soulsstudies

[soulsstudies]

I bring a very "taking notes in swenglish" energy to my studying that microsoft word doesn't like

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wants to sleep forced to statistics

I don't really wanna do the work today i don't REALLY wanna do the WORK TO-DAY I don't really wannadothe thework today I don't WANNA do the work today

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akademisk kvart my beloved

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only four chapters left to read

If I hadn't lost monday to my bad mental health i would have been doing really good! but alas it is what it is

[soulsstudies]

If I procrastinate on my reading with meal planning and procrastinate on taking out the trash with reading and so on i might actually get everything done

[soulsstudies]

I store all my study motivation in ravel's bolero

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"delvis finansierade av brännvinsskatter" lmao

[soulsstudies]

students emailing teachers vs teachers responding.

me: oh, mighty professor, bearer of knowledge infinitely superior to mine, I humbly beg thee to answer my lowly cries for help interpreting the sacred texts which I, but a small pupil of your elite occupation, dutifully study at your excellency's demand. pray tell, will you condescend to clarify, when the moment pleases you, to which of my meager mathematical calculations does this elaborate visual diagram apply?

professor: 12 & 13 sry bout thst.

[soulsstudies]

when is it my turn to get the feminine urge to study for three hours straight

[soulsstudies]

"Jag stämde träff med chefen för Research & Development och planterade tanken där. Den bar frukt och jag blev utnämnd till processägare av den globala technology intelligence process."

thanks i hate it here

[soulsstudies]

The success of Sci-Hub has made it a target for injunctions and investigations. Academic publishers have sued Sci-Hub repeatedly, opponents have accused the site’s creators of collaborating with Russian intelligence, and private sector critics have dubbed it a threat to “national security.” Elbakyan recently tweeted out a notification she received that the FBI had requested her personal data from Apple.

Whatever happens to Sci-Hub or Elbakyan, the fact that such a site exists is something of a tragedy. Sci-Hub currently fills a niche that should never have existed. Like the black-market medicine purchased by people who cannot afford prescription drugs, its very being indicts the official system that created the conditions of its emergence.

[…] Even the champions of the academic publishing industry appear unable to formulate coherent defenses. In 2019, rumors began to spread that the Trump administration was considering issuing an executive order that would require published articles funded by government grants to be made immediately available to the public. An association of academic publishers issued the following warning in response:

“In addition to financing and managing a world-leading peer review process, publishers make extensive investments in education, research, and innovative digital platforms that advance American competitiveness and help ensure the quality and integrity of American science. Undermining the marketplace is unnecessary, counterproductive, and would significantly harm the system of peer-reviewed scholarly communication that fuels America’s leadership in research and innovation.”

In this case, “financing” the peer review process means not paying anyone to do the actual work of peer review. Likewise, the “extensive investments” in “innovative digital platforms” failed to produce a user experience superior to that made by Elbakyan when she was in her early twenties. As for ensuring the “quality and integrity” of science, this seems to mean operating journals with surprisingly high retraction rates and inconsistent reliability. A 2018 study found that the costly involvement of academic publishers made “no significant differences” to the quality of scientific papers. Given the flimsiness of these arguments, it is unsurprising that a large number of Nobel laureates wrote a separate letter encouraging the Trump administration to go ahead with its plans—which, in any event, never came to fruition.

[…] Given the example of Sci-Hub, the easy logistics of internet publication, and the funding structure of academic research, it seems clear that in the absence of the academic publishing industry, scholarship would be more widely available, not less. If the academic publishing industry did not exist, scientists could still do their research—in fact, it would be easier to do so as more people would have access to scholarly literature. The peer-review process could still function normally—though there are good reasons to change that as well. And the resulting papers could simply be posted in a place where anyone could read them. 

[…] Overwhelmingly, the lobbying strategy has outperformed the activist strategy. According to Open Secrets, the parent company of Elsevier spent just under $2 million on lobbying in 2021. With that amount greasing whatever arguments they bring forth to politicians in favor of their position, they have been able to secure enough political support to persist in their activities. Focused political action with the right strategy meets success. Those who came of age during the height of the activism strategy, on the other hand, have yet to make a similar strategic update. 

[…] Sci-Hub can make information accessible because it has escaped the economic and political constraints it would have faced by merely trying to reform existing institutions. But for such projects to succeed, their proponents would need a machine that can defend and entrench their existence, both politically and legally. 

The component parts of such a machine already exist. Beyond individuals working in universities and hospitals, the cause of open access to information enjoys broad support in both the crypto community and the machine learning field. Sci-Hub’s importance as an essential platform for contemporary research means that it enjoys backing from a broad, if unlikely, coalition of industries that together have the resources and capacities to foster and sustain the creation of a new political lobby. 

[soulsstudies]

we've had foggy weather for over a week and the room where I'm sitting trying to write my paper has faulty lights so everything is dimmed

it's like someone turned down the saturation on everything it is a very weird feeling

[soulsstudies]

I wanna watch critical role but unfortunately i have 39 more pages to read and an outline to draft...

[soulsstudies]

there are many benefits to being a marine biologist vaccinated and most of them are that you get to study at the university library lmao

[soulsstudies]

i think university is about walking around campus with a tote bag (or backpack) and trying to look purposeful and busy. and whoever manages to look the most purposeful and busy wins

[soulsstudies]

Look! I'm back!

[soulsstudies]

anyway blackout poetry not just as an art form, but as an act of violence against other works of art

taking a piece of text that someone probably put their heart and soul into creating and using it as your raw material, cutting out everything that you deem irrelevant to the point you want to make

i mean imagine cutting up a painting and using it to make a collage, or taking a marble sculpture and carving pieces out of it to make a different sculpture

just to be clear: i love blackout poetry, im not criticizing it here. i am just waxing poetic about it. i dont really know where im going with this i just have Thoughts about art being destructive