Robert Insall

done

Try this

preply.com/en/learn/eng...

(I scored more than 500! Woo hoo!)

This is actually quite brilliant, up to and including the final sentence 🔥

Glory be.
As he says, unis are worried about QR getting canned; unis whose research is a bit slow are worried about it getting slower; the REF supports a huge ecosystem of jobs and titles and work.
But those of us who were around when the first RAE happened know - it was good, & it's now useless.

But that's not what's happening! All MRC grants are shut. All medical researchers who want an MRC grant will be unfunded for a year, whether they work in a priority area or not, if their PI's renewal falls between Last Sept and late this summer.

Not a sub-field, a career path :(

Yep, Andre, I'm agreeing with you.
Even if the process is perfect, there are not 60+ excellent, trustworthy referees for each grant. Peer review can't work with such numbers, it becomes a hyper-expensive stochasticity.

So no point at all fixing the criteria if you don't fix the numbers.

(4) I well remember the shift when Blair & Brown asked the pharma industry what they actually wanted. Turned out that universities concentrating on developing medicines etc was not it - they wanted well-trained, diversely-interested, future-facing PhDs.
Can't see a hint of that in current plans.

(3) the system could well do with an overhaul as you point out. But at the moment this seems to be doing the opposite of what it needs - establishing a complex, written, non-agile hierarchy of what the centre thinks should be researched in the next ?10 years.
Why not try & create an agile system?

the way you've used italics and inversted commas makes me think you concur.
(2) part of this I don't understand - a cohort of young scientists will be unexpectedly kicked out, in 1-2 years. Randomly, based on when their employer's funding fails. This is obvious but nobody's screaming about it?

A few comments:
(1) the term "curiosity-driven research" is both completely inaccurate (try to get the MRC to fund a project based on curiosity, not a disease with an unmet need...) and damagingly misleading (fits UKRI's narrative of a load of shamateurs pootling about, and demeans the process).

Essentially doesn't matter if 96.4% is not funded; peer review simply doesn't work on such margins.
But agreed a new process is obviously needed.

As opposed to, for example, suddenly stopping the funding that pays young researchers' salaries for a year or so...

old man done good

yes please

interesting

Was thinking reveal.js but that is a refinement...

Very good. One of yours? OK to use it in an undergrad lecture?

(from Six Colors, I have deleted)

Pages, Numbers, and Keynote Ratings Crash After Apple Creator Studio Launch Pages, Numbers, and Keynote ratings are falling as users react to ads and paywalls introduced with Apple Creator Studio across Mac and iPad.

It's a new version - it asks you to install it, but threatens you that there will be no updates if you don't.

www.macobserver.com/news/pages-n...

Apple will try and persuade you to update Keynote.

Don't!

The new one is foul, the equivalent of a budget airline, advertising everywhere and nudges to try and extract more of your cash and embed their AI.

I'll give htem a month then find a new program.

Yet let him that submitteth remember also this: that he who would be published herein must not only proclaim his measure, but declare likewise the bounds thereof; showing the number of observations, and the common error attendant, lest his saying be taken for certainty where it is but an estimate.

The "Friends Don't Let Friends Make Bad Graphs" list is great...

BUT

I STRONGLY disagree with the suggestion to use log scaled axis on barplots.

(the absolute worse being "stacked barplots on logscale")

Just don't use barplots if the values are on different orders of magnitude.

Who's with me?

Usually communications are this poor reflect bad thinking, not only bad expression.
In this case - I suspect
- consequences weren't completely thought out, esp. on careers of junior researchers;
- execs more concerned with secrecy than secondary effects;
- underlying drivers still a little murky.

I think Ian Chapman's focus throughout this process has been excessively PI-centred and ignores early career researchers and training.
A big funding pause doesn't cause them to worry about their jobs. It causes them to lose their jobs. And to be unable to get new ones. Their careers will be ended.

@grok: is this really the only legitimate use for AI?

Open letter from Ian Chapman to research and innovation community UKRI Chief Executive outlines changes to UKRI investment approach, addressing concerns about research funding and the financial position of STFC.

Today, we're sharing an open letter from our Chief Executive, Professor Sir Ian Chapman, outlining changes to UKRI investment approach, and addressing concerns about research funding and the financial position of STFC. Read his letter here: www.ukri.org/news/open-le...

Spot on.

Even if the changes are for the good (I doubt, but await the data) - implementing them like this is curtains for the careers of a bunch of postdoctoral scientists, and probably a final dissuasion for a bunch more.

And they talk and TALK about how much they want to support junior careers..

trying to send you a super candidate

I like Restaurant 22

Wiley: "We’re supporting responsible research assessment practices" onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/1520...

Also Wiley: "Prove that your article is a good fit for this journal 😉😉😉😉😉 by citing at least two of our articles in your manuscript before we will even consider reviewing it" 🤡

The semantics presume that government ministers and MRC mandarins know better than medical scientists what is useful to the future UK economy. I suspect they don't.