DeSci Ep. #1: Using Web3 Tech to Reward Good Science—with Chris Hill & Philipp Koellinger of DeSci Labs

The system for publishing scientific research is broken. 

Academic success is measured by citations rather than scientific quality. And publishing companies have a monopoly on the knowledge scientists produce.

Can we use blockchain technology to promote the verifiability of scientific findings? And make science accessible to everyone?

Dr. Christopher Hill is an interdisciplinary scientist with a background in neuroeconomics and machine learning. Phillip Koellinger is Professor of Social Science Genetics in the Department of Economics at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. 

Together, Chris and Philipp are Cofounders of DeSci Labs, an initiative that aims to make science more replicable, accessible, transparent and fair by way of Web3 technologies.

On this episode of Boost VC, Chris and Philipp join us to explain what inspired their interest in decentralized science and explore what differentiates success for science versus individual scientists.

They walk us through the goals of the open science movement and weigh in on how DeSci tech provides new ways of funding research and makes scientific knowledge available to everyone.

Listen in for insight around the grassroots movement known as metascience and learn how DeSci is working to improve the quality of the scientific record and reward scientists for the value they create.

Topics Covered

What inspired Chris & Philipp’s interest in decentralized science

• Bureaucracy and broken publishing system in academia
• Passionate about open science, reproducibility
• Improve durability and quality of scientific record
• Uplift material conditions of early-career scientists

The goals of the open science movement

• Make research more transparent, accessible to everyone
• Better markers of scientific quality than impact factor
• Improve and promote verifiability and reproducibility 

What differentiates success for science vs. success for scientists

• Scientific success = verifiable new knowledge
• Success for scientist = prestige

How Chris & Philipp define decentralized science

• Tech stack for true open access to research
• Makes science more transparent and reproducible
• Allows scientists to recapture value they create

The problem with measuring value by impact factor (IF)

• Metric derived exclusively from citation rates
• Publishers have monopoly on scientific knowledge

How DeSci technologies can benefit scientific research

• Accelerate pace of knowledge progress and accessibility
• Provide new ways of funding research
• Business models that reward scientists for contributions
• Potential for rapid experimentation at scale
• Create accountability in peer review process

The interdisciplinary grassroots movement of metascience

• Check work of other scientists through replications
• Conduct basic hygiene of scientific ecosystem

The transition from scientific manuscripts to research objects

• Store artifacts of journey, including peer review feedback
• Permanent knowledge graphs to secure scientific record 

Connect with Chris Hill & Philipp Koellinger

DeSci Labs https://www.desci.com/

DeSci Labs on Twitter https://twitter.com/descilabs

DeSci Foundation https://descifoundation.org/

DeSci Foundation on Twitter https://twitter.com/DeSciFoundation

Resources

David Deutsch https://www.daviddeutsch.org.uk/

‘Raise Standards for Pre-Clinical Cancer Research’ in Nature https://www.nature.com/articles/483531a

‘Why Most Published Research Findings Are False’ in PLOS Medicine https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1182327/

Gitcoin https://gitcoin.co/

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