ScienceSoWhat - So Who?

[mjrobbins]

In response to Frank's request for feedback, I thought I'd pitch in with some criticisms and suggestions regarding SSW's anonymity.

Twitter:
SSW's Twitter feed consists mostly of links to BBC and NS stories, adds no context, and is often woefully out of date on the stories it reports (for example relating the 'news' today that scientists aren't convinced about Ida - stuff we were talking about in May. Furthermore, there's no engagement with other twitter users - no @s, no RTs, nothing.

Communication:
That leads me on to communication more generally. layscience.net is now quite a prominent group blog with some 18 contributors now (and growing). I get regular e-mails from the PR departments of charities, the BBC, Economist and so on. Yet, I've heard nothing from ScienceSoWhat - no press releases, no notice of events, no invitations, nothing. It seems there's little attempt to engage with other science writers on the web.

The Website:
1) I'm not sure who the website is supposed to be aimed at - the bright lego colours suggest kids.
2) The content seems very unremarkable. The features at the top include Alom Shaha's video from many months ago, and the now dull Diet Coke + Methos explosion. The articles are reruns of articles you'd find elsewhere on the web, and fairly characterless. There doesn't seem to be anything original on the site, or to put it another way, it fails to add value. Updates seem to be few and far between. Given the limited staff, producing content of your own seems pointless since you can't compete with a good individual blog, let alone the likes of New Scientist. Securing drastically more writers from e.g. the civil service is about the only way to rescue that side of things.
3) Finally, you've spoken previously about this project being a hub, yet the site makes no reference to other writers or the blogosphere.


To summarize, it's all very professionally done, but I still don't understand what SSW is trying to achieve, or who it's trying to aim at. Furthermore, the website adds no value to online science - there's no reason to bookmark it. I'd love to finish with some more helpful advice, but I think that until you can clarify the aims and goals, that's a fairly futile exercise.

Sorry of this all sounds a bit harsh!

[Frank Swain]

Hi Martin, thanks for the feedback. As a quick response (as my tea is in the oven)

Twitter:
SSW's Twitter feed consists mostly of links to BBC and NS stories, adds no context, and is often woefully out of date on the stories it reports (for example relating the 'news' today that scientists aren't convinced about Ida - stuff we were talking about in May. Furthermore, there's no engagement with other twitter users - no @s, no RTs, nothing

The Twitter feed does have a large amount of BBC and NS content, true but it also draws from Ars Technica, Alpha Galileo, EurekaAlert, Science News, Sci Am, as well as the SSW research partners BBSRC, EPSRC, NERC, STFC, and so on. The reason it draws more from the BBC and NS is because these are the most friendly formats for non-scientists. It's a bit glib to call it 'often woefully out of date' because of the Ida piece - the BBC news article is dated 21 Oct! Yes, most scientists / science-heads already expected as much, but the paper has only just been published. So it goes.

Engagement - it's tricky, as I'm not being paid to sit 8 hours a day on Twitter! I RT and reply if I can, but the level of investment in Twitter is deliberately light because our core audience are not the very small tech savvy proportion of people in the UK already using this service. Must try harder, yes, but I also need to keep an eye on where best my efforts are put.

Communication:
That leads me on to communication more generally. layscience.net is now quite a prominent group blog with some 18 contributors now (and growing). I get regular e-mails from the PR departments of charities, the BBC, Economist and so on. Yet, I've heard nothing from ScienceSoWhat - no press releases, no notice of events, no invitations, nothing. It seems there's little attempt to engage with other science writers on the web.

Not sure what you're expecting - SSW isn't running any events at the moment, what kind of invitations / press releases are you meaning? The SSW site is on a soft launch - e.g. IE6 bug has only just been ironed out today. Consider it in late beta, when we are at full tilt we might send out some press releases, if they'd be of benefit (e.g. if we have exclusive content, and so on)

I'll address your further points a bit later - I have to dash off right now.

[mjrobbins]

Thanks for the replies. The responses so far raise the question; If SSW aren't running any events, and aren't producing much in the way of exclusive content, then what are they doing? What is the site there for? What are SSW there for?

The aims you stated a while back were:

* an appreciation of the value of science (popularise and mainstream science)
* a sense of public ownership and pride in scientific achievements
* make the links between the taxpayers’ money and the science it funds
* a greater awareness of careers in science (and careers that require an understanding of science)
* raise awareness about the benefits of careers in science - for individuals, society and the economy

But I'm not sure I understand how the website at present is helping to meet those objectives. It feels like it's lacking a place in an overall strategy.

[Frank Swain]

Sorry for the delay, I'm in the US for a freelance feature. By the miracles of wifi and netbooks I'm still in touch though.

The Website:
1) I'm not sure who the website is supposed to be aimed at - the bright lego colours suggest kids.
2) The content seems very unremarkable. The features at the top include Alom Shaha's video from many months ago, and the now dull Diet Coke + Methos explosion. The articles are reruns of articles you'd find elsewhere on the web, and fairly characterless. There doesn't seem to be anything original on the site, or to put it another way, it fails to add value. Updates seem to be few and far between. Given the limited staff, producing content of your own seems pointless since you can't compete with a good individual blog, let alone the likes of New Scientist. Securing drastically more writers from e.g. the civil service is about the only way to rescue that side of things.
3) Finally, you've spoken previously about this project being a hub, yet the site makes no reference to other writers or the blogosphere.

Absolutely agree that there's little point in creating an entirely new magazine website when there are fantastic ones out there already (and wrote as much in the comms strategy some months back). Similarly, I'd much prefer to see the SSW site run as a crowdsourced venture with government support rather than oversight. There is a whole host of problems implicit in this that I don't think can be overcome without major restructuring of the campaign strategy. Right now, that plainly isn't going to happen.

On the cover of things, the website must work to support the campaign objectives, a large part of which will mean coordinating with PR firm Kindred's initiatives, and producing somewhat safe content in line with that. It was never going to be able to compete with pre-existing online science content, but it can operate as a sandbox for trying new ideas. The real value is stuff like what we're doing right now in this forum - establishing a dialogue so that your ideas can make it to the ears of Lord Drayson. Believe it or not, they are keeping an eye on this forum. It's not often that the sci comm community gets an audience with the upper echelons of government, so speak loud, speak often, and speak sensibly...

[DrKate]

In my humble opinion - the one thing that needs strengthening is the careers section. We have a means to capture an audience here and we immediately direct them away to other websites.

When I was at school (~15 years ago) the careers advice was appalling, especially for those interested in science. I think we should make much more of how to get into science, what it requires, and have more case studies presented on the website. Perhaps even a question and answer function to working scientists.

[Tim Jones]

Hi Frank,

This is a response to your appeal on Twitter for feedback; and I've also recently supplied some content to the site via Greg Foot

Firstly, I find myself agreeing with the underlying sentiments in Martin's points above, re clarity of where SWS fits into the broader strategy. I can also see this is something of a sandbox for experiment, so deserves to be cut some slack - but only if there is a timetable for review/decision making. So I guess my points/questions are:


1. Content. The content per se looks good and the site mechanics are slick enough.

2. Strategy. Issue here is where the site fits in with other initiatives in a broader picture.

3. Measurement. How is the success of the site being measured? Can you see whether you are reaching the intended audience? For example, you mention Twitter isn't really the target audience, because that constituency is I guess already tech-aware at least, but neither it would seem is Facebook (only 3 group members now including me). At least with Twitter and Facebook you could do some profiling of users (within ethical/legal constraints).

So, what are the site's (and your PR agency's) kpis - and how are things looking? What got me thinking on this aspect was one of my own small projects (Exquisite Corpse) which SSW links to. The project invites folk to make a drawing of what they think is important in science for linking into a larger mosaic. It struck me how few referrals had reached my site from SSW; in fact zero after the first day. I'ts no skin off my nose, but it struck me that I should have had more hits from people just clicking around having a look. Andrew Maynard's blog on my project is also linked to from SSW, and he has had zero hits too. So we're not even getting the monkey score .

4. Community. The site doesn't lend itself to building a community. We are back to Martin's point on value, plus I don't see mechanisms to establish and maintain self-fueling momentum: like projects on the site itself rather than links to external projects. Once someone has engaged with an off-site project via the site, there is no insentive to come back. That may well be the intention, but then we are back to what the 'unique value proposition' of the site is(excuse the suit speak).

5.Promotion. I don't know how the site is being promoted and it's not clear to me how successful any promotion has been - which comes back to what you are measuring? I wonder if there is sufficient mutual promotion between the various govt websites (for example those concerned with innovation etc)? Is SWS appropriately linked into aspects of education strategy/syllabus etc? In marketng speak, is the idea to build SWS as a brand? I'd be interesting to see the PR strategy and deliverables if available. Is anything physical and hands on being done to promote SSW - like visits to schools etc.? My nephews (12 & 15) had never heard of it. Lastly, look at Change 4 Life: a very visible campaign with a clear message and TV advertising etc. On what arguments does SSW and science in general NOT receive that level of exposure. Is it cost, the message isn't clear / there is no message, or what?

6.Agenda. In the language of the Science Studies folks, I guess the balance of the site is at the 'Scientistic' or less questioning positivist end of the scale.

Anyhow, hope those comments are of some use. I know finding solutions to challenges is the hard bit.

Regards

Tim

[Frank Swain]

1. Content. The content per se looks good and the site mechanics are slick enough.

Cheers - the design team will be pleased to hear it!

2. Strategy. Issue here is where the site fits in with other initiatives in a broader picture.

3. Measurement. How is the success of the site being measured? Can you see whether you are reaching the intended audience? For example, you mention Twitter isn't really the target audience, because that constituency is I guess already tech-aware at least, but neither it would seem is Facebook (only 3 group members now including me). At least with Twitter and Facebook you could do some profiling of users (within ethical/legal constraints).

So, what are the site's (and your PR agency's) kpis - and how are things looking? What got me thinking on this aspect was one of my own small projects (Exquisite Corpse) which SSW links to. The project invites folk to make a drawing of what they think is important in science for linking into a larger mosaic. It struck me how few referrals had reached my site from SSW; in fact zero after the first day. I'ts no skin off my nose, but it struck me that I should have had more hits from people just clicking around having a look. Andrew Maynard's blog on my project is also linked to from SSW, and he has had zero hits too. So we're not even getting the monkey score .

4. Community. The site doesn't lend itself to building a community. We are back to Martin's point on value, plus I don't see mechanisms to establish and maintain self-fueling momentum: like projects on the site itself rather than links to external projects. Once someone has engaged with an off-site project via the site, there is no insentive to come back. That may well be the intention, but then we are back to what the 'unique value proposition' of the site is(excuse the suit speak).

Forgive me for bundling these together, but it's all inter-related. I believe the site was originally intended to support the activities of Kindred, so that when they placed a science piece in the press or a magazine, there could be a website for people to follow up the story, with more info etc. Obviously the problem with that we have inherited a site (both myself and BDP Media only came on board recently) that is stuck in an outdated 'top-down' approach to science communication. I'm pushing to be more creative with the site and use it to trial tools that will support people's engagement (in fact, the entire campaign needs to be more focussed on this). E.g. a Google map mashup for parents to find science days out for kids in their area, or supporting events that will make it easier for scientists to get media training. Or run a competition for young people to upload an experiment on YouTube demonstrating some science principle (OK that's been done already, but it's a cool idea). But obviously it takes time for these ideas to percolate up to the decision makers.

One thing is obvious - even with excellent content, the SSW cannot compete with ScienceBlogs or New Scientist or Discover magazine in being a "go-to" place for science info. All the really interesting stuff about science that people care about is politically charged or personal, neither which lend themselves well to an official government website. The blog on there is simply supposed to provide a hook that will lead users further into the site. In my view, any online stuff needs to operate a step above where it is now - encouraging & supporting interesting, passionate and opinionated scientists to write about their work (or be confident about communicating it to the media) rather than trying to write about science ourselves.

I'm not sure what the KPIs are for the PR team, but the success of the site itself is based on growth of traffic measured by the usual web metrics. I believe Lord Drayson is going to release them soon. Tricky though to translate those into real-world impact - how many people who read the site got more involved in science / chose a science degree / etc?

5.Promotion. I don't know how the site is being promoted and it's not clear to me how successful any promotion has been - which comes back to what you are measuring? I wonder if there is sufficient mutual promotion between the various govt websites (for example those concerned with innovation etc)? Is SWS appropriately linked into aspects of education strategy/syllabus etc? In marketing speak, is the idea to build SWS as a brand? I'd be interesting to see the PR strategy and deliverables if available. Is anything physical and hands on being done to promote SSW - like visits to schools etc.? My nephews (12 & 15) had never heard of it. Lastly, look at Change 4 Life: a very visible campaign with a clear message and TV advertising etc. On what arguments does SSW and science in general NOT receive that level of exposure. Is it cost, the message isn't clear / there is no message, or what?

Unfortunately as the lowly sci-comm kid, I don't have access to the PR stuff off hand though I could try and get them for you. Certainly there are plans for SSW as a brand - I believe that most projects that use money from it must carry the logo, for example. In terms of physical stuff, yes - off the top of my head there's the Bloodhound attempt to break the land speed record with a 1,000 mph car, and SSW also sponsored the ScienceOnline conference of science bloggers earlier this year. I'd like to see far more things like that happening.

As a final word, it's important not to confuse the SSW website with the SSW campaign - many of the campaign goals as listed in earlier posts can't be met through a website. The site previously existed to support the PR campaign, and I'm doing my best to make it something much better than that. But ultimately, what we need is real-world projects with tangible results.

[mjrobbins]

In my view, any online stuff needs to operate a step above where it is now - encouraging & supporting interesting, passionate and opinionated scientists to write about their work (or be confident about communicating it to the media) rather than trying to write about science ourselves.

Okay, but there a danger here, and an opportunity. Firstly, I don't believe SSW should carry any original content. It seems contrary to your mission to try and suck hits away from the rest of the blogosphere.

But, as I identified when I expanded my site, there are a shit load of people who would like to write about science, but don't want the hassle of setting up and maintaining a blog and writing for it regularly. Why not have a mini-directory listing science blogs like ours who are willing to carry guest posts from scientists who want to explore the idea of blogging?

Unfortunately as the lowly sci-comm kid, I don't have access to the PR stuff off hand

This seems to me to be completely backwards. I really get the impression that the people in charge of this fundamentally don't understand what they're trying to do, or how to do it.

As a final word, it's important not to confuse the SSW website with the SSW campaign - many of the campaign goals as listed in earlier posts can't be met through a website.

The problem is, there isn't an SSW Campaign, therefore the website is the campaign. Can you point to anything else that SSW have actually done?

[Frank Swain]

In my view, any online stuff needs to operate a step above where it is now - encouraging & supporting interesting, passionate and opinionated scientists to write about their work (or be confident about communicating it to the media) rather than trying to write about science ourselves.

Okay, but there a danger here, and an opportunity. Firstly, I don't believe SSW should carry any original content. It seems contrary to your mission to try and suck hits away from the rest of the blogosphere.

But, as I identified when I expanded my site, there are a shit load of people who would like to write about science, but don't want the hassle of setting up and maintaining a blog and writing for it regularly. Why not have a mini-directory listing science blogs like ours who are willing to carry guest posts from scientists who want to explore the idea of blogging?

The problem is one of endorsement - a sad fact of politics is that no amount of "SSW has no control over content of outside websites" will wash. A link is an implicit endorsement of everything on that site. This is why I'd much rather see SSW money for online programmes used to run, say, a day's workshop on popular writing for scientists, or support events like ScienceOnline, or set up some kind of system to allow bloggers the same access to politicians as journalists have. (The emphasis above is because science bloggers are just one piece of the puzzle.)

Unfortunately as the lowly sci-comm kid, I don't have access to the PR stuff off hand

This seems to me to be completely backwards. I really get the impression that the people in charge of this fundamentally don't understand what they're trying to do, or how to do it.

. See Pallab Ghosh's comments at the start of the campaign.

As a final word, it's important not to confuse the SSW website with the SSW campaign - many of the campaign goals as listed in earlier posts can't be met through a website.

The problem is, there isn't an SSW Campaign, therefore the website is the campaign. Can you point to anything else that SSW have actually done?

I think maybe you're just a teeny tiny bit guilty of believing because you haven't seen it, it doesn't exist! See previous comment on Bloodhound, ScienceOnline 09 etc. I can badger my superiors for a list, I think it would be good to see it all in one place. In addition, there are a lot of science news stories placed in newspapers and magazine that are in that scary world beyond the limits of Google and won't necessarily end up carrying the SSW tag. For example women's magazines Reveal, Best and Glamour will be carrying light science pieces subbed by Kindred next month. Another item on serendipity in science went onto the AP newswire last week. Professor Armand Leroi was on the radio Monday I think, talking about Darwin. I have my reservations about the top-down strategy, but let's face it: the women who read Best probably don't read Lay Science. The campaign has a duty to reach all kinds of audiences, many of whom don't use the internet...

[Jon(HolfordWatch)]

To be fair, there have been various other things SSW have done as part of their campaign: they got a fair bit of mainstream media coverage, for example, and have sponsored various things. I've been critical of the website and the campaign - but it is important to acknowledge what they have achieved, as well as what could have been done better.

EDIT: Frank just crossposted saying much the same thing, in more detail