
Kardashian index: a measure of discrepant social media profile for scientists - Amorymeltzer
http://genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13059-014-0424-0
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PaulHoule
I would make a counter-case that scientists don't get much credit from the
scientific community for communicating with the public, which funds their
research, engages potential students, etc.

An extreme case is Issac Asimov who dropped out of the rat race of academia
and writing Sci Fi with L. Ron Hubbard for a penny a word and wrote decades of
monthly essays about science for the public that were a big reason why I went
for a PhD. He didn't contribute hugely in terms of research or traditional
teaching, but his impact was immense.

Also, Carl Sagan's involvement in Cosmos and the books he wrote overshadows a
completely solid career in space and planetary science.

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not_that_noob
Odd as it may seem, I think Kim is a highly intelligent woman who could have
if she had been so inclined become a solid scientist.

Crazy? Not if you think of her as using applied psychology to acquire and
retain attention in a world where attention is the scarce resource. She has a
finely tuned sense of how to stay in the news and fascinate the world.

That takes intelligence and social savvy. I'm sure she could have directed it
to more scientific endeavors if she wanted.

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gooseus
I think you may be mistaking the individual for the brand. I'd be willing to
bet that the applied psychology and ability to retain attention across the
world is more the work of her PR team than any individual intellectual skills
she may (or may not) possess.

Also, at the risk of sounding sexist, I'd be willing to bet that if Kim
Kardashian wasn't a sex symbol (we remember how she initially got that
attention, correct?) I imagine she'd get significantly less attention.

That being said, I do agree she could have used her star power to improve
science... yet I'd be curious how many followers she'd have now if she'd spent
the last 5-10 years sending smart science tweets instead of sexy selfies.

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dluan
[https://twitter.com/KimKierkegaard](https://twitter.com/KimKierkegaard)

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dluan
The original article is old, and also a bit cringey in trying to be hip and
sardonic. And obviously it's an argument and opinion not meant to be taken
scientifically. No scientist would voluntarily include a K-index (ratio of
citations vs. twitter followers) on their twitter profile unless they felt
they deserved larger recognition.

That said, there's this growing clique of scientists on twitter and as the
clique grows in spread and weight, it's becoming harder for new scientists to
jump in. What used to be a safe place to air laundry and commiserate about
academia is now kind of like regulated hivemind where you can only air
'certain' topics that the twitter cabal approves.

I've heard this from more and more scientists approaching social
media/openness/the internet, that twitter is not as flat as it's been
portrayed to be. I think this stems from the main conflict of popularity vs.
legitimacy, and in science buzz it's so easy to game the system once you have
the minimum amount of recognition.

All of this points to the conclusion that twitter is not a natural home for
scientists, but rather scientists have adapted their behavior to twitter and
shrewd ones have capitalized. Some of it's good, some of it's not good, and in
that regard I agree with the author.

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scottcowley
Here's an example of the Kardashian index applied to the specific field of
marketing academics:
[https://analyticdashboards.wordpress.com/2015/10/08/from-
kar...](https://analyticdashboards.wordpress.com/2015/10/08/from-kardashian-
to-nye-krauss-for-marketing-scientists/)

Credit: Koen Pauwels

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danso
Someone should try this with Github commits/repo-stars and Twitter followers.
There a good number of productive developers who don't have much of a social
media following.

