The SSRN Blog

Two recent articles in the Journal of Wine Economics by Roger Hodgson and discussed in Leonard Mlodinow’s Wall Street Journal article A Hint of Hype, A Taste of Illusion throw cold water on expert ratings and wine competition awards.

The articles, An Analysis of the Concordance Among 13 U.S. Wine Competitions (abstract, PDF) and An Examination of Judge Reliability at a Major U.S. Wine Competition (abstract, PDF) provide some of the best empirical data about the awarding of medals and the variability of wine judges’ scoring. Based on a fair bit of experience, I can’t say that I am surprised. Most knowledgeable wine people I know pay attention to ratings and medals but don’t treat them as gospel. They believe as I do that the best bottle of wine is the one you drink with friends.

For oenophiles, the Journal of Wine Economics looks like an interesting journal. For SSRN, it looks like I need to follow up with the American Association of Wine Economists (AAWE) to get their articles into the SSRN eLibrary.

iSSRN, our free iPhone App, was released recently.  It provides instant access to the latest Social Science and Humanities research in the SSRN eLibrary from scholars around the world. iSSRN is available from Apple’s iTunes store.

iSSRN allows iPhone and iPod Touch users to search over 250,000 papers and read the full text of the papers directly on their device.

Note: This is an updated version of the previous iSSRN App and this version, not the previous one, will be updated in the future.

Not to sound boastful but I was wonderfully surprised to see that SSRN was number one on the current  Ranking Web of World Repositories. The ranking is an initiative of the Cybermetrics Lab, a research group belonging to the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC), the largest public research body in Spain and includes a very impressive list of repositories from around the world.  I know and greatly respect many of the other repositories.

Thank all of you for your continued support of SSRN!

Here are the latest announcements from SSRN:

Erasmus Law Review Upgrades Its LSN Partners in Publishing Journal

We are pleased to announce that Erasmus Law Review has upgraded its Partners in Publishing Journal within the Legal Scholarship Network (LSN), which includes, but is not limited to, a customized abstracting eJournal distributed to SSRN subscribers.

View Papers: http://www.ssrn.com/link/Erasmus-Law-Review.html
Subscribe: http://hq.ssrn.com/jourInvite.cfm?link=Erasmus-Law-Review

The Erasmus Law Review seeks to foster independent critical scholarship as relevant to the discipline of law.

The Board of Editors encourages the submission of legally relevant manuscripts by legal scholars and practitioners as well as those versed in other disciplines relevant to law, such as criminology, sociology, political science and economics.

The Erasmus Law Review intends to issue calls for papers on specific topics, topics will be posted on the website of the journal. All articles which the board in principle intends to publish will be submitted to peer-review.

Business History Review Joins MRN Partners in Publishing Journals

We are pleased to announce that the Harvard Business School, Business History Review has joined our Partners in Publishing Journals within the Management Research Network (MRN).

BUSINESS HISTORY REVIEW

View Papers: http://www.ssrn.com/link/Business-History-Review.html

Business History Review is a quarterly publication of original research by historians, economists, sociologists, and scholars of business administration. BHR’s ongoing mission, from its 1926 inception as the Bulletin of the Business Historical Society, is to encourage and aid the study of the evolution of business in all periods and all countries.

China Academy of Financial Research (CAFR) Joins Finance Research Centers Papers

We are pleased to announce that China Academy of Financial Research (CAFR) has started a Finance Research Centers Papers series within the Financial Economics Network (FEN).

CHINA ACADEMY OF FINANCIAL RESEARCH (CAFR)

View Papers: http://www.ssrn.com/link/CAFR-RES.html

CAFR is the China Academy of Financial Research. The role of the CAFR is modeled after the NBER in the US and the CEPR in Europe.

CAFR Research Paper Series aims at promoting high-quality theoretical and applied research in financial economics. The Series also aims at promoting high-quality research on China’s economy and financial markets. The Series features contributions both by CAFR Research Fellows and by a network of external researchers.

Announcing New ERN Research Paper Series Journals

We are pleased to announce that Universidad de los Andes Department of Economics and George Mason University Department of Economics have each started an Economics Departments Research Paper Series; George Mason University School of Public Policy Faculty Research has started an ERN Public Policy Centers Research Paper Series, within the Economics Research Network (ERN).

UNIVERSIDAD DE LOS ANDES DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

View Papers: http://www.ssrn.com/link/U-Andes-Economics.html
Subscribe: http://hq.ssrn.com/jourInvite.cfm?link=U-Andes-Economics

The Documentos CEDE Working Papers Series aims to advance the Department of Economics at Universidad de los Andes as an outstanding center for research on Economics. The series reflects the interest of our faculty on a wide array of economic issues and on applied economic research. Documentos CEDE provides our faculty and students with an opportunity to disseminate their research and exchange ideas with policy makers and the academic community.

GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

View Papers: http://www.ssrn.com/link/George-Mason-Economics.html
Subscribe: http://hq.ssrn.com/jourInvite.cfm?link=George-Mason-Economics

The Department of Economics at George Mason University (GMU) is distinguished by its excellence in Austrian economics, experimental economics and public choice. Its intellectual contribution to these fields is exemplified by two Nobel prizes awarded to Mason professors James Buchanan (public choice) and Vernon Smith (experimental economics). Complementing its tradition of academic excellence is the department’s Washington DC location, which leaves it unique in its ability to draw direct attention to its extensive outreach and policy research programs. The Working Paper Series (WPS) aims to further enhance the academic strength of the department by promoting the rapid dissemination of research, facilitate the exchange of ideas with other researchers, and stimulate intellectual exchange and communication throughout the scholarly community.

GEORGE MASON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY FACULTY RESEARCH

View Papers: http://www.ssrn.com/link/GMU-Faculty-PUB.html
Subscribe: http://hq.ssrn.com/jourInvite.cfm?link=GMU-Faculty-PUB

The School of Public Policy (SPP) at George Mason University is at the crossroads - both geographically and intellectually - of government, non-profit organizations and private industry. The SPP Faculty Research Paper Series exhibits a cross-section of the faculty research output. Founded in 1990, today SPP has 70 full-time teaching and research faculty from more than a dozen academic fields, including political science, economics, geography, sociology, anthropology, business, engineering, history, law, medicine, education, and urban planning. Currently offering five Master’s degrees and a Ph.D. in Public Policy, SPP now attracts almost 1,000 students from the U.S. and abroad and has one of the largest doctoral programs in public policy in the US.

Announcing the 2009 IACM Meetings Abstracting eJournal

In cooperation with the International Association for Conflict Management (IACM), the Negotiations Research Network (NEG) is pleased to announce the 2009 IACM Meetings Abstracting eJournal. This abstracting journal is available to all users at no charge and contains abstracts of the meetings papers with links to the full text within the SSRN eLibrary.

You can browse all IACM 2009 Meeting abstracts in the SSRN database by clicking on the following link. There are currently 63 such papers in the system. You may wish to bookmark it in your browser.

View Papers: http://www.ssrn.com/link/IACM-2009.html
Conference URL: http://www.iacm-conflict.org

HOW TO SUBSCRIBE
You can subscribe at no cost to the IACM 2009 Meeting abstracting journal by clicking on the following link:

http://hq.ssrn.com/jourInvite.cfm?link=IACM-2009

This link uses browser cookies to store the name of the eJournal while you log in. You will need to enable cookies on your browser to use the link above or to access the SSRN HeadQuarters. If cookies are not enabled, you will not be able to subscribe to SSRN eJournals or to log into the HeadQuarters. If you have any questions please call 877-SSRNHelp (toll free 877.777.6435 within the United States or 00+1+585+4428170 outside of the United States).

Participants of this year’s conference will be subscribed to the abstracting journal. In addition, subscribers to the IACM 2008 Meetings abstracting journal will automatically receive this year’s journal as well.

Stetson University College of Law Joins LSN Research Paper Series

We are pleased to announce that Stetson University College of Law has started a Research Paper Series within the Legal Scholarship Network (LSN).

Stetson University College of Law

View Papers: http://www.ssrn.com/link/Stetson-U-LEG.html
Subscribe: http://hq.ssrn.com/jourInvite.cfm?link=Stetson-U-LEG

Stetson University College of Law, located in Gulfport and Tampa, Florida, is a dynamic scholarly community with a vibrant faculty and student body who strive to have a meaningful and far-reaching impact on the law, the profession, and society. To further this mission, the Stetson University College of Law Legal Studies Research eJournal contains abstracts, works-in-progress, and published articles and essays written by members of the College of Law faculty on a wide variety of legal and law-related topics.

As many of you know, we have worked closely with The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation to create our Entrepreneurship Research & Policy Network (ERPN). Earlier this year, they held the first Economics Bloggers Forum and I was fortunate to be able to participate.  It was a wonderful event and a great opportunity to meet and learn from some very intelligent people, a few of which are included in the Renewal of Entrepreneurial Capitalism video below.  Other than my friends at the Kauffman Foundation inserting the wrong blog URL for me, I was very impressed with the quality of the videos and the professionalism of the staff.

Overview - Economic Bloggers and the Renewal of Entrepreneurial Capitalism

Gregg Gordon - Entrepreneurship Research and Policy Network

Gregg Gordon - Building the Field of Entrepreneurship Research

Please let me know what you think about the videos and what changes are occurring in your discipline.

I am very fortunate to love what I do, love the people with which I work, and have the experiences I get to have. My work includes wonderful discussions with very intelligent, interesting people that are very often in interesting academic settings.

Earlier this week, I had the opportunity to visit Oxford University, the oldest university in the English-speaking world. It is a breathtaking place!  However, even more incredible to me was that I was there to talk about repository technology!

I spent the day with Sally Rumsey, the Service Development Manager of the Oxford University Research Archive (ORA), and several librarians from Oxford University, learning about the Oxford University Research Archive (ORA). ORA has a forward thinking design and creative approach to partnerships.  ORA currently has over 2500 holdings from faculty at Oxford in a broad range of disciplines.  While I learned a lot and thoroughly enjoyed the discussions, the best part of the day was the wonderful tour of Bodleian Library by the extremely knowledgeable Wilma Minty, Head of Catalogue Support Services at the Bodleian Library. If you ever get a chance for a tour with Wilma, TAKE IT! 

Note: Tip of the hat to Amy Brand, Program Manager of the Harvard Office of Scholarly Communication, for the wonderful suggestion to stay at Malmaison Hotel. It is a former prison and I highly recommend it!