Hello all -- here's a few good articles on open/citizen science I wanted to share (along with what made me excited or glum about them):

Forbes, "Now Every Company Is A Software Company" (http://www.forbes.com/sites/techonomy/2011/11/30/now-every-company-is-a-software-company/)

Sunnyvale-based Picarro, with 90 employees, has developed a highly accurate mobile measurement device for gasses, with related software that turns the tool’s output into an easy-to-understand visualization. Any organization or individual can drive Picarro’s $70,000 instrument around and create stunningly detailed maps documenting, say, point-by-point methane leakage from a pipeline or a refinery. The implications are enormous. Rather than produce in blissful ignorance, industrial and energy giants can now know what, if any, toxins they are putting into the atmosphere. More critically, if they’re unwilling to look at this data, anyone with a car and Picarro’s tools can do it for them.

Facebook for Scientists?

“I want to make science more open. I want to change this,” said Ijad Madisch, 31, the Harvard-trained virologist and computer scientist behind ResearchGate, the social networking site for scientists.

Started in 2008 with few features, it was reshaped with feedback from scientists. Its membership has mushroomed to more than 1.3 million, Dr. Madisch said...

The Web site is a sort of mash-up of Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, with profile pages, comments, groups, job listings, and “like” and “follow” buttons (but without baby photos, cat videos and thinly veiled self-praise). Only scientists are invited to pose and answer questions — a rule that should not be hard to enforce, with discussion threads about topics like polymerase chain reactions that only a scientist could love.

NYTimes, "When Breakthroughs Begin at Home" (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/17/science/for-bio-hackers-lab-work-often-begins-at-home.html)

Great to see them getting good coverage. Apologies for the grumbles.