Scientists are all about doing new things but actually they’re very conservative about the way they do them, according to Cameron Neylon, a senior scientist of biomolecular sciences at the Science and Technology Facilities Council. The problem is or was that research papers are on paper, limited to a small audience. New kinds of tools are needed to produce, use, share and archive the research material.   Web 2.0 generates a number of services to help researchers, for example, Mendeley, a reference management package.

Web 2.0 opens to a global community of experts. Not limited to the views and criticisms of immediate peers. Tools like f1000 and twitter are at hand for scientists who can quickly pass on their new papers to a global audience with minimal effort.