Publish science for free, access science for free.
For Aletheia to be successful we need a media strategy that our social media team can take direction from. The below are generic guidelines that all Aletheias can follow and be a part of. We would ask that if you want to speak in your capacity as an Aletheian at an event or to someone you speak to either the maintainers on contact@aletheia-foundation.io or an Aletheia community organiser.
Aletheia needs to be active on multiple social media platforms. The goal is to have an update on all channels at least once a day, if possible at times that coincide with high usage patterns of our audience. Along with the below, other channels need to be explored and leveraged.
- Instagram, people can submit photos to contact@aletheia-foundation.io of Aletheia events or activities related to material published by Aletheia such as field or lab research that will be posted on the Instagram account.
It is an aspiration to have brochures and posters created and stored here in the repositories so that volunteers can print the material off as and when required.
Mosy of our users will be university students, at least to begin with. This means every university needs to know about Aletheia. The library at the university is likely the body that has to pay to access paywall journals, so this is the department to touch base with. Outline Aletheia to them, arrange to speak with them and demo Aletheia to them. Ask them how much they are paying to paywall journals and tell them to keep that figure in mind throughout interacting with them as that figure is what they stand to save.
Universities will also most likely form the backbone of the Aletheia network early on. It's envisaged that Aletheia nodes will be bundled with the Aletheia app, but that may not be technically possible in the early stages. It might be required that large nodes be run to maintain the network and this is how universities can help. We would be asking them to run a node for us. In conversations with universities it can be said that the fact that large nodes are required to keep the network up demonstrates that Aletheia works and it's popular. In helping support Aletheia in the early stages, these universities could be saving themselves hundreds of thousands of dollars, possibly millions.
Working on Aletheia is great, but we also need to be telling people about what our amazing community is doing. Active outreach to various groups is essential.
- Approach the vocal minority of researchers who are against paywalls, introduce them to Aletheia and ask them to publish through us.
- Engage the anti-paywall movement through social media interaction, emails, whatever channels they use to communicate.
- Most technical conferences have speakers talking about papers they have written, often not yet published. Conference organisers need to be engaged to see if speakers would be willing to publish through us
- Pitch news stories to the local media. There's a lot to talk about with Aletheia, it's free to use, it fights paywalls, it helps get science to the people, moreover the people have in most cases already paid for science through their taxes. The project hasa grand vision of improving education globally as per the README, it's new technology, it's an implementationn of blockchain past currency.
- Attend local tech and science events. If you do plan on attending an event as an Aletheian make sure you go prepared. Practice articulating the founders vision, and your own interpretation on the vision. Be comfortable speaking about what drew you to Aletheia and what keeps you contributing. If possible, take brochures and posters if such material is here in the repositories.
- If you're a student, look at the internal communication channels like newsletters and mailing lists to see if they would be willing to spread the word. If you work at an educational institution or even an organisation where people may be willing to contribute you can look to the staff version of these.
Aletheia has a website through GitHub pages which has our blog. Contributors can write blog posts and they can share blog posts written by others on their personal social media if they so desire. Blog posts are meant to be read, so getting as many eyes to them as possible is important.