Interesting article by Gunther Eysenbach:

Can Tweets Predict Citations? Metrics of Social Impact Based on Twitter and Correlation with Traditional Metrics of Scientific Impact. Gunther Eysenbach. J Med Internet Res 2011 (Dec 16); 13(4):e123.

“Tweets can predict highly cited articles within the first 3 days of article publication. Social media activity either increases citations or reflects the underlying qualities of the article that also predict citations, but the true use of these metrics is to measure the distinct concept of social impact. Social impact measures based on tweets are proposed to complement traditional citation metrics. The proposed twimpact factor may be a useful and timely metric to measure uptake of research findings and to filter research findings resonating with the public in real time.”

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Impact has a bad name among many researchers, but thinking of impact as re-use could be key to uniting both funders and researchers. Blog post by Cameron Neylon.

“We may not be able to demonstrate or to measure significant re-use of the outputs of the research that we fund now for many years. But what we can do is focus on optimizing the capacity and the potential for future exploitation. Where we can’t demonstrate re-use and impact we should demand that researchers demonstrate that they have optimized their outputs to enable future re-use and future impact. Where research doesn’t have near term applications we should apply a higher standard of curation and archival, and above all require researchers to ensure that their work remains discoverable over the next decades when its possible applications may surface.“

“The central aim of the BRIF (Bioresource Research Impact Factor) initiative is to construct a quantitative parameter to evaluate bioresources, modeled to some degree on the Journal Impact Factor (JIF), and to provide guidance and methodology for optimizing recognition of bioresources, their use and their sharing at international level.”

[Source: Mabile, Laurence, Dalgleish, Raymond, Thorisson, Gudmundur , Deschênes, Mylène, Hewitt, Robert, Carpenter, Jane, Bravo, Elena, Gourraud, Pierre-Antoine, Hofman, Paul, Harris, Jennifer, Munoz-Fernandes, Maria Angeles, and Cambon-Thomsen, Anne. The BRIF (Bioresource Research Impact Factor) as a tool for improving bioresource sharing in biomedical research. Available from Nature Precedings <http://hdl.handle.net/10101/npre.2011.6568.1> (2011)]

“Some researchers may recoil from metrics-based assessment. But they should know how others are keeping score.”

Read the article in Nature: The Athletes of Science by Maria Pavlou and Eleftherios P. Diamandis. Nature 478, 419 (2011). doi:10.1038/nj7369-419a.