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Type of site | Subreddit |
|---|---|
| Available in | English |
| Founder | u/spez[1] |
| URL | www |
| Users | 33 million members[1] |
| Launched | October 18, 2006; 19 years ago (2006-10-18)[1] |
r/science is anInternet forum onReddit where the community of participants discuss science topics.[2] A popular feature of the forum is "Ask Me Anything" (AMA) public discussions.[2] As of 2014, r/science attracted 30,000–100,000 visitors per day, making it the largest community-managed science forum and an attractive place to host discussions.[2] It has over 33 million members as of 2024.[1]
Nathan Allen is an American chemist. While working as a chemist atDow Chemical Company, Allen began to imagine that scientists could useReddit's "ask me anything" (AMA) interview format to create discussions between scientists and the public.[2] Allen became a forum moderator there and has since been prominent in guiding the culture of the community there and as a spokesperson for the forum.[2] Allen has advocated that chemists should be more active in communicating with the public in online forums such as reddit.[3]
As of 2014, r/science attracted 30,000–100,000 visitors per day, making it the largest community-managed science forum and an attractive place to host discussions.[2] In January 2014 Allen began the r/science AMA series with the goal of raising the visibility of scientists who are producing groundbreaking work in their fields but who are not well known outside of their fields.[2][4] Outgoing links posted in the forum must go to peer-reviewed science articles published within the last six months.[5]
The discussion series was instantly a success, and established the world's largest two-way discussion between scientists and the public.[2] Allen does most of the organization for the talks, including soliciting scientists to participate and training them to communicate in reddit's discussion format.[2]
In May 2018, the series ended due to a change in Reddit's ranking algorithm making AMA talks less visible and less engaging.[6][7]
r/science has an ongoing content partnership withPLOS.[8] As an academic journal, PLOS invites authors who are publishing scientific papers to publicly present their work in r/science and to participate in community "ask me anything" discussions in the forum at scheduled times.[8]
Editorial decisions in r/science are made by the moderators who themselves follow rules that they present for the forum.[5] If new rules are introduced then those are discussed with the community of readers.[5] Rules for r/science include guidance that contributors keep discussion on-topic and thoughtful.[5]
Allen led the decision to ban discussion in r/science which gives credibility toclimate change denial.[9][10]
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