5 ms·

My personal favorite? #2: "Ask" It is truly astonishing what you can get when you ask (of course, the answer could be "no", but asking is free - why not do it?

My personal favorite? #2: "Ask" It is truly astonishing what you can get when you ask (of course, the answer could be "no", but asking is free - why not do it?)

antegamisou 3y ago
May be field dependent but unfortunately the most likely outcome is the authors never getting back to you.
- hannob 3y ago
  Not my experience, and I do this regularly. Scientists are often happy when people are interested in their research.
  - dredmorbius 3y ago
    Many authors I'm interested in are dead. Asks are rarely answered.
- warrenm 3y ago
  in this case, the article does suggest asking the journal for a free account - not directly to the authors (that's #6)
generalizations 3y ago
For me, it's the latency. If I'm researching something, I want to read the papers right then so that I can build off of them to do my next round of searches, instead of waiting for stuff to (maybe) trickle in. With scihub, I can do the search-read-search cycle in a matter of minutes rather than waiting hours/days for emails to be replied to.
- JJMcJ 3y ago
  > it's the latency Journalists are often on deadline.
  - kergonath 3y ago
    On the other hand, journalists are also those who would benefit the most from some direct interaction with the authors. The vast majority of them don’t have anywhere near the background necessary to actually understand the articles.
    - kragen 3y ago
      maybe those journalists shouldn't be the ones covering the papers then
- pessimizer 3y ago
  > I want to read the papers right then so that I can build off of them to do my next round of searches I want to read the papers right then so I can figure out if they're actually totally irrelevant or even just garbage, and delete them and move on.
kergonath 3y ago
I have never heard about a researcher who would not provide an article when asked, ever. Most of them would also be happy to discuss the content of the articles, how they can be replicated and whether they are still accurate. It does have more friction and latency than a search engine, though.
- pessimizer 3y ago
  What if the researcher is dead?

My personal favorite? #2: "Ask" It is truly astonishing what you can get when you ask (of course, the answer could be "no", but asking is free - why not do it?)

antegamisou 3y ago

May be field dependent but unfortunately the most likely outcome is the authors never getting back to you.

hannob 3y ago
Not my experience, and I do this regularly. Scientists are often happy when people are interested in their research.
- dredmorbius 3y ago
  Many authors I'm interested in are dead. Asks are rarely answered.
warrenm 3y ago
in this case, the article does suggest asking the journal for a free account - not directly to the authors (that's #6)

generalizations 3y ago

For me, it's the latency. If I'm researching something, I want to read the papers right then so that I can build off of them to do my next round of searches, instead of waiting for stuff to (maybe) trickle in. With scihub, I can do the search-read-search cycle in a matter of minutes rather than waiting hours/days for emails to be replied to.

JJMcJ 3y ago
> it's the latency Journalists are often on deadline.
- kergonath 3y ago
  On the other hand, journalists are also those who would benefit the most from some direct interaction with the authors. The vast majority of them don’t have anywhere near the background necessary to actually understand the articles.
  - kragen 3y ago
    maybe those journalists shouldn't be the ones covering the papers then
pessimizer 3y ago
> I want to read the papers right then so that I can build off of them to do my next round of searches I want to read the papers right then so I can figure out if they're actually totally irrelevant or even just garbage, and delete them and move on.

kergonath 3y ago

I have never heard about a researcher who would not provide an article when asked, ever. Most of them would also be happy to discuss the content of the articles, how they can be replicated and whether they are still accurate. It does have more friction and latency than a search engine, though.

pessimizer 3y ago
What if the researcher is dead?