Trump's Grand Finale....

[ex-khobar Andy]

Back in the olden days before the intertubes were invented and even before photocopiers were common, scientific papers were accessible through your library - if they could afford a subscription to the journal - or via reprints. Relatively rich libraries in Europe and the US had all the major journals but poorer libraries relied on abstracting services. So Chemical Abstracts, for example, would weekly scan all the major journals worldwide and publish a paragraph on each paper's major findings along with a complete citation and details of the address of the primary author. Chem Abs* wasn't cheap but it was a lot cheaper than a subscription to half a dozen major journals plus all the rest.

So when you published something you were not paid for the piece, but you'd get (if memory serves) 50 reprints of your article. And then you sit back and wait for the postcards to come in. Mostly they were addressed to Dr Andrew Khobar even though I did not have a PhD (still don't, BTW - maybe I'll write it up one day - I've been saying that for 45 years now). One guy was taking no chances that I'd toss his request into the garbage: his postcard (from Hungary IIRC) was addressed to Professor Sir Andrew Khobar, PhD. He got his reprint.

I had to pay to mail out all these reprints. As a poor grad student on a grant working in the scientific trenches, my department had no funds for this. (We didn't publish a lot of papers.). I got almost 100 requests for reprints for my first paper (I had to go back to the journal to request a second batch of 50 which they very grudgingly sent) and I can only recall that I had to moderate my beer consumption for a few months. So maybe it was a good thing.

* My first job in a lab was in flavour research for Unilever. We were trying to understand what constituted various flavours so that we could amplify what was lost in food processing and put it back, off the storeroom shelf. One of my responsibilities was literature searching. So if we were doing celery, I'd scan Chemical Abstracts from 1907 to the present day (1967) for all references to celery and order journals for anything that might be interesting. (This meant that I spent hours in the company's research library. I didn't mind this. This may not have been unrelated to the fact that the assistant librarian was rather gorgeous. Long black hair, a smile a mile wide, sparkling eyes and mini-skirts were then coming into fashion. Where are you now, Jenny Clark? I digress.). The 1907 Chem Abs was about the size of a typical family bible. By the time I got up to the present, Chem Abs came out every two weeks and each volume was about the size of a US road atlas.

[Big RR]

Andy--two things I recall about the publishing: one was that you (really your grant) had to also pay a publishing fee in most journals (at least that was in the 70s/80s when I got a couple of technical papers publishedI think that's still the case). Also, because, under patent law, any publication could avoid the ability to get a patent, people would often publish in an obscure journal (like the Annals of Outer Mongolia) weren't referenced in the abstract services (and there really wasn't a computer searching) and most libraries did not keep them in their collections. The prevented someone else from getting a patent for something you were keeping essentially as a trade secret. The obscure journals were also often changed once they were recognized and carried by libraries.

[ex-khobar Andy]

Patenting was never an issue for the things I published - well only marginally in the sense that one 'effect' I think I was the first to publish could have been useful to an instrument manufacturer but I don't think it ever was used. I did see a note about the effect in an instruction manual (which made no reference to me) which outlined how to avoid it.

I don't remember a publishing fee. I found during a move a couple of houses ago an envelope with all the stuff from my first publication (referee comments, first and second draft, my hand drawn charts and graphs, the galley proofs, the letter of acceptance) but no mention of a fee. This was Nature which was then (and is still) one of the world's top scientific journals (and I am not claiming some earth shattering scientific breakthrough - I was lucky in my topic which was then fashionable) so the fee rules may have been different from other journals. Now you mention it I was joint author on something in the Hazardous and Industrial Waste Proceedings in 1996 (I don't have it on this computer) (OK I just looked it up [thanks Google] and I had both the date and the journal name wrong) and I think there was a publication fee which the company picked up.

[Big RR]

I have no real experience with Nature, but other Journals I published in (or dealt with as an attorney) did charge a publishing (or article processing), fee. I also presented a poster once at a meeting (of the American Chemical Society) and there was a fee to present the poster as well. I guess it's a way the organizations defray expenses

[Burning Petard]

Here in the USofA "Adjunct Professor" is an itinerant position with no job security. In my experience, they are usually better for the students than the 'full professor with tenure' who has little experience in the subject outside academia and probably doesn't give a damn if the student ever finds a job related to the field.

snailgate

[BoSoxGal]

This is a good place for this little gem:

[BoSoxGal]

Thanks to Daisy for this cathartic rant!

[Gob]

In deference to those here I respect, I'll drop it. (However, anyone believing our resident hysterical, histrionic, hyperbolic, harpy could have ever been a "professor" needs their head read.)

[BoSoxGal]

Right, I’ll be sure to tell that to the dozens of university students I taught over the years.

Thanks for the rent free space. Keep enjoying your obsession. And the iPod.

[Gob]

"University of Fantasy Island" perhaps?

[BoSoxGal]

"University of Fantasy Island" perhaps?

I can only assume it’s your insecurity over your own inadequacies that drives this obsession. I really just feel sorry for you. Keep on sharing your small self!

[ex-khobar Andy]

There's some good news to come out of all of this, from the Daily Mail:

Don Jr. plans move to Jupiter

So there's that . . .

[Scooter]

[Big RR]

Or finish the wall. Or collect the Bill from Mexico for the part completed...

[BoSoxGal]

Not to mention the never-ending audit that held up his tax returns . . .

[Scooter]

Suddenly every Republican politician is wearing a mask, now that they are no longer afraid of Trump using the refusal to wear a mask as a litmus test of loyalty.

[BoSoxGal]

Suddenly every Republican politician is wearing a mask, now that they are no longer afraid of Trump using the refusal to wear a mask as a litmus test of loyalty.

Also, it’s a mandate on federal property as of noon today, I believe? (So they can say they’re just following orders.)

[dales]

Our long national nightmare is finally over!

Long live President Biden and Trump slinks back into the morASS of his own failings.

[Scooter]

Oh, snap!

NIGELLA LAWSON CHOOSES ‘BITTER ORANGE TART’ AS RECIPE OF THE DAY AS TRUMP LEAVES THE WHITE HOUSE

Nigella Lawson has tickled the internet by choosing a “bitter orange tart” as her recipe of the day, coinciding with the departure of Donald Trump from the White House.

On Wednesday, the popular TV cook and author shared her daily recipe on Twitter.

“Well, yes, Bitter Orange Tart just happens to be #RecipeOfTheDay," Lawson wrote in an apparent jibe to the outgoing US president.

“Apart from anything else, there are more things to make with Seville oranges than marmalade! This is not complicated: the base is bashed ginger nuts.”

The 61-year-old Cook, Eat, Repeat author added that if you don’t have Seville oranges, you can just use regular oranges and limes.

However, Twitter users were far too enthralled by the name of Lawson’s recipe of the day, and her playful timing, to fixate on the recipe itself.

"Absolutely LOVE @Nigella_Lawsonfor making this her recipe of the day today," tweeted one person.

Another person described the choice as “Top level trolling".

Meanwhile, the journalist and author Caitlin Moran commented: “If anyone says ‘’given the last few years, are there any things that still make you proud to be British?' I have to reply, 'It's a dwindling list, but Nigella Lawson calmly choosing Bitter Orange Tart on the day Trump leaves office would be one of them’.”

Historian and author Greg Jenner described Lawson’s tart as the “perfect choice for this historic day”.

One person described the choice as the perfect “chef’s kiss moment”, tweeting: “Nigella’s recipe of the day as we farewell Trump is.... a legit chefs kiss moment. God bless Nigella and all who sail in her.”

Many Twitter users described Lawson as a “legend” and a “glorious queen”, while many others vowed to bake the sweet citrus dessert to honour the cook’s good humour.

[ex-khobar Andy]

Why do they have all these redcoat soldiers marching around? Weren't they the enemy for want of a better word?