Whether you’re new to academic publishing or just new to open access, here are a few friendly tips to help get your talk from slides to article.
You don’t need a fancy structure — clear and simple is great.
Classic scientific-style outline works well:
- What was the problem or context?
- What did you do (tools, data, workflow)?
- What happened or what did you learn?
- What should someone else take away from this?
Think well-documented GitHub README but with more narrative.
- Write like you’re explaining your project to a smart peer from another field
- Use plain language and short paragraphs
- Avoid acronyms if you can, but if you use them, explain them
- Use an active voice where possible
- It's okay to write in your natural voice
- Zotero is great if you're citing multiple sources
- If you're only referencing a few tools, datasets, or papers, the copy-paste citations on Google Scholar are fine
- You can cite:
- Software
- Code libraries
- Datasets
- Documentation
- Blog posts (yes, really)
Publishing your data helps others build on what you’ve done and gives your work longevity.
Good data sharing options:
- Zenodo – integrates with GitHub, assigns DOIs
- Figshare – good for datasets and figures
- Dryad – often used in environmental sciences
- Institutional repositories — check with your library
What to include:
- A README that explains what the dataset is, how it was collected, and how to use it
- A license (e.g. CC0, ODC-BY) so others know how they can reuse it
- A citation suggestion so you get credit
You’re not on your own, the Academic Committee and Stacks editors are here to support you.
We can:
- Help shape your idea
- Review drafts
- Suggest structure or formatting tips
- Answer questions about the process