THE BIOSCI NEWSGROUP SYSTEM NEEDS YOUR HELP
in this important readership survey!
IF YOU SEE THIS MESSAGE (posted to BIONEWS/bionet.general), PLEASE
SEND A MAIL MESSAGE in response to the Internet address
SURVEY at GENBANK.BIO.NET
PLEASE LOOK AT YOUR RESPONSE BEFORE SENDING IT TO BE SURE THAT IT IS
DIRECTED TO THE ADDRESS ABOVE AND ***NOT*** TO THE NEWSGROUP.
Responses to mail that pass through the IRLEARN Listserver in Dublin,
Ireland will default to go back to BIONEWS and then everyone will get
copies (ugh!).
The safest way to reply is to send an original message to the above
address. EVEN A BLANK MESSAGE TO THE ABOVE ADDRESS WILL SUFFICE as it
will be proof that you saw this posting.
It is important that we get some kind of quantitative determination of
BIOSCI readership (BIOSCI = "bionet" on USENET), but this is difficult
to do given the many mechanisms for message redistribution. We do
know that over 1000 sites now receive the bionet newsgroups on USENET
alone. This does not count our many readers that receive BIOSCI
postings by e-mail around the world over the Internet, BITNET, JANET,
etc.
In a little over a month I will be giving a presentation about the
BIOSCI newsgroups at the international BIO-MATRIX meeting near
Washington, D.C. (July 9-11). As you know, awareness of electronic
communications is increasing in the biological community, and has the
potential to play an important role in how science is done in the
future.
Others, however, seem to think that biologists will always be computer
phobes, won't learn how to use e-mail, can barely handle a computer
unless it is a Macintosh (and even struggle somewhat with that), etc.
I'm sure that we've all heard these stories and will undoubtedly hear
more.
However, I believe, based on the growth in newsgroup use, my contacts
during BIONET, etc., that we biologists have more brains than the
"cognoscenti" give us credit for. One way to document this is to get
a handle on the readership of the newsgroups (which I have always
believed is far larger than one might guess). Unfortunately we have
no way of determining readership except by this type of survey, and
surveys typically only get a small percentage of readers to respond.
My hope, however, is that each of you will recognize the importance of
this work, take the time to respond, and prove the conventional wisdom
wrong.
You can help me get this message across to everyone and demonstrate
the utility of BIOSCI. The couple of minutes of your time that this
will take may have an important impact on the future of biological
networking.
Thank you very much in advance for your continued support!!
Sincerely,
David Kristofferson, Ph.D.
for the BIOSCI (bionet) newsgroups
