ScienceBlogs is an invitation-only

blog A blog (a Clipping (morphology), truncation of "weblog") is a discussion or informational website published on the World Wide Web consisting of discrete, often informal diary-style text entries (posts). Posts are typically displayed in Reverse ...

network and

virtual community A virtual community is a social network of individuals who connect through specific social media, potentially crossing geographical and political boundaries in order to pursue mutual interests or goals. Some of the most pervasive virtual communi ...

that operated initially for almost 12 years, from 2006 to 2017. It was created by

Seed Media Group ''Seed'' (subtitled ''Science Is Culture''; originally ''Beneath the Surface'') is a defunct online science magazine published by Seed Media Group. The magazine looked at big ideas in science, important issues at the intersection of science and s ...

to enhance public understanding of

science Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence ...

. Each blog had its own theme, speciality and author(s) and was not subject to editorial control. Authors included active

scientist A scientist is a person who conducts scientific research to advance knowledge in an area of the natural sciences. In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, philosophers engaged in the philosop ...

s working in industry, universities and medical schools as well as college professors, physicians, professional writers, graduate students, and post-docs. On 24 January 2015, 19 of the blogs had seen posting in the past month. 11 of these had been on ScienceBlogs since 2006. ScienceBlogs shut down at the end of October 2017. In late August 2018, the website's front page displayed a notice suggesting it was about to become active once again.

History

ScienceBlogs was launched in January 2006 with 15 blogs on the network. For the launch blogs, Seed invited some of the best-known independent science bloggers and allowed them to blog about whichever subjects they wished. Revenue was generated through advertisements sold to companies who wished to attract "bright, curious consumers who buy products like automobiles, books, cellphones, computers, liquor, music and watches." As a result of the free rein given to bloggers and the incentive to increase traffic, bloggers on the network often discussed hot topics such as

politics Politics (from , ) is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studies ...

and

religion Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatur ...

in addition to science. These topics frequently incited heated arguments in the comment threads and bloggers on the network sometimes got into arguments with each other over a series of posts. ScienceBlogs and Seed received some notable awards at the end of their first year of activity, including the 2006 UTNE Independent Press Award for Best Science/Technology Coverage being granted to Seed, in large part due to the success of ScienceBlogs. Additionally, two blogs on the network received Weblog awards:

Pharyngula The pharyngula is a stage in the embryonic development of vertebrates. At this stage, the embryos of all vertebrates are similar, having developed features typical of vertebrates, such as the beginning of a spinal cord. Named by William Ballard, t ...

for Best Science Blog and Respectful Insolence for Best Medical/Health Issues Blog. The creators of ScienceBlogs expanded their collection of hosted blogs in three major waves, supplemented by individual additions along the way. Some of the most trafficked blogs included Pharyngula, Respectful Insolence, Good Math Bad Math, Deltoid, Cognitive Daily, Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted) and On Becoming a Domestic and Laboratory Goddess. According to

Technorati Technorati was a search engine and a publisher advertising platform that served as an advertising solution for the thousands of websites in its network. Technorati launched its ad network in 2008, and at one time was one of the largest ad network ...

, , ScienceBlogs had an "authority" of 9,581 and its number of inbound links ranks it 37th among blogs worldwide. ,

Quantcast Quantcast is an American technology company, founded in 2006, that specializes in AI-driven real-time advertising, audience insights and measurement. It has offices in the United States, Canada, Australia, Singapore, United Kingdom, Ireland, Fran ...

charts it as having over 1.1 million monthly unique visitors, 65% of whom are from the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

. , ScienceBlogs hosted 75 blogs dedicated to various fields of research. In April 2011, ScienceBlogs was taken over by

National Geographic ''National Geographic'' (formerly the ''National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as NAT GEO) is a popular American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. Known for its photojournalism, it is one of the most widel ...

. While Seed would still maintain ownership of the site, National Geographic would acquire editorial control and responsibility for advertising sales on the site. ScienceBlogs launched a

German language German ( ) is a West Germanic language mainly spoken in Central Europe. It is the most widely spoken and official or co-official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Italian province of South Tyrol. It is also a ...

edition of the site, ScienceBlogs.de, in 2008 in partnership with

Hubert Burda Media Hubert Burda Media Holding is a German media group with headquarters in Offenburg. It originated as a small printing business, founded by Franz Burda Snr in Philippsburg, in 1903. In 1986, the corporate group was divided up between Franz Jnr ...

. As of 7 December 2010, the site hosted 35 blogs. ScienceBlogs Brazil debuted in March 2009 with 23 Portuguese language blogs.

"PepsiGate"

In June 2010, ScienceBlogs started a blog which was sponsored by

PepsiCo PepsiCo, Inc. is an American multinational food, snack, and beverage corporation headquartered in Harrison, New York, in the hamlet of Purchase. PepsiCo's business encompasses all aspects of the food and beverage market. It oversees the manufa ...

and was to be written by their employees. This led to backlash by many of the bloggers on ScienceBlogs who considered this to be an unethical mix of advertising and journalism, and the PepsiCo blog was withdrawn from ScienceBlogs. This affair was informally named "PepsiGate". By the middle of July approximately a quarter of the bloggers had left ScienceBlogs. Subsequently, some bloggers such as PZ Myers of

announced they were going on strike as part of a general feeling that the people running Seed had failed to respond to concerns surrounding the incident. Seed Media responded by killing off ''Food Frontiers'', the Pepsico sponsored blog, but that didn't stop the defections. According to PZ Myers, "The ship is sinking". A writer at the ''New York Times Magazine'' reviewed the incident and commented, "ScienceBlogs has become Fox News for the religion-baiting, peak-oil crowd." Some other science blogging networks were launched, including scientopia.org, scienceseeker.org and one hosted by ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...

''. In early 2015, however, eleven of the network's 2006 founding-generation blogs were still active, including Myers's.

Demise

On 14 October 2017, astrophysics blogger Steinn Sigurðsson publicly revealed that ScienceBlogs was due to be shut down, and David Gorski, author of the "Respectful Insolence" blog under his pseudonym Orac, stated that ScienceBlogs had "barely existed as an entity for a few years". Astrophysics blogger Ethan Siegel reported on 22 October 2017 that ScienceBlogs had informed bloggers it "no longer had the funds to keep the site operational, and so they would be shutting down".

Revival

In late August 2018, a note appeared on the home page which said that ScienceBlogs was now part of the Science 2.0 family and that plans were in place to make the site active once again.

Awards

* 2012:

IQ Award The IQ Award is a prize donated by the high- IQ association Mensa to honor people and organisations who have made remarkable contributions to public welfare by an intelligent idea, scientific research about human intelligence or the positive imag ...

Content

ScienceBlogs consisted of ten channels, or categories, of blog entries. Each blog author decided what channel his or her individual post belongs in, and each post was indexed accordingly on the main page. The categories were: * Life Science * Environment * Brain & Behavior * Humanities & Social Sciences * Medicine & Health * Education and Careers * Physical Science * Planet Earth * Politics * Technology

References

External links

ScienceBlogs website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Scienceblogs Blog networks Blog hosting services Science blogs American science websites