Ask HN: Does anyone do academic writing in their own time? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone do academic writing in their own time?

#51

Post by RobertRoberts » Thu, Sep 20, 2018, 4:46 PM UTC

p1esk wrote: post #36

RobertRoberts wrote: post #29

I study every day on my career, and consider it an academic exercise to read tech blogs on coding, design, server admin, etc... and I sometimes write about these topics to inform my clients. I kill 3 birds with one stone. I learn, I get to dive into topics deep that benefit my mind, and my work (doubly satisfying) and educate my clients. It lowers my stress when my research provides a very real world solution. (These…

I believe "academic writing" usually refers to original research. One notable exception is a survey of recent advances in the field.

Well, I am amateur academic, and my research is all original, felt it was worth sharing.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone do academic writing in their own time?

#52

Post by dahart » Thu, Sep 20, 2018, 5:58 PM UTC

r0rbit wrote: post #44

dahart wrote: post #37

I’ve written a few academic papers on my own time after grad school. It wasn’t much harder than writing papers while in school, it just took some nights & weekends time, and I had to work a little to find people willing and capable of reviewing the papers and giving feedback. It cost a bit of personal money to present at a conference whenever a paper was accepted, but it was what I wanted to do so it never bothered m…

I think what seems to be the hardest part is to not only find the time but combat the imposter syndrome of not producing research within an academic context/with supervision. Also, reduced access to scientific databases is a bit of a turndown, we used to get it at uni. Not all that interested in publishing in academic journals persé.

Access to journals is a good point. I’ve had some access through jobs, and some access through alumni accounts. You might check with your alma mater whether you have alumni access to their databases. Sometimes a proxy into the school’s network is sufficient, via an account into your old department. I would also sometimes ask academic friends to grab copies of papers I needed.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone do academic writing in their own time?

#53

Post by efficax » Thu, Sep 20, 2018, 8:18 PM UTC

bhritchie wrote: post #15

I dropped out of a PhD in philosophy and am now a software developer. Tinkering with some of my old papers is my main hobby these days. I also have little kids, so I don't get a lot of time for it, but I'm hoping to have at least one significant item ready for publication in the next year or so.

I'm also an ABD PhD in Philosophy (the clock on that is almost 4 years old now so there's little chance of me actually writing a thesis at this point) turned software developer. We failed philosophers turned hackers should form a little society or something

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone do academic writing in their own time?

#54

Post by tincholio » Thu, Sep 20, 2018, 8:43 PM UTC

r0rbit wrote: post #25

tincholio wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Death by a thousand paper cuts. Bad management making bad decisions, funding getting harder and harder to get, pressure to do contract research (I was at a large public research institute, not at a uni)... Things were going downhill quickly and seemingly irreversibly, so I was no longer happy there, and there were no good alternatives in research where I live.

Sounds rough :(

It was... but if you do care about science, you can still do it :)

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone do academic writing in their own time?

#55

Post by chaoxu » Thu, Sep 20, 2018, 10:40 PM UTC

I still publish. I joined an industry lab this June. My day to day function is highly non-academic, but we can do academic research on the side (we don't have to).

I intend to keep on researching since research is fun. But writing itself is not as much fun, so I wonder if I will try to publish as much.

1. Collaboration. If you look at my publication records, I only have a single paper where I am the sole author, and I made sure a few very knowledgeable friends read it. So find someone sharing similar interests and talk to them. Once a collaboration starts, it is much easier to get going.

2. Branch out. Recently, I improve algorithms in areas (more applied operations research) close to mine (theoretical x {computer science, combinatorial optimization}). This includes 3 of the papers I'm preparing. It only took a few hours to realize improvements are possible, although it takes much longer to polish and present. It also leads me to an interesting problem in my own field.

3. Giving talks. It is probably much easier to have an opportunity to give tech talks. Giving the talk itself forces you to organize your thought well. I often find better ways to organize my writing after I've given the presentation. (I really should give talks before writing the paper...

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone do academic writing in their own time?

#56

Post by realandreskytt » Fri, Sep 21, 2018, 4:19 AM UTC

I’ve done a conference paper and had another one accepted. For me, the hardest is finding good places to publish. Conference levels fluctuate and magazines carry different weight - this is not necessarily obvious for a bystander.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone do academic writing in their own time?

#57

Post by chriskanan » Fri, Sep 21, 2018, 5:22 AM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #47

borroka wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is certainly gate-keeping at decent journals. For instance, not having an affiliation with an institution or a company known to carry out research is not the best presentation you can make.

But reviewers will not know who you are affiliated with until reviewing is done and the paper is accepted.

Double blind reviewing is mostly just a computer science conference thing. Very few journals do it.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone do academic writing in their own time?

#58

Post by qualsiasi » Sat, Sep 22, 2018, 5:43 PM UTC

I always wondered how you can submit your work for approval and publishing from outside the academic life. Are there conferences that accept submissions from someone who is totally unknown?