Weblogs as a species of scientific communication.

From Geeky Mom, the link to a presentation she gave about blogging science. (The link takes you to a summary. There are additional links you can follow from the summary page.)

Lots of good stuff to think about here: Who's the intended audience for science blogs (other scientists vs. lay people) and what kind of communication are they intended to provide (communicating new results vs. correcting bad science journalism), how the back-and-forth of ideas is mediated in blogs vs. other arenas, etc.

The blogosphere is still young, so I suspect many of the issues raised in this talk are still being negotiated by the scientific community. Perhaps, given the communicative potential available here, this would be a good time for the scientific community to examine some of these issues and make some thoughtful decisions.