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8/13/2019 Peer Reviews: Tweeting the Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011
1/5
eer
Reviews
Desai T, Shariff A, Shariff A, Kats M, Christiano C, Fang X, Ferris M. Tweetingthe Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011 . PLoOne 2012. Vol. 7, No. 7, pp. 1-9.
Nephrology On-Demand http://www.myNOD.org
Reviewers' comments:
Reviewer #1:
I read the manuscript "Tweeting the Meeting: A in-depth analysis of
Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011" with great interest because
understanding how social media can enhance academic meetings is
important. The authors analyzed 993 tweets from 173 individuals.
Presumably all these individuals took part in the meeting, but that is not
clear from the manuscript in its current form. They found that among
informative tweets, there was more negative sentiment expressed, but the
presented results seem to obscure this finding. A more useful paperwould look at the social media shortcomings of the conference with an
eye to improving social media engagement in conferences. I would
speculate that most nephrology conferences do not cater to junior
investigators who are more likely to tweet and this may have been one
reason why so much negative sentiment was found. Currently the
advertising tweets would seem to drown out substantive contributions
and that is a major drawback of using twitter in this context. Althoughthe idea is of interest, there are major problems with the introduction,
the outcomes, format, analysis of negative sentiment, and connection to
public awareness as outlined below:
MAJOR COMMENTS
1) Introduction weak. The introduction is only one paragraph and
requires more thought and revision. The authors mention general
statements about social media being important for professional societies,
but they need to dig deeper. How has social media been used in other
scholarly conferences, either well or poorly? What are the risks and
benefits? How does one engage young academics especially in these
kinds of activities? How does focusing on social media apply to
individuals who do not use it or do not understand it?
8/13/2019 Peer Reviews: Tweeting the Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011
2/5
eer
Reviews
Desai T, Shariff A, Shariff A, Kats M, Christiano C, Fang X, Ferris M. Tweetingthe Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011 . PLoOne 2012. Vol. 7, No. 7, pp. 1-9.
Nephrology On-Demand http://www.myNOD.org
2) Public education and academic conference connection. The focus
of academic conferences is not typically for public education as the
author suggests in the introduction. Usually scholarly conferences are
ways for academics to exchange and while popular media are present,
this is only relevant to a small number of transformative research
results. Why is public education a high priority for nephrologists in
particular?
3) Outcomes. The authors did NOT measure "public awareness."
Tweets were all from conference participants who are not the public.
This needs to be clarified.
4) Format. Number all pages. Double space. Refer to PLoSguidelines for submitting manuscripts. Having methods after
introduction would be a more typical format.
5) Negative sentiment is not analyzed. The authors should directly
state their findings about more negative informative tweets instead of
stating the inverse. Box 1 only says "less positive" - implying that
negative is not actually negative. Be more objective about descriptions.
6) Definitions unclear. Recommend defining twitter, internalcitations and tweet amplification, and other terms that will not be
familiar to a typical nephrology audience (remember only 1.4% of
participants even tweeted).
7) Increasing public awareness unclear. The authors argue that
having informative content, internal citations, and positive sentiment
increases public awareness. Why are negative sentiment tweets not
increasing public awareness? This is a key point because more negative
informative tweets appeared.
MINOR COMMENTS:
1) Pg 3, line 8. Twitter is an "online networking service." This is a
poor definition and should be revised. Also, this idea of defining twitter
is essential to the introduction.
8/13/2019 Peer Reviews: Tweeting the Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011
3/5
eer
Reviews
Desai T, Shariff A, Shariff A, Kats M, Christiano C, Fang X, Ferris M. Tweetingthe Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011 . PLoOne 2012. Vol. 7, No. 7, pp. 1-9.
Nephrology On-Demand http://www.myNOD.org
2) Pg 4, line 28. Why were Spanish tweets not analyzed?
3) Pg 4, results. State total number of informative and uninformative
tweets.
4) Pg 4, line 44. What about junior investigator pathways or anything
specific to young participants?
5) Pg 5, line 39. Awkward sentence, rephrase.
6) Pg 6, line 37. Why focus on total if only informative tweets are
what you are interested in? Again, being painfully accurate is more
important than painting a rosy inaccurate picture.
7) Pg7, two places underlined. No need to underline for emphasis.
8) References. Use PLoS convention throughout.
Reviewer #2: Desai et al. present a very novel and unique study
examining the use, content and characteristics of social media,
specifically Twitter, during the largest annual nephrology meeting in theUnited States. With the growing interesting in applications of this
communication format for academic, outreach and marketing purposes,
this research effort also promotes novel methodology for consideration.
Comments:
1. Several times the authors note in the manuscript, including the
abstract, that the objective was to determine how "effectively" Twitter was
used to increase public awareness and education of kidney disease.
However, this study has no measure of that outcome (i.e. public
awareness or education). The objectives of the study should be clarified
to describe only that for which data is available --- the quantity and
characteristics of Twitter messaging.
8/13/2019 Peer Reviews: Tweeting the Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011
4/5
eer
Reviews
Desai T, Shariff A, Shariff A, Kats M, Christiano C, Fang X, Ferris M. Tweetingthe Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011 . PLoOne 2012. Vol. 7, No. 7, pp. 1-9.
Nephrology On-Demand http://www.myNOD.org
2. The rationale for describing sentiment remains unclear. Given the
novelty of this area, including in the introduction the rationale for this
characteristics would be helpful to the reader. Also, the authors seem to
imply that positive sentiment is what is desired. Is this always true at a
scientific meeting where debate may occur and differing viewpoints
expressed? Could negative sentiment represent disagreement with a
Tweet content that could be "useful" to the dialogue?
3. Clarify the attendees at the ASN conference. Not all 10,000+ are
health care providers and there is more heterogeneity in the type of
professionals attending.
4. Provide more basic summary of the details of the conferenceincluding the number of days, tracks, types of sessions, vendors, etc?
This will aid in framing the data about tweets relative to the overall
conference structure.
5. What is the rationale for assuming the relationship between
number of posters and tweets is linear? What about complex areas with
few investigators/studies, but those that do happen are very
provocative/high impact?6. As above, expand on the application of the sentiment score. What
do these values and the magnitudes described in this study mean?
7. Can the authors make any comments about the people that either
generate or consume the tweets?
8. Omit the statement about STROBE guidelines, unless required by
the editor.
9. Can the authors comment about any misinformation - especially
"informative" misinformation among the Tweets examined? One of the
potential concerns about social media is the possible rapid dissemination
of inaccurate information.
10. How do these analyses specifically suggest that "physicians" can
confidently use Twitter - as stated in the conclusion?
8/13/2019 Peer Reviews: Tweeting the Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011
5/5
eer
Reviews
Desai T, Shariff A, Shariff A, Kats M, Christiano C, Fang X, Ferris M. Tweetingthe Meeting: An in-depth analysis of Twitter activity at Kidney Week 2011 . PLoOne 2012. Vol. 7, No. 7, pp. 1-9.
Nephrology On-Demand http://www.myNOD.org
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