Yuri, I think you need to accept Researchgate for what it is - a social media site like Facebook LinkedIn or Quora with an emphasis on science and academia. It has many of the same problems that the other social media sites have. It also has a grading system that is flawed, most participants claim they don't care about RG score but they still seem to talk about it a lot.

I have had the opportunity to interact with a few young researchers on this site who needed a little guidance. I appreciate that this site gave me the opportunity to do that. I believe that is the true value of the site – bringing people together that can help each other.

I prefer not to worry about people trying to inflate their RG scores. I believe RG scores are just a gimmick that artificially increases the amount of discussion on the site. I prefer sticking to the actual scientific discussions and helping out young researchers when I get a chance.

Dear Muzammil Iqbal ,

thanks for opening this discussion. I hope it will have more responses than the similar discussion which I opened recently:

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

I have to admit that some my answers are not formally related to the question. The goal of such answers was not to offense the questioner but to improve the quality of questions. In the most of cases the questioner respond adequately.

In my opinon the answer to your queston is no. I don't think RG monitors the content of the questions at all except possibly screening for a few unacceptable words.

Dear Prof. Yurii V Geletii

Thanks for your comments, I have checked the discussion that you already open before starting this discussion, that will be very helpful to avoid these type of answers like following or agreed, but we need more board discussion about the standard of questions,

As I think RG provide a platform to researchers of every level, just like You are Senior Scientist and expert in Reaction Kinetics so according to your standard asking a simple question like can we make hydrogen by combing proton and electron, is not good on a professional level. But for new researcher may be it is useful.

So for these type of questions, we have many solutions like give them a link that someone already answered it or report it to RG if we think it’s only to increase RG score, as you have said in your previous answers.

I like your way to improve the quality of questions and but some time it’s too harsh for new researchers.

Prof. Rick Manner Thanks for comments

The good thing is whenever we write a question RG shows some similar results to avoid the similar type of question, so at that time it depends on the person that He/She really wants an answer or it for self-promotion or RG score. So we have only right to report it to RG about its contents if we feel its not for the academic purpose instead of on answering the question.

@Muzammil Iqbal

Normally I would agree that posters on social media site should leave enforcement of inappropriate behavior to site management. However the management at this site doesn’t seem to be concerned with monitoring inappropriate activity or enforcing any rules. Yuri is treating this site as if it is a professional scientific research site and imposing stricter standards on users he believes are acting in an inappropriate manner. I hope site management will step up and enforce some basic rules to avoid rampant cheating but so far it doesn’t seem they are willing to do that. As a result, some have resorted a system of vigilante justice.

Rick Manner

Sorry I didn’t give answer there as I believe that important question by Ibrahim Mohammad should not be mixed that that discussion.

The definition of inappropriate behavior of these types of forums is different so it is also a difficult task for site management to judge every question, except asking the user to recommend or report, but still RG allows the people to recommend and report who have institute email, so its better to take RG as a cocktail of new and professional researcher and expected every type of questions.

RG is not bordered about the way you ask or answer questions. It grades you based on conversance... my opinion

My opinion. The RG administration does not control at all the content of the site.

I consider this forum as for the professionals who actively involved in research. It's not for learning the basics of science.

RG, RI and other scores do not have any significant values and should not be considered to evaluate the scientific contribution of a researcher to science. These score are an opinion of only the members of RG, which do not represent all scientific community. All attempts to inflate the RG score are inappropriate.

The value of "recommendation" is completely discredited. The people commonly recommend each other for useless answers. Some members recommend all answers including such as "following."

In general, the RG forum is quickly degrading thanks to the members posting low quality questions/answers to inflate their RG score. RG score should be removed.

Joseph Gbertyo What is " conversance..." and how to grade it?

Yuri, I think you need to accept Researchgate for what it is - a social media site like Facebook LinkedIn or Quora with an emphasis on science and academia. It has many of the same problems that the other social media sites have. It also has a grading system that is flawed, most participants claim they don't care about RG score but they still seem to talk about it a lot.

I have had the opportunity to interact with a few young researchers on this site who needed a little guidance. I appreciate that this site gave me the opportunity to do that. I believe that is the true value of the site – bringing people together that can help each other.

I prefer not to worry about people trying to inflate their RG scores. I believe RG scores are just a gimmick that artificially increases the amount of discussion on the site. I prefer sticking to the actual scientific discussions and helping out young researchers when I get a chance.

Rick,

I agree with you. Since I can't improve the site, I follow only the questions/discussions I'm interested in.

Yuri, Actually you have improved the site. Your contribution to the discussion are always very good.

I totally agree with Dear Mr. Rick Manner that we should take RG as social media as it is open for all people to signup and post any level of question and answer, like following or interesting question. Hope RG administration will make some strict rules for signup, and open question and answer forum only after a certain level of score or ban for some time if the same type of question asked many time. Or we should wait for another professional forum that will replace RG.

I also appreciate Prof. Yurii V Geletii efforts to improve RG by giving answers that are really helpful for the new researcher.

Muzammil.

I am not a Prof or even a Phd. I am just an Chemical Engineer with an MS for MIT and 40 years of experience in the Petroleum Refining business.

If RG is a social media, all scores must be removed

Yurii V Geletii

As you already mentioned that RG, RI and other scores do not have any significant values, so I agree till now we can’t predict scientific contribution on the bases of RG score, but if in future we have that type of mechanism that will increases RG score on the bases of recommendation and every persons recommendation should have different score according to their contribution in that specific field according to question.

Just like if I recommend an answer in Reaction Kinetics field, it should have 0.1 score and if Prof. Yurii V Geletii recommend answer it should have 10 score as his contribution in Reaction Kinetics is more. In this way even if a Senior Scientist recommended a answer in others field that will get a low score.

Dr. Muzammil Iqbal

I Don’t think RG need those changes that you mentioned, Everyone allowed to ask the question, but their question got a number of reads according to his/her followers' number. New users asked some basic questions and got only a few reads, until a Senior recommend or answer that question, as that question will also appear on the Homepage of followers of the person who answered or recommends.

Any questions related to professional development, research, community-service, academia in all fields are important. RG monitors your score based on how interactive you are and how others perceive and recommend your work. Interactive discussions among all professions are crucial and fruitful learning experience. It is all about learning.

Hassan Izzeddin Sarsak

I think "Important" and "Crucial" are a bit of an exaggeration of the importance of Researchgate. It is a nice site where "scientists" can interact with each other and occasionally help each other, but it is really just a social media site with a slant toward technology and academia. There are many more important things in the world than this site. Fun, Interesting, Entertaining and helpful are good words to describe this site but crucial is a bit of an overstatement.

Dear Rich Manner,

Thank you for your response. I was actually referring to the importance of interactive discussions among different disciplines in specific.

Really good question, i asked same thing few days back but didn't get any reply..there should be some procedure to filter questions

Pargat Singh

Dr. Singh,

How many answered you get is not only depends on the quality of your question. It also depends on how many famous keywords you added, and how many people have these keywords in their skills so that your question will appear on their homepage, or how many people are following you.

I know many good quality questions are unanswered but some questions with obvious answers got much intention.

I would recommend the following threads as being closely related to this very interesting Question:

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

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