Women of Science bringing Science to the Public on Twitter

#SciArt Linocut cloud classification http://t.co/sxJ1Xhz92b Diagrams themselves make larger cloud shape #meteorology pic.twitter.com/YC7BqSNn8Z
— Ele Willoughby (@minouette) March 4, 2015

I was really flattered to be included in the io9 article by geophysicist and science writer Mika McKinnon's round up of all sorts of scientific women who are actively communicating science, in all sorts of ways, on twitter! She mentioned my science and history of science linocuts (including the tweet above), and listed roughly 40 others, both well-known and not. Just recently, I was asked by a couple of my mother's friends about twitter: why would one be interested and how can it take up one's time. It was one of those, "Why would you want to read, 'I ate a sandwich for lunch!'?" type questions. I gave a fairly standard reply that if that is in fact the only sort of thing a person tweets, you simply don't follow them; instead, you can follow @NASA. This round-up is a better answer; you can follow - and actively engage with - some of the most creative, knowledgeable and interesting, entertaining people out there. You can stay abreast of your own interests and follow those who work in radically different areas and are excited about topics which you might not even have known existed. If you're looking for great people to follow, and kick-ass women in STEM to boot, this is a good place to start, as well as the other lists she links to.

The #SciArt tweetstorm did put my work in front of new eyeballs and I'm also flattered to have gained new followers. Thank you to all 1258 twitter followers, 667 FB fanpage followers, 960 Etsy followers, 2700 Etsy ♥, 3861 Pinterest followers, and 83 Instagram followers. I had to correct the numbers in the previous sentence twice, in the time it took me to type it (and I type quickly). It was quite amazing to find my work spreading so quickly and get so much feedback that I could barely keep up. If I failed to reply to you, my apologies; please try again. I usually do reply promptly and don't usually feel that popular. ;)

#SciArt Tweetstorm

 

A lot of the artwork I make is directly informed and inspired by science, and this is the week for art about science or #SciArt on twitter. Local Scientific American blogger Glendon Mellow (aka @FlyingTrilobite), part of the trio behind the Symbiartic blog (@Symbiartic) about the intersection of art and science, declared a #SciArt tweetstorm. He suggested that those of us who care about scientific illustration and art inspired by science should:

• tweet at least 3 artworks a day (March 1 through 7) tagged #SciArt
• retweet at least 5 #SciArt tweets daily
• or more...

#sciart Twitter NodeXL SNA Map and Report for
Monday, 02 March 2015 at 18:50 UTC from Marc Smith

The resulting storm is in fact raging. #SciArt is trending on twitter and has been for days. In fact, Symbiartic has posted some statistics. Marc Smith of Connected Action produced this figure showing how the 4000 odd tweets and twitter accounts posting #SciArt are interconnected. As you can imagine, I'm all over this, and am in fact the 5th vertice of 2,227 users, ranked by centrality within the first 24 hours. Read more and see the figure in full detail here or by clicking on it.

You can follow some of the other blogs write-ups of the tweetstorm via Symbiartic and find  Nature's post here.

But what you really should do is simply go check the #SciArt hashtag right now! There are some truly wonderful things being shared from that fertile intersection of art and science. There is everything from scientific visualizations, to art quilts inspired by neurology, to microscopic photographs, to science comics, to fine art on scientific themes, to a cupcake periodic table. Do not miss out. It's inspiring!

1900 hearts!

As you may know, I love getting hearts. Today I have 1900 hearts on things from secret minouette places! Etsy now calls them 'admirers' but we all know these as ♥s. So, I'd like to take a moment to thank each and every one, as well as the 763 Etsy followers, 821 twitter followers, 995 pinterest followers, 582 fans of the things from secret minouette places fanpage, and last but not least, anyone who follows this blog! It's sort of amazing to me that 1900 people have seen my art, let alone added it to their favorites, so it's really encouraging and appreciated.

Squirrely

So, while working this morning, I've been having a conversation on twitter with Ratatoskr the Old Norse Squirrel messanger god, about the Legendary White Squirrel of Trinity-Bellwoods, along with the White Squirrel himself, cause that's what you do.

Incidentally, I've been reading A.S. Byatt's Ragnarok: The End of the Gods, so Yggdrasil seems to be the recurring theme of late.

1. 1. Ele ‏@minouette 1h

      my 'terms of venery' linocuts http://ow.ly/iRXnr  Love those collective nouns for animals

      View summary
   2. Ratatosk ‏@Ratatosk4 1h

      @minouette I am impressed by the glowing red eyes of the Legendary White Squirrel http://etsy.me/10Nwscj  @WhiteSquirrelTO #SquirrelArmy #wlf

      View details
   3. Ele ‏@minouette 1h

      . @Ratatosk4 Thank you very much! The @WhiteSquirrelTO (and family) do indeed have some eerie pink-red eyes..

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   4. Ratatosk ‏@Ratatosk4 1h

      @minouette I believe @WhiteSquirrelTO & Co. were the inspiration for Cronenberg's “Scanners”...

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   5. Ele ‏@minouette 57m

      . @Ratatosk4 Ah! Hmmm.... that's definitely a new twist on the story of the Legendary White Squirrel of Trinity-Bellwoods @WhiteSquirrelTO

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   6. 
      

      Ratatosk ‏@Ratatosk4 53m

      @minouette Believe me, nobody hunts or traps squirrels while @WhiteSquirrelTO is around. He's the #SquirrelArmy's secret weapon.

Predicitive Twittering Abstract Poetry

So I know some of you hate the idea of twitter, some of you love it. I've been using it for quite some time now (@minouette), and enjoy it a lot more than I would have suspected. If you're curious there are many tricks to making it work for you. It's pretty easy to avoid the mundane, the shrill, or otherwise unfortunate users, and their existence shouldn't deter you from the entire concept. I find it a great news source for specific interests, and a means to filter the internet for interesting links. (I can follow everyone from @NASA to @feministhulk to @DAVID_LYNCH to @rebelmayor (William Lyon MacKenzie, Toronto's first mayor and 1837 rebel) to @sockington (a rotund cat) to collections of artists and science journalists, and of course several of the people on my friends' list here and this works for me). But it is, what it is. I doubt anyone's tweets warrant archiving (I'm looking at you, @librarycongress the Library of Congress). One can only be so profound in 140 characters. So, after that verbose caveat, let me pass on this funny Twitter tool du jour, That Can Be My Next Tweet, which employs your previous tweets as a means to predict your next (via teenangster, who calls it "like magnetic poetry, except way more embarrassing and personal.")

Here are some of the funnier suggestions for @minouette:

“More block print of Memories’ wedding guestbook will show up the pussycat… pillow. congratulations!”

“You promised tweets. Still waiting. : enough seismic data. perspective is crazy, but luckily not inside.”

“Haha! I watched a carpentry tool? It ought to Scott Walker and eating a documentary about reindeer and.”

“Radiolarians block prints. Will be at Pearson. Somehow, I’m listening to radiolarians Working on my block.”

“New monster avatar : today too!”

“Model wireless solar-powered charging ‘tree’ for a block printed pillow new monster avatar ; drinking tea?”

and, my favorite, (though I do love the idea of listening to radiolaria at the airport),

“Debugging imaginary problems is crazy, but more elegant than Toronto Street Team.”

happy unicorn coffee

I find this amusing or enlightening or at least something worth posting. My three most common words in the last year, on twitter: thanks, blogging, time.