Gains and losses

I have just been checking through what I, rather grandly, call my communication archives to see what changes have taken place in the last 12 months.

GAINS

The Facebook Social History group
https://www.facebook.com/groups/609806292391471/

I am the Administrator of this group which has enrolled nearly 850 members in just 8 months. I try hard to post one or two items of interest every day.

Happiness factor - 8/10 

My cemetery related blog
http://grave-mistakes.blogspot.co.uk/

This was started back in July 2013 and it gets between 500 and 2000 visitors a day.

Happiness factor - 10/10 

LOSSES

AC/DC - a young blogger and E-pal of mine who remained cheerful and upbeat despite money troubles and the sudden arrival of her live-in boyfriend's sister to share their tiny flat. I sometimes hear how she is getting on via Eve and Ella but I do miss the first hand contact.

Sadness factor - 4/10

 

 

Old Timer - His "matter of fact" approach to life was like the proverbial breath of fresh air in the world of blogging. He is a widower but has just got engaged to his first ever girlfriend from way back in his school days. He now seems, perhaps unsurprisingly, to be too busy to stay in touch!

Sadness factor - 5/10



 

The Astro-Cynics - Four years ago there were five of us who shared a common interest in astronomy and also in being a proverbial thorn in the flesh of the astronomical "movers and shakers". We used to exchange emails a couple of times a month and I used to look forward to hearing all the gossip. Then Hannah died and we were down to four and in 2013 two other members gave up on the hobby as advancing years and retreating finances took their toll. Now Charles, my friend and sounding board in the USA, has decided to retire from the world of science to take up golf and fossil hunting.

And that just leaves me - the last man standing

Sadness factor - 9/10

  

So I seem to have gained 18 points and lost 18 points which rather confirms my view of the last 12 months - "Moderate but not more".

 



“When people don't stand up for what they think is right, they die one piece at a time.”

This is an email I wrote to the editor of the Astronomical Journal

EXPRESSION OF CONCERN

DOUBLE STARS IN THE USNO CCD ASTROGRAPHIC CATALOG
William I. Hartkopf et al. 2013. The Astronomical Journal 146 76

Many of the common proper motion pairs identified in this paper as new discoveries were identified and published by me as long ago as 2009. At that time my results were also sent – in the form of a spreadsheet – to both Zacharias and Finch and they both, independently, confirmed receipt.

1- The issue is simple. Did the staff at the USNO use the astronomical results I had shared with them in October 2009 without proper, indeed any, acknowledgement? Secondly why did the superintendent of the Observatory then fail to respond to my two letters on the matter?

2 - That many of my results are identical to those subsequently published as their own by USNO staff
is both beyond dispute and easily proven. Both my results and the USNO results are in the public domain and the numerous similarities are plain at a glance.

3 - That the USNO staff had prior knowledge of my results is also beyond dispute and easily proven. I have copies of their emails in which they confirm receipt. 

4 - This is the second time I have had this problem with USNO staff. I have in front of me an apologetic letter, dated January 2011, from R S Steadley, at that time Superintendent of the US Naval
Observatory, in respect of a similar problem that also involved third parties being given credit for my peer reviewed discoveries.

"Papers published in the AJ and ApJ should include citations to previously published papers which are directly relevant to the results being presented. This requirement is especially important when new ideas or results are being presented. Deliberate refusal to credit or cite prior or corroborating results, while not regarded technically as constituting plagiarism, represents a comparable breach of professional ethics, and can result in summary rejection of a manuscript."