I wonder if this was inspired by a recent xkcd?
At text: People may complain about readability, but even with jpeg compression, extracting the data points is usually computationally feasible if there aren’t too many of them.
Maybe for the way in which they are layering them, but I’m pretty sure the reasoning behind it is inspired by content that has been made into comics for quite some time, for example
My idea: have it so every time the document is opened the names are randomly scrambled. I don’t think this would work with PDF or on paper but it’s a fun idea
Edit: While it wouldn’t work decently on paper, this would work with E-Ink display, and instead have it change every few seconds while the paper is being read.
I do the same but with all the words.
Are you the guy that reviewed the rat testicle paper?
How do you know my password?
PDF can… embed javascript. So, sadly it is possible.
It wouldn’t work with PDF, but probably would work with Postscript (being that it’s Turing-complete).
(I say “probably” because I don’t know for a fact that Postscript’s API has a
randomfunction.)You can embed javascript or 3D objects in PDF, surely you can reorder some words
That has to be the furthest possible opposite from what PDF is for.
Not only is this paper real: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2304.01393.pdf
But they actually made it practical:
We have implemented two ways to reveal the actual names present in an overlapping stack, when viewing a PDF file on a computer.
First, hovering over the stacked names should pop up a tooltip with the authors listed in their original order, as shown in Figure 1.
This feature works on many desktop PDF viewers (e.g., Acrobat, Evince, Firefox, VSCode), but notably not Chrome, Edge, Safari, or MacOS Preview. It also does not work on mobile devices we tested (probably because they lack a natural notion of “hovering”).
That doesn’t sound very practical at all.
All it’s done is force you to read a tooltip. Which is an awful idea. The tooltips still create a first-author situation, so now your forced to screw around with a tooltip for…. Nothing.
I mean, relatively practical. Just the fact that they actually made an effort. It’s not much different from having it in a footnote
Easy fix (for html). Just embed js to randomly shuffle the order of the authors every time you hover or something.
I think the point is to recognise a paper by its author blob so you don’t end up needing the tooltip that much (they talk about it in the paper) I’m not really convinced that it’s worth it, but they did think it through.
Hmm… it’s not working for me in either Firefox or Okular.
Now whoever has the longest name has an advantage
International collaboration with Spaniards and Hispanics instantly drops to 0.
Every paper comes with an author appendix as cut-out scrabble tiles (scrambled) so readers assemble the names in the order they prefer.
I honestly didn’t know if this was serious at first…
Edit: lol the fuck? It is real? When you hover, the tooltip is still a list with an order… what’s the point?
It’s funny
I may be missing the point, but why not instead list names in whatever order, but clarify who contributed what.
Order matters in academia whether the authors want it to or not. Other academics will look at the order of the authors and make judgements based on that, so you’d have to specify something like “authors listed alphabetically”.
In math and (theoretical) physics alphabetical is the presumed norm.
Huh, TIL. That actually makes sense
