While most of the web is written in HTML, scientists continue to use LaTeX and PDFs for publications. It's the closest to a paper in modern days you can get.

However, there is no such "paper" to get general review about the overall advances in science, which you could sit back and read like a newspaper. Instead, many use HTML- based services like Slashdot, Twitter, Google Plus, Google News, etc.

So, the idea is such a news daily in PDF, which summarizes the new publications by placing them into easily distinguishable categories (so the purposes or goals of the researches are easy to understand even if the title is hard), yet with original scientific language, and with the HTTP links to original papers.
-- Inyuki, Jan 07 2015

I don't see the need for this (as a practicing scientist). I can see plenty of daily news-type science updates on the web - why is better to have them in PDF format?
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Jan 07 2015


[MaxwellBuchanan],

// why is better to have them in PDF format? //

to make people who like science news get used to accessing scientific literature seamlessly. Or.. should all the PDFs be converted to some beautiful HTML format, supporting comments and advanced features, such as forking?
-- Inyuki, Jan 07 2015


I'm not entirely sure what the objective is. I mean I'd like to get an in-depth report on some stories, without having to endure page headers and footers, hot and cold running advertisements, page breaks after a paragraph or two, et cetera, but it sounds like a wibni.
-- FlyingToaster, Jan 07 2015


//to make people who like science news get used to accessing scientific literature seamlessly.//

I still don't get it. If a non-scientist is interested in science, there are plenty of science news websites and fora. Why is it better/easier for them to download a PDF?

If they want to progress to access the original research, then links from a news story in HTML can take them to the literature (at least, any parts of the literature that are open access).

As for [FT]'s comment that advert-free would be nice, well, yes - but a PDF publication is going to be no more advert-free than an HTML one.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Jan 07 2015


Hmm. No. There's a whole load of journals that have rich format web publications as standard. Some journals are going the extra mile with video abstracts or schematic abstracts, largely the concept of a "paper" is now abstract. For me at least, PDFs are for printing. Why print? Well, there's a lot to reading a good paper in your field. A range of emotions which swirl around the central theme of "you complete b@#tards! I could have done that!" with side eddy's of "well, that was clever, I'm stealing that approach" and "there's no way in the world you know what you're doing with that technique... if you're not walking around nervously gibbering about calcium concentration, you can't make ICM"

Anyhow, they're best taken to locations that sell beer.
-- bs0u0155, Jan 07 2015


A lot of on line science magazines out there.
-- travbm, Nov 02 2015



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