"internet too fast for academia"?

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/technology/shanerichmond/feb08/thurman-ugc-study-is-flawed.htm

Does a two-and-a-half year publishing turnaround render studies of the Web dead on arrival? That's the claim argued in the following exchange over a study of the efficacy of reader comments in online journalism. Maybe Leonardo Transactions can help?

jon

* Posted by Shane Richmond on 28 Feb 2008 at 11:28
....Neil [Thurman] is an eminent academic and experienced in this field and I'm not suggesting that this study is without merit. However, many of the problems he highlights are not problems any more. Some of the problems we have now didn't exist
back then.

Does the internet move too fast for academia?

* seamusmccauley 28 Feb 2008 12:45
Shane - I emailed Neil about this, as I had the same concerns (our own cited interviewee likewise left the company more than two years ago). He was kind enough to share with me a far more up-to-date report. I've read it and it addresses some of the
issues you raise. Alas, I understand that academic publishing cycles mean the new report won't be out until September, when things will of course have moved on again.

Not Neil's fault, I hasten to add - he's doing some great work in this space, indeed some of the only really rigorous academic studies into the subject at all. But the academic publishing schedule he seems to be lumbered with does create these
considerable problems of relevance and timing. By the time his papers come out they are essentially recent histories of the web rather than investigations of the current state of the art.

* neilthurman 28 Feb 2008 14:26
As Seamus recognises, the "problem" you perceive regarding the length of time that has passed since the data was collected, is not of my making, but a result of the fact academics are leant on to publish in peer-reviewed journals (who demand
exclusivity) in order that they and their departments are rewarded--for example with income from the Research Assessment Exercise. Even though the journal that published this paper has recently increased its pagination and frequency, more than 17
months elapsed between acceptance and publication (and more than a year between submission and acceptance).

Some academic publishers are trying to speed up the publication cycle (via initiatives like Taylor and Francis' iFirst), although the promised improvements are "several weeks", rather than the months or even years required.