AoB Blog!

AoB Blog is a weblog set up by the Annals of Botany Company to support The Annals of Botany and AoB Plants. The company is slightly younger than the journal as it was registered with limited liability in England and Wales on 13 July 1903 under the registration number 00078001. The Company is also a registered charity, with the registration number 237771. ‘Charity’ in the UK is similar to ‘not-for-profit’ in the USA: it means we have defined aims which are of public benefit, and all our resources are used for these. Our aims are ‘To promote the science of botany … [by means of] the publication known as the Annals of Botany [and other publications], … and to employ such other means as [are] … conducive to the promotion of botanical science.’ We are fairly certain that our founders did not envisage AoBBlog 123 years ago, but a blog is certainly consistent with their aims.
Reader input is heartily welcomed and we have a few guidelines that we hope will help.
User Guidelines

1. Add value:You’ll find that you’ll get more and richer responses if your comments go beyond ‘Me too,’ or ‘No, it’s not.’ If you can add more data, see things from a new perspective or help others with their problems you’ll be adding value.
2. Give us your experience:You have experience that we don’t. That’s valuable. We’re also aware that this experience isn’t likely to be packaged neatly into an AoB article. If you have something useful to share that’s in another journal or on another website then we encourage you to link to it. We don’t want to keep botany in a walled garden.
3. Be transparent: Yes, people can search Google for information, but hyperlinks mean that they don’t have to if you link to the things you’re citing. Transparency is a great way to be helpful and gain credibility. Likewise, search engines mean that trying to mislead people will – sooner or later – turn out to be a very bad idea for your credibility.
4. Be accurate: Comments have a worrying permanence. If you’re not sure of the exact details of something you may find it helpful to delay and take the time to check. Likewise no-one is omniscient and we all make mistakes. If you find you have made one then please take the time to correct it. If it’s a direct edit of a comment then you might want to make this clear, so that anyone who cited the erroneous information doesn’t look unnecessarily foolish.
5. Consider your audience: AoB Blog is aiming for a wide audience. Some readers will be experts in their field, others will be people with an interest in science but not botany graduates. We’re also hoping to gain readers from around the world, some of whom will not have English as a first language. It is possible that some posts or comments may have unintentional meanings.
6. Be respectful: If you have a negative comment to make, you’ll make it more persuasive if you can present it in a constructive way. It’s possible you still won’t persuade them, because it’s a fact of life that people disagree, but is your goal to persuade everyone or most people? Your comments will also be read by other people as well as the person you’re disagreeing with, and being respectful will help win them over.

Basically if you’re the kind of person who’s taken the time to read this page, you’re the kind of person we love to see commenting here.