@Andrzej: For papers "reprinted" on RG, it is best to give the original journal or conference proceeding title if published. URLs are fine to point to the source of a discussion.

I guess that some of our foreign contributors to RG use Google Translate to convert to English for posting on RG. Any serious summarizer would need to fix the translations.

Discussions contain mainly opinions which could be harvested and pointers to literature and tools which might be acknowledged.

When I and my RG-found co-author started "giving out serious trade secrets", we switched from RG discussions to E-mail. So I do not think too much quotable material appears in the discussions, unless you are writing about researchers!

Feel free to summarize this article. It is your creation! However, be careful about lifting unattributed ideas. For example, I am slotting many of my answers on RG into my book, which will be copyright.

Your summary would have three entries: Your ideas (no citation), Your paraphrases (where you can say it better than the halting English of a ESL speaker), and a quote (where you cannot improve on the way someone wrote something.) In the second and third cases, you need to cite the author of the thought or expression.

Since posting on ResearchGate is a public communication, (Googleable), and the paraphrases or quotes will be short, there is no need to ask the authors for permission to republish. If you want to paraphrase or quote more that a hundred words, it would be courteous to send a RGateMail to the author to ask permission.

The easy part is deleting the asides. Certainly you would be providing a useful service by grammar checking, spelling checking ('controversies') and logic checking during your summary. To adopt a Neutral Point of View, you may have to present the two sides to a story, without being able to conclude one way or the other. You can even post your summary on the RG article for final approval by the authors. The most useful summaries will cross the boundaries of posts, and bring together two threads dealing essentially with the same topic.

By publishing your summary outside ResearchGate, you will also be helping to market ResearchGate.

Providing a precis of a RG thread would be a good exercise to give your students as it teaches them how to reorder, delete, and rewrite and cite.

I don't think so. A discussion is afterall a discussion. It is about somebody's research problem or views of some people on a particular topic. I wonder how a paper can be made out of anything. If you are trying to do so, you need to ask and seek approval from each and every contributor. Also you will have to seek the permission from the Research Gate admin for these purpose.

I would like to quote the objective of research gate from the home page itself:

"Research Gate is a network dedicated to science and research. Connect, collaborate and discover scientific publications, jobs and conferences. All for free"

"Research Gate is a social networking site for scientists and researchers to share papers, ask and answer questions, and find collaborators. Members are encouraged to share raw data and failed experiment results as well as successes, in order to avoid repeating their peers’ scientific research mistakes"

Thank you for these comments..

I think there may be many researchers who will not agree to their contributions being used for anything 'other than the discussion itself'.. hence this discussion is important to know the researchers' view on this matter...

One possible way to go about it may be to comment in the discussion to say that this is an interesting topic and there have been many opinions from various experts in the field. I would like to summarize this discussion and submit for publication if there are no objections..

The other option is as suggested by Dr Nahata, to individually contact all contributors and ask them the same question..

I am not sure if publishing or not publishing clashes with the objectives of ResearchGate as posted above, but would like to know how the research community feels about it..

@Ian: Thank you for the spelling correction.. :)

regards, raza

I agree with Alok. The content of a discussion is no scientific result. A discussion is the exchange of meanings and analysis with possible errors from the authors. So if you don´t perform a sociological study on the behavier of the discussion group I don´t see a great sence in publishing the disscussion results.

I will go with Dr Nahata. It should not published because we gave suggestions on the basis of our research experience. Sometimes it works or may not work. Second thing is that its a social networking research site for researcher.

I think that it can be used to support research already in progress or almost completed. I also think permission should be sought from those who made the remarks.

I have used some comments of researchers on my LinkedIn network in a research I conducted. I sent an e-mail to each person and did not use the comments of those who declined. It was used in addition to a survey i had already conducted on a different group of respondents.

If there are high quality responses I wonder why they should not be published. The essence of social media use in research is being highlighted thereby. Why not?

I think what Raza is alluding to is that there is a lot of valuable content in many of the RG threads. First of all, there many research tips and techniques discussed by (hopefully) experts. (Like Wikipedia, caveat emptor.) It is certainly a pity that any and every interested party (and I mean any Googler) has to wade through asides, dead-ends and fallacious ideas to get to the core of the content. The story line is distorted by timezone differences and by who has the time to maintain involvement in the discussion, and this can usefully be sorted out.

We assume for purposes of discussion that Raza wishes to put out a paper, say on teaching colitis to disinterested medical students via E-learning. First he needs to give the reader the definitions and background on E-learning (garnered and heavily summarised from many current RG threads). Then he should give the background on his medical students (gathered from thinking about his posed question about his students). Then he needs to give the background on non-participating students. Finally he can tackle his research question of how to effectively teach colitis to medical students: which section will be where his research paper really is going. Obviously he will also send “teaching colitis to disinterested medical students via E-learning” to Scholar and Medline, because RG is not all knowledge.

I do not feel that ResearchGate owns any intellectual property in rewritten ResearchGate discussions, as long as the appropriate acknowledgement is given. Raza raised the question, and answered it. It belongs to him.

However, one should contact the _significant_ contributors individually, as they may have unfollowed the topic. You need their explicit approval.

The direct conversation; no, However, it may serve as inspiration.

There is another thread on a similar topic here https://www.researchgate.net/post/How_do_you_acknowledge_valuable_answers_by_RG_peers_in_your_papers which covers some of the same ground.

Subject to ethics clearance (and I anticipate this would require obtaining consent from individuals involved in the discussion) I can imagine the discussion could be data for qualitative research. NVivo computer aided qualitative data analysis software includes tools for importing social media and websites as data sources. The discussion could find its way into an article as data, which would still require analysis etc.

In one way discussion in ReserachGate is to contact and interact with others who are interested in your area of research (social media??) but still it is a discussion based on openion and it is not based on data or results of original work. However, I see it, as a positive way to enhance and broad knowledage.

But to publishing and documenting, it is another story and should be in scientific way of evaluation and editing.

Dear Raza,

Actually discussions here can be regarded as “published/available on-line” personal communications. You can refer them as such. However I do not see how can you be able to overcome the main prerequisite of all of the journals to state that “… was not published in any form elsewhere”.

I think this is a very interesting discussion.. It is obvious many of RG scholars would not wish their comments to be cited without permission.. but we have to realize that when we write something on social media that we make available to everyone (RG is googleable!!!), we cannot completely control the right to that information.. anyone can quote it, and these comments cease to be anonymous...

so for example, i want to perform qualitative research on the topic "Scholars' view of publications arising from online research community discussions'.. I can provide an introduction by referring to this forum and say that opinion is divided among scholars, many not willing to have their contributions turn into publications, whereas some do not have any problem with it. Hence this is an area worth exploring, so we developed a qualitative study interviewing researchers in this matter..

I think Kristoffer Greaves and Michael Mannen have raised a similar point...

Dr Julianov, you raise a very interesting point.. I think the discussion, which is communication between scholars, can be cited to as a difference in opinion and at least used to identify areas worth exploring...

regards, raza

I do not want here to give a clear answer "YES" or "NO" because the matter is not easy.

But I'll pay attention to one very important detail that ResearchGATE adopted in their assumptions a rule that users may place in it all his works - including those not formally published in magazines. This means that anyone can cite the work of any user of this portal, giving ResearchGATE as a source of references.

In this context, I would think that in a similar way as the cited of publications, could be cited (given) a link to the specific topic of discussion in ResearchGATE.

Of course, it's just a loose idea, which perhaps starting a series of complex formal operations if they had to be accepted.

It seems that one of the most difficult to solve the problems would have an idea of ​​how to raise the level of English in our discussions. The case is not easy, and arranging it through a professional adjustment (employment proofreaders???) - extremely difficult technically.

Quotes can be published, I believe, with the permission of the writers. One who is going to use it, will naturally think about its correctness, with reference to grammar and construction :))

@Andrzej: For papers "reprinted" on RG, it is best to give the original journal or conference proceeding title if published. URLs are fine to point to the source of a discussion.

I guess that some of our foreign contributors to RG use Google Translate to convert to English for posting on RG. Any serious summarizer would need to fix the translations.

Discussions contain mainly opinions which could be harvested and pointers to literature and tools which might be acknowledged.

When I and my RG-found co-author started "giving out serious trade secrets", we switched from RG discussions to E-mail. So I do not think too much quotable material appears in the discussions, unless you are writing about researchers!

Here is an example of a discussion thread that is ripe for summarising and preparation towards an undergraduate or term paper in an English class. https://www.researchgate.net/post/Is_English_language_a_Germanic_or_a_Romance_language

@Glen: Here is my personal assessment of RG, without doing any Research (with a big "R").

Depth:

Ranging from profound pieces of wisdom to bland opinions, even within a thread.

Profile:

There are really lots of lurkers out there.

Range:

Excellent, crossing cultural, languages, geographic, timezone and discipline-specifics.

Authority:

Mixed, with opinions from undergraduates as well as professors.

Question quality:

Usually surprisingly good, although not always fully explained.

Answer length:

Usually terse and to the point contributions, but with many threads

becoming too long to read, repetitive or drifting away from the question posed. It is far from being a Wikipedia, and needs much editing to ever be "printed".

Content:

Not much that is quotable or paraphrasable, unless you are e.g. doing research on ResearchGate or social networking.

Speed of 1st reply:

Within the hour up to within a month. (However, some badly posed or too specialised questions are never replied to after months.)

Advice:

Excellent base after you have worked out the main drift of the contributions.

Culling:

It is best to search across all of RG via _Google_ to uncover all threads dealing with _your_ keywords. E.g., researchgate keywords

This should be augmented with non-researcher input to get a balance.

Ownership:

Since RG is Googleable, RG discussions would be regarded as being a public communication, just as if you posted it on your own searchable site. Remember to cite correctly!

Secrecy:

I have not yet seen anything patentable or in the category of a trade secret put on RG. Posters working in industry have presumably already been pressurised by their bosses under pain of ejection not to post proprietary or pre-patent material.

I certainly have been happy to feed the community little bits of advice, which one should be able to find elsewhere anyway (but after a long search).

In return I am finding out what really bothers researchers.

Business model:

Currently the business model of RG is to obtain revenue from

job vacancy ads. Hence we are asked to profile our posters by

providing endorsements to allow groups with selected 'skills' to be targetted.

Stability: Could be sold.

Dear all, yes we are going to publish the Discussion material we collected and still are collecting in Environmental Sustainability for the question "Sustainable development and the Pirsig's monkey trap". Of course, as it stands, the Discussion can be hardly published, as it needs to be structured to fit the frame of a journal, but once you find some volunteers for that it can be done. I think that this should be encouraged as a way for not dispersing many good ideas coming up within RG and for establishing connections and cooperation among people who have never met but who have similar interests .

@Giovanni: You have creatively combined a monkey trap with environmental sustainability (title). For that you need credit. You posed the question well, with a draft abstract. You now have some lovely anecdotes (Canada!) and some relevant material you can quote or paraphrase. You can get a good essay out of it.

Thanks so much for your nice words Ian. Yes, now we have some examples of the Pirsig's trap even from Canada. We proceeded by making a tentative draft from the discussion, organizing what came out with contributions from all the discussants. Note that discussants never met personally but were attracted and stimulated by the topic. Now this draft is under review in a peer-reviewed journal, quoting of course the discussion we had on RG, and we are hoping for the best. Alok reported that "Research Gate is a social networking site for scientists and researchers to share papers, ask and answer questions, and find collaborators. Members are encouraged to share raw data and failed experiment results as well as successes, in order to avoid repeating their peers’ scientific research mistakes". I think RG promotes exchange of ideas and helps find consensus among participants on certain issues. I think RG will powerfully serve just that, and beyond the personal satisfaction of being voted for the questions we pose or the answers we give, not considering often the possibility of publishing even conflicting opinions that can come out would be a real waste.

Happy New Year Everyone

I view this problem as follows: Research Gate is a sort of a medium or a place of communication, just as live talk in a conference room or a street where someone meats would be. There isn't much difference. Research Gate does not inherit any rights on what any one of us says (writes) here.

So, just like you could use, say... a written correspondence (through letters - paper or through e-mail) and use it as "notes" when writing a publication, I believe that in a same way, you can use the discussion history to quote someone, or draw from someone's conclusions etc.

That is my point of view, at least.

I see that some threads have exceeded one thousand posts. These must surely be ripe for condensing and coherently reporting? I usually unsubscribe to any thread after a hundred posts have appeared.

I agree Ian. Personally, I like to 'strike early' within posts. i might be wrong, but I tend to find that the earlier responses are the most useful. Later debates can really go off at tangents (or be quite circular) - and are probably best served as fresh questions.

I think Researchgate should publish the discussion in the form of a book after very finest scientific editing.The discussions about several things reported in researchgate needs to be analyzed in the book.Popular science books may be another suggestion.

Lala,

That might be something that RG would want to pursue; another 'string to its bow'. However, while some threads might be printable, not sure that it would be an easy process - and most threads are not publishable.

@Lala: My approach has been to use RG to spy on what problems researchers are facing today. I answer them and then clean up my own answers to slot them into my book. (This particular discussion thread and my posts to it do not make the grade, as I deem that the topic question is not one that worries the average researcher.)

Even I have maintained a separate section in my PC where I collect most of the research papers and books made available by various researchers according to their topics of discussion. Anything I want to refer again, I just go to particular folder and can use it anytime. But I feel it is good for personal reference and can share such data with other researchers in the form of answers to their questions. If a discussion seems to be very important, anybody can easily save it and refer it anytime.

Regards

I agree with the possibility of publishing the content of the discussions. However, I think the RG should "evaluate" the contents through a panel of experts, based on their scientific merit, number of participants and other pre-established criteria, and propose preparation of the papers and its publication in accordance with the following order of availability:

1. Questioner

2. Participant who gave more answers

3. Participants remaining

These conditions ensure the release of GR and that the questioner is valued because it was who started this and set the tone of the discussion. Moreover, all participants should be informed of the intention to publish and give informed consent. The fact that the participants wanting to contribute to the discussion does not implicitly mean that they are willing to give this information for publication or to constitute research data. Ethical aspectps are to be met.

But also the type of publication should be proposed by the RG. Suggestion of an article of content analysis or other format, and respective standards of publication, to ensure the scientific rigor.

Finally, I think the RG should facilitate the publication through contacts with the most appropriate scientific journals.

I agree with Paula Diogo comment.She has suggested useful comments regarding publication.

Discussions over research gate has helped me understand many things. Still there are many people who do not know this platform and are at the same time unable to interact with various researchers over the world. So, I think discussion to important as well as very fundamental questions showed be published in form of an e-book (easily downloadable) so that researchers as well as common people can benefit from such an approach. What say?

I accept the eBook format for publication. It is increasingly common and quite accessible. However, the conditions of submission and review that I mentioned and others have to be ensured.

I think these are excellent suggestion... It might be a very big task for RG to take on..

just a query i wanted clarified... there is an admin aspect of RG that is concerned with smooth running of the web interface and possibly to maintain a bit of discipline.. then there is the 'content' aspect of RG... this refers to the vast number of researchers connected to RG...

taking this point forward, it might be too much to ask the RG admin staff (who will likely be not related to the content aspect of RG) to summarize a discussion on RG.. it is very likely that the burden will fall on the researchers who will take the lead and then the same debate might start whether each contributor would be willing for someone else to publish their comments as author...

i think there may be some merit in treating the intellectual content we place on RG as open source or 'creative common'... should we have any concerns if our contributions are used to spread knowledge...

regards, raza

A very good response Raza - especially related to the constraints that are probably imposed on the RG administrative staff. It would be something though that I think that RG should seriously consider in the future.

I agree Dean.

Some of the valuable discussions should be marked 'endangered species' as they will otherwise be potentially lost in the archives of RG.

@Raza, excellent remarks on project constraints, as @Dean stated while ago. As it is Your thread on publishing ResearchGate discussions, Your idea, maybe You should contact RG stuff in order to clarify both intentions, possibilities etc! It will be a great loose if some nice discussions simply get lost out of RG archive! Agree at all!

I think RG need to be contacted first!

@Issam, that is exactly what I had proposed to You as an autohor of this thread/ an idea! Keep us informed if any action toward RG is performed! Thanks!

From experience RG are very understanding and helpful people. I suggest professor Jacic you contact them with a request and we would all be interested to know the outcome.

According to me discussions on RG could be summarized as an article so that it could help others in clear understanding of the matter.

Regards,

Nitish

@Issam, I'm honored by your suggestion. Unfortunately, I am in a small conflict with RG officials for their failures that lead to the removal of my questions that are accompanied with a lot of answers. So, I think that you, as the author of the idea should do it!

Professor Jacic

I understand. I am more than happy to do so. I shall come back with their answer asap.

Nowadays, anything can be published. Sometimes, an original idea (no matter how wrong or crazy it may sound) deserves to be heard. In my opinion, RG provides this opportunity.

Here are some related issues/research questions.

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Can_we_cite_discussions_at_ResearchGate

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Is_RG_suitable_place_to_generate_and_discuss_proposals_for_unification_of_formats_of_citing_books_articles_etc

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Is_ResearchGate_the_future_of_scientific_publishing_for_everyone

I would imagine RG admin would need to be consulted and as prod have previously said not all contributions made to are published some are very much raw pieces of research work and essays altjough on can use unpublished research belonging to another it must be cited in references as an unpublished document. All publications have value to their authors and for some sharing raw unpublished data is more difficult than a published piece open to public scrutiny. I think everyone is intitled to be consulted in relation to their work and no one has a right to publish with out first consulting the relevant authority