I get very frustrated every time I see an article about a PLoS article in the popular press that doesn’t include a link to the article. One of our motivations for starting PLoS was to give the public access to the primary research literature, and readers of popular news accounts of one of our articles are exactly the people most likely to be interested in the article itself.
So I was particularly annoyed at a story in today’s NY Times about a recent PLoS One paper describing a recently discovered fossil primate, because the NYT story was about the authors trying to find a wider audience for their work!
It’s not like the NYT has a policy against including links. They do it sometimes. But they – and all papers – should implement a blanket policy of providing links to primary research articles that are a source for one of their stories if the article is freely available to their readers.
P.S. – The PLoS article is very cool!
[UPDATE - They added the link! Maybe someone at the Times reads my blog 
]
I'm a biologist at UC Berkeley and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. I work primarily on flies, and my research encompases evolution, development, genetics, genomics, chemical ecology and behavior. I am a strong proponent of open science, and a co-founder of the 
2 Comments
Did you see the Google homepage today? It’s too bad that the PLoS paper doesn’t come up in the list of links when you click on the graphic…any way to change that?
@Michael,
Totally share your frustration but am glad to see that NYT have now added a link.
A very similar situation arose here in the UK a few months back. A link was added after a simple nudge. Condensed version of the story here:- http://is.gd/BJr4 I informed Jonathan who was rather pleased
One Trackback
[...] it is NOT junk: Unfortunate lack of links in the NY Times [...]