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Potential of Internet-Based Collaboration Was Vividly Demonstrated This Month

charityfundraiser

Senior Member
Messages
140
Location
SF Bay Area
Not specifically health-related but interesting for the potential to collaborate and speed up science research.

Step 1: Post Elusive Proof. Step 2: Watch Fireworks.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/17/science/17proof.html

What was highly significant, however, was the pace of discussion and analysis, carried out in real time on blogs and a wiki that had been quickly set up for the purpose of collectively analyzing the paper. This kind of collaboration has emerged only in recent years in the math and computer science communities. In the past, intense discussions like the one that surrounded the proof of the Poincar conjecture were carried about via private e-mail and distribution lists as well as in the pages of traditional paper-based science journals.

Several of the researchers said that until now such proofs had been hashed out in colloquiums that required participants to be physically present at an appointed time. Now, with the emergence of Web-connected software programs it is possible for such collaborative undertakings to harness the brainpower of the world’s best thinkers on a continuous basis.


Also relates to another recent NY Times article on science collaboration posted here:

Rare Sharing of Data Leads to Progress on Alzheimer’s
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/13/health/research/13alzheimer.html
http://www.forums.aboutmecfs.org/sh...ng-of-Data-Leads-to-Progress-on-Alzheimer%92s


Also happening in the humanities:

Testing a Web Alternative to Peer Review
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/24/arts/24peer.html