Making connections and finding collaborators is really easy on Nature Network. We’ve designed the site to offer many different ways of networking. Here are just a few ideas.
1) Make some contacts
You’ll find various tools on the People page to help you find like-minded individuals. Most simply, you can search for people by name, interests or affiliation. Down the page, you’ll also see several sections with recommendations for potential contacts. These are based on information given on your profile page, so make sure you fill it out to get the best recommendations . The people page will then show you people who share interests with you (similar people), users who have contacts in common with you (one degree of separation), and shared affiliation.
When you find a profile of interest you can do one of two things. You can either ‘Follow’ someone as you would with Twitter, or invite them to join your network, like Facebook. Following people works best if you are simply interested in tracking their content (blog posts, comments etc). Adding them to your network implies you know that person, or would like to befriend them.
2) Join in the conversation
The best way to build up contacts is to converse and exchange ideas with people. Nature Network offers many spaces for doing this.
– The blogs section includes regular posts from scientists of all disciplines. Leaving comments on blog posts is one of the simplest ways of participating in a conversation on the network, and you’ll soon ‘get to know’ other regular commenters.
– Groups and forums allow discussion based around a theme. You’ll find forums for just about any subject – from bioinformatics to science publishing. Any member of Nature Network can start a topic for discussion in a forum, or respond to a topic another user has started. Have a look around. Groups are slightly more formal and designed for associations and institutions.
– Q&A is a new feature of the site where you can ask, or answer, a question about science. By doing so, you are likely to interact with other users and discover who is the most helpful to your research. Check out the recent how to blog post if you’d like some help getting started with Q&A.
3. Keep up with what’s going on
Once you’ve got a network of contacts, or have started following people, there are several ways to keep up with their activity. For a quick snippet, when logged in, clicking the ‘home’ tab will show you the three most recent actions by your contacts. You can get a more detailed view by clicking “View your full activity stream” which you can also reach from anywhere on the site by clicking the ‘Snapshot’ tab on the People menu. This lists out all your contacts’ activities and also allows you to see whose responded to your forum topics and replies. Any of these can be followed by RSS.
The Contacts module on Workbench gives much the same information but in a continuous stream. Have a play with both systems to see which you like best. Beyond your network, the homepage will also give you an overview of popular blog posts and Q&A conversations, while the People homepage will show recently active users.
4. Local networking
Nature Network also has dedicated areas for networking with scientists in your local area. Three cities (London, Boston and New York) have special hubs, where you’ll find a local blog, forum, events calendar and jobs board, as well as a people finder. Other cities have local forums of blogs – simply search for your city name to find out if it has a strong presence on Nature Network. Recently active examples include Cambridge Toronto San Francisco and Colorado If you can’t find a forum for your local area, why not start your own to encourage scientific collaboration in your city?