David Crotty

New York

Editor in Chief at The Scholarly Kitchen

What's hot and cooking in Scholarly Publishing. Blog from the Society for Scholarly Publishing-account run by Editor David Crotty. Retweets are not endorsements

Articles

Is Grammar an Inherent Product of the Human Brain?

3 weeks ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty

Gotta love a good academic controversy! The video below looks into perhaps the most intense and raging arguments in the field of linguistics, beginning with Noam Chomsky’s theories from the 1950s and 1960s suggesting that humans share a Universal Grammar (UG) that stems from the structure and functions that have evolved in the human brain. This theory is still hotly debated, and takes on even more interesting parameters in the age of artificial intelligence and large language models (LLMs).
Greetings from SSP 2025 in Baltimore

4 weeks ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty

I write this post about halfway through the 2025 Society for Scholarly Publishing meeting, held this year in Baltimore. Some impressions below:First, the good news: some of the views from the meeting hotel are spectacular, particularly for a baseball fan:Home run celebrations aside, the vibe of this year’s meeting is different from any I’ve seen in the 15 or so years I’ve attended.
Off for the US Holiday - Wishing You A Constructive Summer

1 month ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty

We are off on Monday for the US Memorial Day holiday. Traditionally, this holiday marks the beginning of the summer season, and so I, along with The Hold Steady below, will wish you a Constructive Summer. See you on Tuesday (and hopefully thereafter in Baltimore for the beginning of the SSP Annual Meeting).
Language Evolves, or rather, Constantly Cooks New Ways to Pass the Vibe Check

1 month ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty

One of my favorite Friday posts we’ve done at The Scholarly Kitchen featured a video of kids looking at the original iPod, in which every single one of them referred to it as a “phone” despite it not having any functionality toward making calls. Language evolves, and now “phone” essentially means any sort of small computer one carries around on one’s person. But that was (gulp) ten years ago.
Welcoming a New Chef in the Kitchen, Randy Townsend

1 month ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty

I am very pleased to announce that Randy Townsend has graciously agreed to join The Scholarly Kitchen as a regular contributor. If you’re a regular reader of the Kitchen or if you’re connected in any way with the Society for Scholarly Publishing (SSP), then you probably already know Randy.
Ask The Chefs - The NIH Steps on the Open Access Accelerator

1 month ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty |Rick Anderson |Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe |Haseeb Irfanullah

On 30 April 2025, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) revised their 2024 Public Access Policy. Not only would the requirements of the Biden White House Nelson Memo still be going into effect, the timeline for their implementation has been accelerated from the beginning of 2026 to 1 July 2025. Jay Bhattacharya, Director of the NIH announced the policy change in a separate statement.
The Scholarly Kitchen Hires a Sous Chef

1 month ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty |Lettie Y. Conrad

In the last few years, The Scholarly Kitchen (TSK) has grown and expanded in many ways, from launching a guest-blogger program to establishing an advisory board (The Kitchen Cabinet). Our latest investment is hiring a Deputy Editor to support Chefs, guest bloggers, and our editorial team — and we are pleased to announce the appointment of Lettie Conrad as our inaugural Deputy Editor/“Sous Chef.”Lettie will officially don her editorial toque at SSP’s Annual Meeting in Baltimore.
Cephalopod Update: First Video Footage of A Colossal Squid Recorded

2 months ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty

The natural world continues to provide marvels, once again showing us something new. In March, an expedition near the South Sandwich Islands in the South Atlantic Ocean captured the first video footage of a live Colossal Squid, a juvenile only 12 inches long. The Colossal Squid is the largest extant invertebrate on earth, and for most of the 20th century, much of what we knew about them came from the scars the species left on sperm whales and from a few beaks found in whale stomachs.
An Elaborate, But Highly Accurate, 11 Second Microsoft Office Gag

2 months ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty

There are pieces of software that we each use every single day, and each seems to have some inexplicable and maddening behavior that one has to put up with. The video below acts out one of my greatest pet peeves, moving an image in Microsoft Word with the analogy of moving a piece of furniture in a room. The effort that went into what is essentially an 11-second gag is impressive, as is the result of giving an image the tiniest scooch.
The Scholarly Kitchen

2 months ago | scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org | David Crotty

There’s so little one can count on being consistent these days, so perhaps it’s time to take solace in the essential physical laws of the universe. And what better combination to help with that than Adam Savage and the Muppets? Here, they attempt to interrogate gravity, but perhaps do a better job demonstrating the always reliable joy of dropping objects from a great height and watching them smash.