Argonne National Laboratory Shuts Down Online Ask a Scientist Program

itamblyn writes In a surprising decision, Argonne National Laboratory has decided to pull the plug on its long-standing NEWTON Ask A Scientist Program. NEWTON is (soon to be was) an on online repository of science questions submitted by school children from around the world. A volunteer group of scientists contributed grade-level appropriate answers to these questions. For the past 25 years, a wide range of topics ranging have been covered, including the classic "why is the sky blue" to "is there way to break down the components of plastics completely into their original form". Over the years, over 20,000 questions have been answered. According to ANL, the website will be shut down permanently on 1 March. There is no plan to make the content available in an alternate form or to hand over stewardship to another organization. When contacted about transferring the repository to another institution or moving to a donation model, the response from ANL was simply: "Thank you again for all your support for Newton. Unfortunately, moving Newton to another organization is not a possibility at this time. Thank you again for your energy and support."

Comments

Probably hit the same problem as /r/AskScience

[Anonymous Coward]

The same questions over and over and over again, with no one bothering to search the 20,000 existing answers.

Re:Probably hit the same problem as /r/AskScience

[Anonymous Coward]

I've seen other more minor outreach efforts go down the tube in part because of that issue. Several colleagues of mine used to answer questions online in various places, including redit. But they would frequently get see the same questions over and over, and questions about topics that have been heavily written about. It gets a bit frustrating linking to a very well written answer or discussion of a question, and have people not only ignore linked content, but get indignant that you didn't rewrite and paraphrase a common answer for the nth time in your reply to their question.

Or worse, have people argue with you, ignoring really basic concepts that should come up with almost any effort to learn about a topic. It is one thing if people just disagree or don't believe something, but to make statements complete ignorant of the existence of things that have been around long enough to be in textbooks and common online summaries is a different deal. And online people with a point to push have way more free time than those that are just curious, leading to a monopolizing of time by those that have no interest in learning anything new, and stopped long doing so long before forming their opinion on some science topic.

As a result, I see more and more scientist burn out from answer questions or any form of outreach online. They are still quite interested in talking to people, and put effort into offline outreach. Offline, people are less likely to be dicks about things, even when it is obvious they disagree with what the scientist is saying.

That said, a lot of things like this is more likely just some budgetary/bureaucracy circus mess than lack of motivation by enough researchers.

Politics?

[milgram]

In my experience, events like this point to some petty internal political battle. It was great for people using it, and I assume there was minimal overhead to running the program, so "stupidity and greed" seem like the most likely course. Unfortunate. Maybe some bureaucrat had a KPI to reduce external facing servers software cost...

Re:Politics?

[ShanghaiBill]

In my experience, events like this point to some petty internal political battle.

Another possibility is that this is the Washington Monument Syndrome. This happens when an agency's budget is reduced, and rather than cutting the least important program, they cut the most visible program, in an attempt to get their funding restored.

Re:Politics?

[JanneM]

[...] and rather than cutting the least important program, they cut the most visible program, in an attempt to get their funding restored.

Honestly, though, a qestion-answer service for school children probably does rank among the least important programs for a research lab. I very much doubt this is part of their written remit (as opposed to communicate their actual research to the public), and the people spending time at work answering the questions certainly get zero professional recognition for it.

It does sound like a very nice, fun service. And I do agree that this kind of outreach is important. But if this is not part of what their funders want them to do, then it should come as no surprise if it's among the first things to go when money becomes tight.

You want this kind of thing to continue? Make sure there's funding (and paid time) earmarked for doing it. In fact, that may be a good idea in general: add a small fraction (.1% or even less) to any research grant over a certain size for general science outreach. If it's part of your funding, that also removes the career obstacles toward doing outreach we too often have now.

Re:Politics?

[Dutch Gun]

I never knew that had a name, thanks. I think everyone has seen their local government threaten funding cuts to firefighters, emergency service (911, etc), parks, schools, and other popular services unless special bonds are passed.

It certainly could be that, although another possibility is that Wikipedia and other online resources have essentially supplanted the need for such a service.

Re:Politics?

[s.petry]

They said nothing will happen with the program. You can toss funds in a pot, but without knowing why it was shut down you are foolish to do so. People giving to the pot are going to want their money back at some point. We all know that stuff like this gets lost in the bureaucracy and may take decades to come up for air.

I'm not being a downer, but a realist. Your answer could be to start your own site doing something similar and have a visible hand off policy in case you stop for some reason like NEWTON. Hell, make that a selling point.

The place that I vehemently disagree is in the perception you give that tax payers have control over funding individual projects NEWTON. We don't, we only pay taxes. Critters holding office that don't a rats ass about the people they represent handle the individual funding (or the people _they_ appoint to lead agencies). If given a chance I'd be willing to bet that a lot of people would support funding NEWTON and get rid of programs like the latest greatest science for killing people. That is exactly why people have no choice, but that's a much longer discussion.

Re:Politics?

[BVis]

why not make your own donations to a similar private service?

Because 1) they'll put it behind a paywall, more than likely, 2) they'll use it to gather Yet More Information on me (I trust the government with my info lots more than any for-profit company) 3) they'll slap ads all over it in order to "monetize" a system that has always been free.

Private enterprise is not a cure-all, much as the old rich white men running the companies would like you to believe.

Re: Politics?

[BVis]

It's a great non sequitur, isn't it. Some people will look for any excuse to push their agenda. All you need to do is make a statement that isn't 100% anti-government and off they go.

Re:Mod points

[EmeraldBot]

How do you get mod points?

You'd probably know if you read the freakin' FAQ. Also, please don't post "frist psot!" comments, they're considered to be extremely juvenile and bad manners.

Re:Mod points

[schlachter]

"Last Post" is fine though. You can keep posting those.

Re:Budget Cuts

[TooMuchToDo]

Please don't. I'm already archiving the entire site into archive.org right now, and don't want their load to increase to the point they were try to prevent the archiving operation.

Argonne National Lab (ANL) Public Mirror Closed

[Anonymous Coward]

And another recent article concerning ANL:

"Public access to the Argonne National Laboratory Software Mirror was closed down as of 1 Feb 2015. ... Many Linux mirrors, not just all of Ubuntu."

http://ubuntuforums.org/showth...

Re:Waybackmachine to the rescue!

[TooMuchToDo]

I'm snapshotting it right now. It'll be in the Internet Archive tonight or tomorrow.

Re:Budget Cuts

[suso]

So I think what you're saying is that you have too much to do.

Re:Budget Cuts

[TooMuchToDo]

Always.

Mirror available

[ThOr101]

Site has been mirrored (and is updating).
Available at: http://newton.cranialthunder.c...

I hope this helps. Seems like a waste to let it just disappear.

The real cause...

[Anubis IV]

Excised from the original reporting was this little snippet:

Representatives for NEWTON indicated that there were a number of reasons for the shut down of the program. When pressed to provide examples, the group sighed in unison before saying, "ELI5."

ELI5 is shorthand for the "Explain Like I'm 5" meme that has spread across the Internet in recent years. "We just can't compete with that," said one of the lead scientists in the program, referring to ELI5. "It used to be that we'd answer stupid questions from children because it encouraged the burgeoning scientists, mathematicians, and engineers to pursue their interests further, but with ELI5 teaching scientifically illiterate adults that it's okay for them to voice their stupid questions too, we simply can't keep up. We're spread too thin."

When asked where individuals seeking answers should go for help, one researcher derisively suggested, "The ELI5 subreddit." Asked what they planned to do with their newfound free time, the group cast a few despondent looks towards one another before collectively breaking down in tears as they wept for humanity.

Public Domain

[InfiniteWisdom]

Being work of the federal government, the site's content is not subject to copyright and is in the public domain. Anyone who wants can legally mirror the existing content. I'm making a copy as we speak.

Re: Cost savings

[NoMaster]

Simple web app: $1000
Shared web hosting: $50/yr
Managing a pool of postgrads, postdocs, researchers, and other subject matter experts to answer children's questions while fending off the Creationists, Tea-Partiers, and other assorted nutjobs who insist on being given equal access and status to teach the Truth to counter the Liberal Ivory-Tower Acedemic lies? Priceless...

Re: Cost savings

[JanneM]

The time spent selecting questions, then answer them in a simple and understandable way is not free. Especially in a climate where even keeping a blog in your spare time is sometimes seen as a suspect frivolity that takes time from your research.

Re: Cost savings

[dbIII]

Web front end on existing infrastructure - a few hundred bucks per year.
Someone like Dr Karl (http://www.abc.net.au/science/drkarl/) - priceless, but you've still got to pay a salary, and most likely not just for one person.

Gee, and no suggestion of the obvious reason

[whitroth]

Congress cutting funding for non-military basic science.

ObDisclosure: I work for a federal contractor, civilian sector, doing that, and we keep seeing budget cuts. So do other folks I know who work in the civilian sector, so I have direct evidence of my suggestion. I can also email friends who have friends who work there.

                      mark "but the Free Market really, really wants F-35's, they're *so* much more important than space, or
                                                    biomedical research, or basic physics...."