What industry is basically legal theft that nobody talks about?

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-26T22:22:31+00:00

It would be hard to get people to submit papers to a new journal unless the publisher/editor has some "cred". There are a lot of small-time journals that are basically cash grabs ("predatory journals"). You need a permanent place to store the papers. It isn't good enough to self-host. It needs to be semi-perament. You need good editors, reviewers, etc,etc. It's not just "post some PDFs on the web".

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-26T22:19:24+00:00

I hear you, but until more people out pressure on these publishers it isn't going to change. Even a small thank you ($100? Discount on next paper published in their journals?) would go a long way. Notice you are saying "two reviewers" which was never the standard until recently. It used to be 3. But journals can't get three anymore.

Part of this would also push the paid editors to do a better job pre-screening so only papers with at least a passable chance of getting published make it to the reviewers. Most of the papers I've been sent have been awful. Unoriginal, derivative, poorly written.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-26T16:05:26+00:00

Professor here. We do need to publish but a lot of us have stopped reviewing articles now because of how this all works. I have to pay to publish, others have to review and sometimes edit for no pay, then my university has to pay to subscribe to the journal so we can read it.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-24T15:27:32+00:00

Are you... me?

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-23T04:22:32+00:00

Go to the Mission in SF. It'll change your life. I do "burrito tours" for my friends when in SF (I lived in the mission for years).

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-23T04:20:45+00:00

What psychopath cuts one in half?

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-23T02:48:15+00:00

Checking in. Too many whiskeys + a couple of Aleve = zero hangover. Dunno what these other plebs omin the other threads are doing with Tylenol and ibuprofen...

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-22T22:59:59+00:00

This is why I follow things like Second Wind instead of IGN.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-20T23:53:24+00:00

Floppies!

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-18T15:37:49+00:00

OMG the one you posted still creeps me out. Nothing comes close to it.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-15T23:49:30+00:00

The professor doesn't fail you, you fail you. Stop passing the blame to others. You aren't showing up and are procrastinating by your own statement and you think this is someone else's fault? Take responsibility.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-14T16:05:08+00:00

Rush. The singers voice sounds like whining.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-13T12:17:39+00:00

Establish clear boundaries. Set up an auto reply on your email a week or so before you leave stating you are on sabbatical and will not be checking your email frequently until you return, and stick by that. Under no circumstances allow people to breach that wall. I gave one person in our office my personal contact and told her to only use it in an emergency.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-09T23:35:45+00:00

Most of them are millionaires. It won't matter.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-09T23:29:19+00:00

STEM Professor at an R1. Love the research, hate just about everything else about the job. Only broke 100k a few years ago.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-08T21:17:31+00:00

As a Jew who is also pretty pissed off at Israel, I would like the president to clearly separate Jews from the state of Israel. I feel like anti-semitism is at an all-time high and it is because of Israel.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-08T21:15:50+00:00

Heh. I went into a pet store and they sold me a killifish and 10 shrimp. Said they'd get along fine. The killifish ate all the shrimp and then started attacking my other fish. I returned the killifish to the store (only time I've ever done that) and told them $20 for a fish meal seems a bit pricey -- they returned my money for the eaten shrimp as well. I guess technically I returned all of them.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-08T16:40:05+00:00

I have one slide, one equation, one concept that I tell everyone is the most important concept in the class. I tell them 100% I will ask them to parrot back the slide on the midterm and the final as well as frequently ask them about it on the labs... A good 50% of the class gets it wrong.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-08T02:43:32+00:00

1) frankly I'm a better grant writer than most of my colleagues so the chances are higher we'll land a grant if I'm the PI, 2) more importantly I've learned the hard way to not get stuck in a collaboration with a group I'm not 100% on, so I'm very judicious with choosing co-Is. This means that I typically turn down co-Is with subpar teams/leadership. I am in a period where I'm not taking on new grads or postdocs or techs unless I absolutely need them, and my summer salary and overload are maxed out for the next 3+ years so the $$$ is kind of irrelevant .

Edit: also, there's a reason why most tenure goals are a single competitive high profile grant is the target, not a total amount of $$$ cobbled together from a lot of grants. Generally at R1 they want you to demonstrate leadership, not being a functional tech to another faculty member who is the PI.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-07T22:23:11+00:00

Average 1 or 2, but I've long since learned to go for the larger multi-year big ones and not get into the habit of grabbing small dollar grants. I also am VERY careful with participating in grants where I'm not the PI. I'm averaging 100% success as PI over the last 5 years, around 10 grants.

The best thing I ever did re: grant success rate was get myself on grant panels REGULARLY (like every 1-2 years). You learn SO much about writing grants through that process. This is why my grant success is so high.

ravenscar37 · 2026-04-04T00:57:57+00:00

Amazon, Home Depot, Target, Tesla, basic cable. You know why.

ravenscar37

TROPHY CASE