not something and open and transparent society should have. So sign the petition, write to the Prime Minister, to your MP and to Matt Hancock, the Minister for the Cabinet Office who is responsible for the clause.