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Social networking for physicists

By Hamish Johnston
Yesterday I was at a conference in London put on by the Specialised Information Publishers Association, or SIPA.

Although SIPA members publish both print and electronic products, old-fashioned paper was barely ever mentioned and the focus was on the Internet.

A great deal of discussion was devoted to building social networking sites for professionals — and we were treated to several success stories.

Some speakers argued that social networking is the next big thing for professionals, and instead of happening on massive public sites like Facebook or Bebo, professionals will interact on much smaller and much more exclusive “niche” sites.

An example cited by several speakers is SERMO, which claims to have over 65,000 doctors as members.

But what about physicists?

In September, the Institute of Physics (which owns the company that publishes physicsworld.com) plans to launch a social networking site for its members. The network has the working title MyIOP and according to the IOP’s Karen Bayless, “The network will enhance members’ ability to interact with each other more widely”.

Do you use social networking sites as a physicist?

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Comments (1)

  • 1 Daniel Colegate July 11, 2008 8:55 AM

    Good morning,

    I stumbled across this blog article by chance today and found it very interesting. I agree that smaller networking websites are far more useful. I have some experience of this.

    I am one of two graduate researchers who have recently launched The Graduate Junction. The aim of the website is to help Masters, PhD and postdoctoral researchers find
    others who share their research interests. (www.graduatejunction.com)

    We have been met with an overwhelmingly positive response from researchers, academics and academic institutions in the UK and now as we spread the news further afield we are being met with the same response.

    Best wishes

    Dan

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