SCIDEV.NET: Advent of online science journalism in India

Abstract

The Science and Development Network, or SciDev.Net has emerged as a pathbreaking Internet-based initiative to promote science journalism in developing countries, especially in places where science journalism either did not exist in the form recognised in advanced countries, or was struggling to find a place in the wider world of national and international journalism. 'SciDev.Net' is an open-access, not-for-profit, international science website focusing on development-related science with an aim of empowering individuals from both developed and developing countries to participate in the dialogue between science and technology and society. This chapter illustrates how Internet challenged the traditional 'linear' model of flow of science information, in which science journalists were the intermediaries who relayed information faithfully 'from privileged sources to diverse publics', in the light of the story of SciDev.Net, as a successful science communication website.