In 2026, Kyiv is facing more ballistic missiles in a single night than it did during the entire year of 2024. I can't wrap my head around the hell we're being forced to endure. And there is still no light at the end of the tunnel.

Russia attacked Ukraine with 35 missiles, including 27 ballistic missiles, and 185 drones overnight. In Kyiv, nine people were killed and 28 more were injured. Seven districts of the capital were affected.

Another one, same conference:

Solal Pirelli@solalpirelli.bsky.social · 4w ago

Today in beautiful figures appearing in definitely totally scientific papers from entirely legitimate and unproblematic ACM conferences.

Today in beautiful figures appearing in definitely totally scientific papers from entirely legitimate and unproblematic ACM conferences.

Imagine a political party run by tax evaders that has ostensibly moderate positions on most issues, but wants to execute anyone who has ever worked for the tax office. We wouldn't be discussing whether their education or transport policy is slightly better or worse than those of parties Y or Z.

It started so well... www.maptap.gg July 4 100🎯 100🎯 100🎯 87🎉 80✨ Final score: 901

oh christ, one of these in the wild again. 'antisemitic' is a term *invented in the late 19th century by Jew-haters* as a euphemistic way of framing their Jew hating. it has nothing to do with what people or linguistic groups are 'semitic,' it means hatred of Jews.

Reform UK : PM should be stopping the boats in the channel Keir: OK, I've stopped the Russkis ReformUK: No not like that ....

Thanks, but your description contradicts my experience. In practice your system heavily interferes with meaningful editorial control over reviewer invitations, which goes to the core of peer-review integrity. This isn't a 'communication shortfall'—it's a systemic choice you made.

Frontiers@frontiersin.bsky.social · 2mo ago

2/3 By design, the Associate Editor’s expertise and reviewer invitations always take precedence. The peer-review system is built to support the editor’s decisions, and you retain the ability to revoke, replace, or invite additional reviewers at any point in the process.

An inevitable development for for-profit Open Access publishers is Fordism: automation & massification. If you earn money piece-rate for each paper you want to increase the flow of papers while minimizing cost. e.g. very low and *uniform* turnaround times at Frontiers and MDPI

Michael Okun@michael-okun.bsky.social · 2mo ago

I’ve officially resigned as Associate Editor for Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience. It used to be a reputable journal, but became a case study in how forced automation destroys academic integrity. 👇

I’ve officially resigned as Associate Editor for Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience. It used to be a reputable journal, but became a case study in how forced automation destroys academic integrity. 👇

"Investigating the integrity of published scientific papers is key to the scientific process, but the necessary knowledge is in short supply." Check the COSIG team's new Community Page article in @plosbiology.org ! doi.org/10.1371/jour...

Introducing COSIG: The Collection of Open Science Integrity Guides

Investigating the integrity of published scientific papers is key to the scientific process, but the necessary knowledge is in short supply. This Community Page presents COSIG, an open collection of m...

doi.org

Today, COSIG and Sal Sleuthmander turn 1 year old! 🎂 Contributions to COSIG are the best birthday gifts we can ever receive, many thanks to all of our contributors 🎉

Journalists still writing "Russia says, Ukraine says, who knows what the truth is" articles in 2026 should be shamed out of their profession forever... Who needs propaganda when there are so many useful idiots?

Will Trump doom the Swiss far right's latest initiative? We might have to thank Donald like so many other countries did... ("Isolating ourselves from Europe? Definitely not right now!")

Actual content: Sweden joins the list of countries that revoke citizenship of dual citizens if they lied to obtain it or commit extreme crimes. If you want popular consent for easy naturalization, this is a requirement. Many prefer sticking to principles that empirically lead to far right govts.

Erik Angner@erikangner.com · 3mo ago

The Swedish 🇸🇪 Parliament just approved a law that would create a tiered citizenship scheme, with a 1st class (mostly for the native born) that cannot be revoked and a 2nd class (mostly for the naturalized) that can: www.svt.se/nyheter/inri... Only two parties (Left and Green) voted against.

Average manager "helping" their team

MyPet Health by Vetcation@vetcation.com · 3mo ago

A golden retriever retrieves a duck that was casually enjoying an afternoon swim. He thinks he saved the duck from drowning... Dog: “I’M A HERO. DUCK WAS DOOMED. EVERYONE CLAP.” Duck: “Bro I was literally just floating and vibing wtf”🤪

Ruslana is 52 😳 I guess the "infinite energy" cheat code she clearly must have enabled also makes her immortal?

Love the Eurovision tradition of pretending Verka Serduchka won when doing anything with past winners as guests, instead of whoever it was that actually came first that year with a much more boring song

Interesting to hear Scott Delman equate retraction with misconduct. That just muddies the waters - they should retract papers when editor no longer has confidence in the findings, for whatever reason. Leaving flawed papers in the literature to avoid upsetting authors does a disservice to readers.

In which we learn @acm.org still hasn't retracted a couple of papers they said they'd retract nearly 4 years ago. And apparently evaluate themselves using the number of investigations in their backlog. 🤨 (Also Elsevier doesn't do a good job. Just as shocking.)

Retraction Watch@retractionwatch.com · 3mo ago

Elsevier retracts the least and reinstates the most, new analysis finds. The study also found a tenth publisher to be an outlier in terms of reasons for retraction.

I just got spam from a paper mill telling me my "background" in this preprint makes me a good match to buy an authorship position they're selling 🤦🤦🤦🤦

Solal Pirelli@solalpirelli.bsky.social · 3mo ago

Did you know there's a barely hidden market for authorship of fake scientific papers in conferences? New preprint w/ @abalkina.bsky.social, @mkunesova.bsky.social, and @yaamurozturk.bsky.social : arxiv.org/abs/2604.22458 We found 4,000+ ads & matched them to 1,720 IEEE conf. papers! ...🧵

Some personal news...

Retraction Watch@retractionwatch.com · 3mo ago

An appeals court in Switzerland has overturned a 2025 defamation conviction against @solalpirelli.bsky.social, a sleuth who had identified dozens of conference proceedings with signs of citation manipulation. The ruling orders the plaintiff to pay Pirelli's legal expenses.

Sleuths face various legal risks but they can also use the law for their advantage. ⚖️ COSIG's newest guide, number 3️⃣5️⃣, covers legal considerations for taking part in forensic peer review. Read it here: osf.io/q3y7s

Next: Nihar Shah @cmu.edu with "The More You Automate, the Less You See: Hidden Pitfalls of AI Scientist Systems" [The room goes dark, ominous music sounds, and a slide comes up] We find that AI scientist systems exhibit multiple pitfalls violating research integrity. #WCRI2026

Reaction from @reeserichardson.bsky.social, me, and @abalkina.bsky.social to IEEE's handling of conferences. (Pic by @elisabethbik.bsky.social)

Session 6.D of #wcri2026 starts with a talk on paper mills in China. Formal businesses with contracts, clients are often clinicians who must publish but have no realistic way to do this.

Last day of #wcri2026 starts with a plenary on research security.

René Aquarius on what sleuths do, meme edition.

Plenary #wcri2026 session on people who actually know what they're doing.