University of Bern, Switzerland - new program to pay reviewers for errors found in scientific journals

[ahimsa]

There's a new program that will pay folks who have found errors in scientific papers.

I immediately thought of this forum, and all the smart folks here who have found errors! So I thought I'd share it here.

I heard about it on this Science Friday segment (about the last 2 minutes):

https://www.sciencefriday.com/segments/odysseus-moon-landing/

No transcript yet, but here's my attempt to transcribe some of what was said:

"A team at the University of Bern in Switzerland says that it will pay reviewers to find mistakes in influential papers. And they're gonna start with the field of psychology. The more errors you find the more money you can make. And right now they have put up about $285,000 to start with ..."

A few more details (not verbatim):

Authors are given small payment ($285) if they submit their papers to the program. They get to keep that money if no errors are found.

If mistakes found lead to a retraction the person who finds the error(s) could get an additional $2000.

A quick search also found that this was reported by the Chronicle of Higher Education but you have to register to read the full article:

Wanted: Scientific Errors. Cash Reward.
https://www.chronicle.com/article/wanted-scientific-errors-cash-reward

 

[Ash]

So it’ll be the well intentioned conscientious researcher who submits their paper to this treatment. Rather than the authors with more murky motivations. Shame.

 

[Ash]

But what a great idea to pay for good work!