Does it really matter the position of names in a publication? Does it really have any influence? What about corresponding authorship? Does it really make any difference?
Well in my opinion, the positions does not make much difference as the number of authors
There is always the lead author of every publication. That person either conceived the idea or made the most input into. Ideally, other authors should follow in that sequence to reflect their individual contributions. The position may depend on the style of the journal. In most cases the lead author comes first.
It depends on the institution or individual looking at the publication. In some instances, the order of appearance of names of authors indicate the levels of contribution to the publication. So it matters in some cases and does not matter in others. For instance, some universities will give each author the same points (1 point each) for up to 3 authors per paper. If more than 3 authors, each author gets 0.25 points. The rationale here is that the more the authors, the lesser the contribution of each author. Hope this helps.
The number of authors and their position used to matter earlier, but now many organizations have started giving equal weight to all the authors. For example, in India now all the authors get the same marks (1.0) for a publication, which was earlier variable, with first author getting maximum (1.0) and other getting 0.25 only. Some journals also put a restriction on the number of authors to maximum of three.
Position of author is also an important. While referring the article, we will put only the first author name (if more than 2 authors). This will credit only first authors, even though all are equally contributed. For this concept I an giving an example. If anybody asked you about " who was the first person landed on moon?" You will definitely say Neil A. Armstrong, even Mike Collins and Buzz Aldrin were along with him.
I think corresponding authorship is not a matter. It is only for communication purpose.
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