@Tolga, I like Your idea! You say: "Is this possible? Or, am I a dummy in thinking too optimistically?"

I think You are not a dummy, it is possible, maybe looks like a fairy tales, maybe not sustainable at the moment, but I hope that it will become reality!

Great... althoigh а little idealistic idea... I support it.

Well, your question is interesting. However, could you rephrase it by splitting text into smaller segments. In current form it's difficult to read.

There are some good journals that will waive charges if you are resource-deprived. eg. check out PLOSONE.

There are foundations that provide scholarships, indiscriminately of your origin. You could call them "global" in a sense. Now, will their financial support be satisfying for your targeted tuition is an entirely different question.

@Jari, my question is simple: Assume that, you are from a resource-deprived country. You did some research and have a publication prepared. Your publication is excellent, and you know that, you can publish it in a top journal, say, IEEE Transactions on Power Electronics. However, it costs $1000+ USD to do so. You can't afford it. My question was : What avenues does a researcher have in this case ?

@Derek, I am checking PLOSONE. It looks like such organizations exist. Good to know ! Also, you said, "there are some journals that waive charges if you are from a resource-deprived country." Can you give me examples ?

My question what motivated by some RG chit chats showing that, this is a big problem. It is good to get responses from you folks, and be aware of the available scholarships etc., so, I can inform other people too when the topic comes up.

Dear Tolga, There exist many globally available funds and scholarships even some sponsored by some bodies of UNO. Also, Common Wealth, DAAD are frequently utilized of researchers. Some of my friends they are in Physics availing scholarships from a lab. in Italy.

Mr. Soyata, the cost for prestigious Journals depends strongly from the scientific areas. For example for the field of chemistry and physics the large number of Journals with the highest reputation world-wide are actually free of charge for for the authors from academic comunities. Examples are publishers such as American Chemical Society, Royal Society of Chemistry, Elsevier, Springer, Taylor and Francis, Nature Publishing Group, which provide forums for publisching of the scientific results, and exchange of knowledge actually free for scientists. The top 10 Journals in the field of chemistry as ranking, including wourld reputation and IF, are from those publishers.

Great topic ! I support it.

@Bojidarka, this is very interesting. I didn't know that, in Chemistry, the prestigious journals were free. I wonder if this is true for a lot of the "pure sciences," i.e., Physics, etc. What makes me wonder is, how they are making money in the end ? Is it possible that, this has something to do with the country that the journal is in ? I am wondering if there is a government sponsorship involved in this ... Or, may be , does it have something to do with your specific institution ? I know that, for example, our university subscribes to SCIENCE DIRECT, which allows all of our faculty members to view Elsevier journals for free, although, individually they cost $39 or something to view ... However, such a subscription costs a lot.

I wonder if your institution has a subscription like this, which allows the faculty members to view and publish without a fee ?

Mr. Soyata, the individual and/or Institutional subscribe (access) to ScienceDirect, Scopus, ISI Thomson is payed. This payment however, does not obligatory covers full access to the selected/or full set of Journals of given Publisher/s. This is related with the management of the distribution of the scientific production from the ssite of the Publishers. The publication process however for the authors is free of charge. Even in Journals, for which given Institution (or individual researcher) has not subscribed, the staff members of such Institution/s (researchers) publish 'free of charge'. The scientific forum and exchange of knowledge actually from the site of the Publishers, covering among the highers ranking Journals in the chemistry is ensured namely through 'free of charge' publishing process. This actually is very good, because of increase the objectivity of the evaluation process of each publishing materials (papers, review, and more). The scientists are not obligate to subscribe to given Journal/s (or even Publishers/s), on which base their results are accepted for publication. The management of the distribution process of the scientific production is completely different from this for the management of the pubslihing process, which actually make the reviewering and evaluation process from the site of the Editors and Reviewers very objective for the quality of the data submitted for consideration.

There is an alternative way to publish with reseqrchers in other countries. Publish edited books, publish books in the United States or England or Europe. If you are a good researcher with a good Engish that will suffice. Qualty can not be hidden.

Dear Tolga,

Request :Not now at later stage

It will be great if you summarize the information, because it will be of great help for young researchers.

Thanks.

I looked at some of these institutions. They seem to have "their own publications." This will restrict one to a limited set of publications. My idea was more along the lines of allowing researchers to publish "anywhere," assuming that, the cost of the publication is the only problem, not the quality. If the quality is not there, there isn't anything that can be done.

@Afaq, if you would like to summarize this information, it will be great. What would be really nice is to summarize 1) which publications allow FREE , as long as you can prove that, you do not have the means to pay, but, the quality of the publication is high, 2) what DISCOUNTs certain publications allow , again, when you can prove that, you do not have the resources.

My primary reason for bringing this up was: There are lots of "predatory" journals out there that take $50 or so from a researcher. In the RG community, I think they are called JUNK JOURNALs. If a researcher publishes in one of these journals, it is actually a negative, not a positive. However, since researchers cannot afford the more prestigious journals, they are stuck in submitting to the junk journals.

Go ahead Tolga. We are with you all the way.

@Tolga, I like Your idea! You say: "Is this possible? Or, am I a dummy in thinking too optimistically?"

I think You are not a dummy, it is possible, maybe looks like a fairy tales, maybe not sustainable at the moment, but I hope that it will become reality!

INASP http://www.inasp.info/work/ and AuthorAid http://www.authoraid.info/en/ are already working in this direction - helping researchers and students from developing countries.

AuthorAid has published a lot of useful resources, funding and mentoring schemes, and INASP has made available online journals to researchers: http://www.inasp.info/en/work/journals-online/

Maybe more efforts in terms of public outreach are needed on the part of researchers in the respective developing countries. Mentoring programs and training on and in English seem to make more sense to me than the simple availability of journals.

Dear Tolga Soyata, Go ahead with concrete proposal and task.

Dear Hristina Petrova, Thanks for adding the links for authors aid.

Tolga,

Lets assume that a sufficient number of volunteer researchers can review the publications that are submitted. Then why paying for re-submitting this publication to an outside organisation charging fees? This organisation could simply publish on line this publication for no fee.

There are many examples of that (some of which are mentioned above). However, I am talking about ANY journal to which one cannot submit to due to financial constraints (e.g., IEEE Journal of Power Electronics).

Hi Tolga..

great question.. i think biomedcentral journals waive their fee from resource-deprived countries but i do not have first-hand knowledge of this.

regards, raza

I agree with all of you. In fact, for non-granted research it is so difficult for the researcher to pay the extensive fees. However, even if there are some journals that give a discount or free publishing for qualified paper ( say Strong acceptance), there is no guarantee that the paper will not be (just accepted). For this reason, the first thing to check is the publication fees besides the scope and IF.

Now the Question is :

Why not to make an RG Journals, with transactions?

Great!

Tolga, your idea is good and your reasoning is sound. And I will repeat what some have suggested above - why not just "publish' on-line? Get Microsoft to host it and get the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to cover review costs if need be. "What!", you will say, "always Microsoft, etc, etc, etc." and shake your head. But think about it. Why not? I spent half my life fundraising for three universities in different countries and a major part of my work was finding funds for research. There are many people and organisations out there who would be willing to put their financial support behind your idea. One problem that I have seen is the lack of English language translations of research that is done in non-English speaking countries. Good work just sits there and does not get the attention it should. So for starters finding funds for good translations into English would help many researchers who do not have the financial means to get their work translated properly. John

Yes it is absolutely possible

Dear Tolga,

Yours is a very positive view. How can you be a dummy? In fact, you are a very nice person.

Tolga: This is a very good question. I think we can do without the Organization you are trying to suggest. My Idea for implementing ways towards Global-Scholarship in the future may include (but by no means are limited to) the following suggestions of institutional cooperation:

• Student exchanges and recruitment programs

• Faculty exchanges and hosting

• Joint conferences and workshops

• Joint academic journals in wide areas of specialization

• Establishing a multi-cultural studies and study abroad programs to promote global awareness

• Administrative staff exchanges, recruitment and hosting

• Joint degree and collaborative programs

What a great idea and suggestions!

Hope there is one. I will apply to avail if there will be.

As you know everything is possible in this world. The main thing is that the very strong desire and take small steps but in the right direction.

I like the idea of establishing a Global-Scholarship programme.Things will change and your dream will be fulfiied.

Dear sir.

This is indeed a great idea...

the problem is genuine especially for those researchers who belongs to developing and under developing countries... mostly journals or any conferences charges in dollars and when we covert this to our currency .its a lot of money to spend from your pocket.

The problem gets more difficult when we don't have such funding type culture ,especially talking about india ,Its really hard to get some sort of govt ,funding or aid.....after working so hard you have to pay all the expenses (like for an international conferences) from your own pocket ,,,.so most of researchers give up due to this money issue

Your idea is extremely helpful in such cases..

Would be great success and improvement of the current situation. Congratulations for the elaborated idea!

Very good question Tolga

And it's not only the charged fees, but also the difficulties in getting throw the process of peer reviewing in high costs and prestigious journals, that is not easy for researchers from some deprived countries.

Its very nice to have such hopeful thinking, but practical implication needs high degree of coordination at various levels.

Dear Tolga,

Ancient world had seven wonders. This world desperately needs wonders. Regarding the importance of necessity, the global scholarship cannot be among the first requests. However, it is a great and ethically virtuous idea. Congratulations.

Great idea. What about teaching? - free online courses for all?

Great Idea Hambiraj,

Hope many buy this idea, so this increases research input and consequent impact from low income countries

Dear Tolga, maybe you think too optimistically, but such people as you can change the world. I seems starting world improvement from changes within science and education is something very important.

Three years ago Coursera was hard to imagine - now it is important part of our reality.

very Brilliant Idea. This idea is rest on idea of educational and intellectual equality. UNESCO and UNDP, World Bank, IMF, WTO, Centre for Nobel, Oslo, should join together to form such organisation. It is possible. Go ahead we are working under same model name Global Association for Inspiring Reseacher (GAIR) promoted by me came news the month of last september 2013, now it in Nascent stage.

Dear Sir,

Dr.Tolga Soyata

Thanks for sharing your question with me also . Sir, your views / thoughts are imaginarily true since it needs a very technical processional set-up i.e., Organization to conduct all these activities also which is firstly free from politics. And, it needs heavy funding , huge amount and more time . Also, it needs a very good editorial board team (formed from all fields of subjects ) which should be free from personal bias. Sir, in a single college / university / educational society , your views are not worked out but Globaly how it is possible ?

My few suggestions to build your dream ideas are as follows : In every country from / at regional level to start this type of organization and get successed from thereof and extend to state –level , semi-country –level, then country –level. Then, it would be fruit ful and ,

For your question/ views sharing with me .

Thanks and regards

Dr.Govindappa Navalagi

Great Ideas will never come true if there is no practical support. It will be my pleasure to donate 100 USD in support of establishing a fund for this purpose (I am not considered a rich man!!! otherwise providing more). But my contribution to this great idea is negotiating with journals in increasing a little bit more page charges for authors from developed countries which is directly deposited in the fund. This step by journals and colleagues from developed countries creates interest among national governments, international organizations and other NGOs to contribute. In a previous post Dr. Hejase proposed a yearly gathering of all of us. I think the first one could be devoted to discussion on how the great idea of Dr. Tolga could be operationalized and what we can do.

RG score could be a good criterion, except that RG score could also be sometimes biased, since it also depends on how often a use posts comments and asks questions on RG. In that case a very active RG user may appear to have a high RG score, not necessary indicative of his/her research profile. Impact points maybe more indicative than RG scores

Dear Jalal, my respect for your constructive and practical idea. Here is my personal contribution: 100 Euro for a fund as help for the start.

As some researchers point out above we can approach to some NGO's or other international institutions and foundations ... i guess we should first start from them

There must be some institution there that will hear the voice of so many researchers across the globe...

Dear Tolga, this is a very interesting view. I think it is possible to establish such organization. However I have some concerns about the project :

1. How to guarantee that the principle of "equal chance" will be respected for all authors worldwide. Speculating that the organization will be immunized against politics or racism is not convincing.

2- How to guarantee that manuscripts to be funded for publication are not fraudulent nor plagiarized. Leaving the task of processing such academic issues under the responsibility of Journals to which manuscripts will be submitted is confusing.

3- How to deal with the problem of "gift authorship" so that the funding will exactly be given to the right authors who really deserve it, because with such publishing scholarships it would not be surprising that opportunistic persons will be motivated !

We have a list with ISI Thomson journals - around 10.000, where it is good to publish. Usually the best journals have not introduced a tax for publication. It is true the journals have mention on their webpage the information for the author to pay for publication if there are some projects where it is developed the content of the article.

No, Tolga, you are not a dummy for thinking what you have. It stands to reason that initially those members of the organization from resource-rich nations should contribute to allow only the best researchers to publish until the establishment of an international body of referees exists with adequate funds at their disposal. I would venture to say that from what I have seen here on RG, we have been in touch with some of the keenest minds on the globe. Not all these minds come from economically privileged countries. Far from it.

Welcome to real world:-)

This is not the only problem.

I think that researcher from undeveloped countries are sometimes "discriminated" simply because they are not from High Caliber institution (of course these have much higher funding to do state of the art science). Nevertheless sometimes editors simply google you end make decision to reject paper on your previous publication record without looking at paper. Also there are many situation where reviewers have complaints on English. I think this is only form if content is interesting. I know journals which help in English editing free of charge if they find the paper worthy to publish. Also I "admire" to editors of general journals who are so brave, and holistic intellectuals like da Vinci so they reject papers outside of their personal scope of expertise without sending it on review. The last one usually happens in middle to low range Journals which are most achievable for authors from low income countries. So we have vicious circulosus. If you want I can give you personal examples. So it is hard to be scientific visible if you live in low income country, possible but harder then deserved.

@Vladimir: Please explain your definite statement. How would you propose to manage the distribution of funds?

Tolga et al.,

Friends, is this what can be called 'Global scholarship', perhaps an early form? Let's say a science teacher in US or UK or Europe has a similar research interest, or research area that's close to my area, gets into my RG page then collaborates on a research with me. Let's say that we have agreed to each person' s responsibility, things turned out so well and my collaborator will put my name in second place after his/her name. Now if this collaboration can be successfully done N times by RG members, is this one form of a 'global scholarship', an early form? A feasible form, at this time?

(Sent from mobile)

I think that where money is the subject politics is behind or not so far. Even for free journals, they also obey to political strategies

@Miranda this again means that you need to be member of some rich and high impact group which is good regarding cooperation on individual level (usually in subordinated position) , but still it is not solution for equal opportunity to publish for everyone. Also what about specific research topics which are not of interest for US or UK RG members.

I think the most important think is to have your dream always in front of you and to fight for it. Doing so you will succeed. It is true at the beginning of the carrier it is very hard to have immediately your publications in the best journals. But since Internet is helping a lot in finding information instantly it is so easy to see all that is written in the field of interest. Also there are a lot of books, online courses such as it is very easy to know everything. Even if you are coming from a low income country if you have good ideas you can send your publications to good journals, where without paying can be published. The problem is to have the exercise to communicate correct your research. Can be a theoretical paper (if there are not grant to support the practical side). It is good to start to write to conferences but this means money for travel, accommodation and conference fees. Again money! After a period of growing in publication and in experience it is good to help as volunteer in reviewing papers for conferences and journals. This is also a good way to see a lot of papers, the hot topic. But how many researchers are ready to offer their time for reviewing papers, books?

Dear Tolga - what a lovely idea! Some of us do not even have the access to funding to do the research, and have to utilise our personal funds. The ability to have one's work published, especially when one believes that it may constitute a valuable contribution to our field of expertise is often outside of our reach.

I like the ideas presented in this post, such as being able to meet others from Research Gate. If we did this, we could possibly pool our resources and contacts to create something constructive. The other ideas that seemed very constructive are possibly getting Research Gate involved and getting them to act as the instrument of this idea. We can choose colleagues who meet specific criteria to act as reviewers etc. I do think as well that there are many whose work goes unoticed due to language barriers and that translational services would assist. Many people are multilingual on Research Gate, so they may be able to offer help with this. Out of interest I already assist a number of Research Gate colleagues with translation work etc on their publications and consider it a privilege.

John Boswell's idea about sponsorships etc is also super and talents such as his should be used, in other words we have many people here in Research Gate who could assist in many different ways.

The other thought is why can we not get Research Gate to set up a Research Gate Journal instead, specifically for this type of thing? It would gain credibility with most people and institutions already registered on Research Gate and over time gain further credibility - what do you think?

Oh , wow everyone ! You gave me so much to think about. I have to now chew on these incredible ideas, and prepare a post. Cheryl , you can't imagine how many people that I heard from about "using their own funds" to do research ... I will have to do my homework to see what a possible "first baby step" is in realizing something like this.

I will post my thoughts in a very organized manner over the weekend. For now, I can send you mega, giga Thanks !!!

I think. as Cheryl says, there is certainly the potential for Research Gate to be involved in some version of Tolga's excellent idea. The infra structure is there for building the communities in different research areas, ensuring quality (as far as that is possible with peer review, but nevertheless the best system we have, I believe anyway) collecting expertise, distribution of papers, and so on. It might need several journals though Cheryl - perhaps a few prototypes covering science, social science, humanities, or whatever. The already established nature of RG also would facilitate cross-disciplinary work. Good luck with thinking how to achieve all of this Tolga, 'Baby steps' might be the way.

@Tomislav, Tolga, Colin et al., thanks for all your recent posts. My research is on-going. We are waiting for your next post, Tolga. Happy chewing and mental digesting and THANKS.

All for it - let us think and implement... giving back to the society!

Regards

Theodora Issa

Hope that Bill Gates or some other filantrop is on RG and following this post.

Tomislav - nice idea - philanthropists - they might look at it and come forward! here's hoping!

To get back to Cheryl's journal idea. RG journal or journals would resolve many of the issues raised on the never ending and circular discussion on the thread, "Is submitting a paper for open access journal a good idea?" Also, many people that I follow at least, across a range of disciplines, are interested on applications of their research to the benefit of societies. So, how about including one journal (cross discipline) devoted to research of any kind that has a demonstrable benefit to the human condition. The cross- cultural nature of RG would make this practical, exciting as such research could quickly reach an international audience and be adapted or utilised widely.

Yes, Colin, Cheryl et al. Having RG journal is a brilliant idea.

@Vasile, we all love you. Have a great day and enjoy keeping fit.

@Tolga et all,the feasibility of this idea that I like is a matter of time. I still believe that there are philanthropists who can help realize these good ideas, even in different areas!

Global scholarship should be formed for academia. This will help to enrich the overall knowledge in all walk of areas. Mutual benefit for mankind.

Dear Tolga let us know what you plan, I am sure many of us will be happy to contribute what resources we have, whether it is vetting publications as experts, trying to find sponsors, etc. By pooling our talents and skills I am sure we can make a difference!

Folks, please note that, MONEY is not going to be the #1 concern for this initiative. In fact, ironically, it will be the least of the concerns. "Volunteering" can be done by dedicating time or dedicating expertise. Once somebody sees a useful movement, there will be plenty of people willing to donate money ... Bill Gates, or, others wouldn't surprise me at all. World of full of philanthropists. And, to start with, I saw a few nice folks to pledge some amounts above anyway. That's a good enough start. The most important thing to do is to have a mechanism that WORKS, and it is easy to attract money.

The best way to handle money is to NOT handle any money at all, until a publication is sent, accepted, and it is time to pay. Then, we ask the folks that pledged to pay directly. That way, nobody "handles" any money, and we do not have to worry about issues that can arise. The last thing we want is to worry about is handling money, before we worry about the scholar quality of this initiative.

I will post the operational issues that need to be considered one by one ...

Hi Tomislav, and Theodora , starting an RG journal is a nice idea, but, this is going against what I proposed. A researcher that has the capability to publish in his/her dream publication should be able to do so (say, the top journal in his/her field that costs $500 to publish in (or more), and (s)he has no funds to do so, but the work is excellent quality). Restricting that researcher to publish in RG (or, any other unwanted journal) is limiting his/her ability. Also, the purpose of my proposal is not to manage a journal, but, rather, manage a mechanism to allow researchers to publish in already established and credible journals (i.e., a SCHOLARSHIP). Starting a journal, and giving it the credibility of existing ones might take a decade, or more. This will derail the efforts from "scholarship" to "publication business" . This is a very difficult business that requires keeping track of the copyright laws, etc. even if it is strictly online. All it takes is one copyright incident to permanently ruin the publication's reputation, not to mention the legal issues that follow !!! Since this is a global initiative, we need to be concerned about global copyright protection, which becomes even more difficult. I say that, it is a lot easier to publish in EXISTING high quality journals.

That being said, if the scholarship initiative becomes very successful, a very feasible follow-up work is its own journal, which offers full scholarships for very high quality work, and has a solid copyright team. There are 1000 journals out there. Do they have the same credibility as, say, IEEE or ACM ? No ! It takes a decade to build that credibility. It takes consistent publication of very high quality work, and the "credibility" will follow ... To be able to build it, the focus should be on CONTENT QUALITY, not, MONEY MAKING. This is why, an effort like this, whose starting point is VOLUNTARY has the chance to make this happen. I envision an advisory board, and a review board who are experienced (possibly, retired) scholars, dedicated to GLOBAL EQUAL RESEARCH OPPORTUNITY, not money making. This is a big commitment ! It is the most rewarding. The volunteers are people who are willing to see everybody in the world get the same chance.

However, if the quality of the work is not there, it simply doesn't get published. Restricting the publications of our scholars to say, RG, will bring up "favoritism" issues. However, if we allow our scholars to submit publications to ANYWHERE, they get reviewed by a panel that has nothing to do with us. If they get accepted, we fund the publication. If they do not get accepted, their publication needs to be improved. We could certainly decide to work with that scholar continuously, but, in the end, the "acceptance" decision cannot be made by our initiative, as this will bring up a "conflict of interest" issues !!!

The goal of this initiative is to create a scholarship that is respected by top scholars ... Am I making sense ?

What a great development to the discussion (overnight)... indeed, a good idea... well when good minds get together see what happens.

Regards

Theodora Issa

Dear Tolga, let us seriously discuss how it should be done. I mean the global scholarship.

Dear Tolga,

Excellent idea. RG members have potential to initiate. I will be happy to render my services if needed.

Let us think about it seriously - count me in.

Regards

Theodora Issa

I am in. Field Psychiatry

Dear Vladimir, thanks for your response. But who is the "community", all participants in RG or all members ina special "scholar institution"?

Dear Tolga, Dear all ,

The number of posts is sign that this topic is important ant it has lot of gaps. Of course that managing new journal perhaps is not the best idea. But Tolga mentioned important issue like conflict of interest. This happens even to journals which are so prestigious. Even the most known Journals had sometimes and still have publishing or copyright scandals, papers with imagined data etc. How we can absolutely be sure that journal is the dreamed one and without bias in publication.

First, majority of journals in the era of paper had advertisement. Let say that I wrote some paper which favorize product of opponent company which have no advertisement in this Journal. Can we be sure that EIC or some other will publish this paper no matter how important it is, without concerns what advertised company will think about that.

Second, I think that the most blind spot in publishing is EXACTLY double blind review process. For eg , many years ago I got offer to review the paper in one of the most prestigious Journal. I only can dream about publishing myself in it. THE AUTHORS OF PAPER WERE HIGH CALIBER SCIENTISTS AND I WAS NOBODY. In that time who was I to judge their paper?, (never mind that I am clever guy :-)). But on the record I was no-name. Who can guarantee that someone will send my paper also to reviewer who is so below my expertise as I was in case I mentioned.

Third, what if reviewers are from competitive group on the same research? In fact it happens to me. Once I have paper rejected by the EIC of several Journals without review. One or two years later I found papers on these topics in all of those journals. I forgot to say that editors’ answers were this is not in focus of our journal.

Fourth, in my narrow field which is adolescent suicidology I managed to identify few very important and strong groups, but they rarely or never quote each other although other group has important papers which supports their investigation.

and so on… it is luck for you that my english is so bad that I do not now how to write next numbers (fifth, sixth?)

I am for establishing some fund, but how?

I am from middle income country and publishing fee is my month salary. Not to mention low income countries.

Ok. So, I am putting together an "organizational proposal" which will list the GOALS, organizational structure, and more ... We should keep kicking it around, and everybody can chip in an idea about "but, it is missing this ... " type . and, we can revise it, and finalize it.

For now, can we , please, get candidates NAMES for the organization ? I am assuming that, it will be an ORGANIZATION. For an organization, there are two alternatives:

a) a virtual organization which is not really legally registered anywhere. This is fine if the transaction volume is small, say, just a few scholars supported by volunteers (somehow directly, by bypassing the organization, but, records are kept by the organization).

b) A non-profit organization, registered in the USA. It is a simple registration. This will be necessary in the USA, since it has to be proven that the organization is NOT MAKING MONEY. Otherwise, it will be TAXABLE. In the USA, a non-profit organization, for example, has to distribute every donation as scholarships. It is a lot easier to handle if the members are not making money (i.e., no salaries). This is a perfect start. 100% volunteer-based ... Records must be kept, that are open to all members and easily visible. I am sure, we can find RG members that are retired accountants that will gladly donate their time for the accounting portion. There should also be a quarterly or annual audit internal mechanism. These are easy to do. I will put that in the initial proposal.

So, for now, please go ahead and start kicking ideas around ... Everybody, think about a NAME for it ... I will put that name down in my initial proposal ...

Why not the name of this thread:

Global-Scholarship

Dear Tolga,

How about Researchgate Fellowship Council? Fellowship implies financial aid, but also companionship. Further, it has a fine dactylic rhythm that will make it easy to remember.

@Louis, let's listen to Nelson. He has done so much humanitarian work that, he knows what he is talking about :) Unless there are objections, I am going with Researchgate Fellowship Council (RFC) ... REVISION 0 of the proposal is attached. This is a super duper rough "Revision 0" ... Please look at it and see if anything is missing. And, then, we can keep improving it.

Please comment on anything that you want to see change ... Also, identify areas where you can help ... We will start putting together a committee as I outlined in the proposal . As we identify folks that can assume described positions, I will update the document and put their names in there ...

First toughts

I like idea that organisation will serve mainly as technical and not content service . In this way only one PD is enough per country or region, since he does not need to know everything about content. If you do not find more appropriate PD for Croatia ore even former Yugoslavia region I could serve as PD

Tolga,

Maybe you will need to receive the authorisation from The ResearchGate organisation if you use the word ''ResearchGate'' as part of the name.

@Louis, I was most definitely worried about that, 5 minutes after I posted it. Second thought : I would drop "Research Gate" and make it Global Research Fellowship Council - GRFC ? Can somebody make sure that, this is not bumping into some acronym that is used ? I have a feeling that, technical committee will not be difficult to form, but, we would need somebody with LEGAL experience. If there is a volunteer, please let us know. Somebody should be the "IP police" , worrying about these issues. REV1 is attached. Changes are:

*** I added a new position LD - Legal Director

*** @Tomislav - I placed your comments in REV1. There are issues to discuss.

*** @Vladimir - I added your comments into the voting process.

*** Also, I am putting in whoever expressed clear desire to be involved. So far, I only have Tomislav as the RD of Croatia. Regions can be expanded if needed.

*** My general comment to everyone: I see quite a few foreign names (including mine). I am now a long time US citizen, but my mother country is Turkey. I came here on a Turkish government scholarship, and I wouldn't be able to afford it otherwise. I now see myself as an advocate to help as many folks as possible from my country. Most of you folks are at higher up places in you own country. I see this organization as a great way to channel your "RG energy" :) into helping your folks in your own country. We need your help in initially identifying candidates for scholarship recipients.The more people you bring from your own country, the more chance they have.

So, please help us by getting involved. We can change things !

Please look at V1 - there are 2 important things to discuss

@Tolga, thanks for proposal. It takes time to read it seriously. Three full pages of text! Yes, we can change things! Yes, we will!

Dear Tolga, it really takes time with your proposal. Not only to read but also to understand and to develop ideas and imaginations. Really inspiring work!

Greetings Hanno

Hanno and Ljubomir, I agree , it takes time. I could have started with a 1/2 page one, but, many details would be missing. We can start with one topic at a time. May be, read the "Operational Goals" and start commenting on it.

My strong feeling is this:

*** We should separate the efforts into three categories:

1) FUNDING (i.e., DONATION) efforts

2) CANDIDATE SELECTION efforts,

3) TECHNICAL EFFORTS in helping the candidates

**** DONATIONs will possibly come from resource-rich countries. I am thinking, 90%+ from USA (at least, for now), and later other countries may join. For DONATION efforts, we should have folks coordinating the fund raising process. They do not have to be technically involved, however, they certainly CAN,

**** CANDIDATEs will come from resource-deprived countries. So, the RD (Regional directors) will be primarily responsible for this,

**** TECHNICAL efforts can include any member that can contribute ...

Dear Tolga, this helps a bit!