The watchers on the Web

MANY scientific studies are flawed. Often, the reason is poor methodology. Sometimes, it is outright fraud. The conventional means of correction—a letter to the journal concerned—can take months. But there is now an alternative. PubPeer is a website that lets people comment anonymously on research papers and so, in theory, helps purge the scientific literature of erroneous findings more speedily.

Since its launch in 2012, PubPeer has alerted scientists to mistakes and image manipulation in papers, and exposed cases of misconduct. But it has also attracted criticism, not least from journal editors, some of whom argue anonymity’s cloak lets vendettas flourish unchecked. Now the site is embroiled in a court case that tests the limits of free speech under America’s First Amendment, and may define what it is permissible for researchers to say online and anonymously about science.

The proceedings centre on discussions that began on the site in November 2013. These highlighted apparent similarities between images showing the results of different experiments in papers by Fazlul Sarkar, a cancer researcher who was then based at Wayne…Continue reading
Source: Economist