Crowdfunding: Trial by Error [David Tuller] Reporting on ME, CFS, ME/CFS, "medically unexplained symptoms," and related stuff, Spring 2021

5vforest said:
Can I ask a really basic / potentially silly question -- why does this work require crowdfunding? UC Berkeley is happy to support this project, but can't do so financially?
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Not a silly question! I see you're from SF. Basically, the UC system is always strapped for funds and the legislature is always cutting back. Many more academics employed in the system, including at Berkeley's School of Public Health, are supported by grants and big gifts--"soft" funding--than are on "hard" funding--essentially, from the state and UC's own cash. Tenured and tenure-track faculty don't need to bring in money to cover their salaries. Other academics do. Most bring in big gifts and grants. I'm the only one that I know who does it through crowdfunding, because there are no big gifts or grants to cover what I'm doing.

So yes--I have support from my department and my faculty colleagues, so that's critical. I could not have done this if I had come to Berkeley with a proposal to create a position based on crowdfunding. I've had a position at Berkeley for a dozen years. It just became unfunded when grant money ended. So all I really did was switch the source of my funding--from bigger annual gifts to crowdfunding. I started this project on my own, and it was unrelated to my Berkeley work. When funding for my previous work ran out, I began the crowdfunding based on my dean's suggestion--he knew about my "Trial By Error" side project--as a way to maintain my position.

Now I just have different responsibilities than I did before. This project is my only responsibility--before I was teaching, advising students, etc, which I miss a lot. But Berkeley across the board has cut back on teaching by non-tenured faculty wherever possible as a cost-saving measure. I was lucky I had another project going on already that I could turn into my official university work, since I'd only been able to spend time on the project in the first place because I had an academic position that allowed me enough free time to pursue it.
 
Donated, and very happy to. There's lots of work left to do.

Thanks for the explanation around university funding Dave. Is there any prospect of you getting tenure? It's a shame you aren't teaching - you have a lot of interesting material to use to get across some important ideas to students.
 
Via e-mail:

Trial by Error Fall 2020 Project Update: UPDATE: Trial By Error Crowdfunding April 2021

Hi, everyone--So far, Berkeley's April crowdfunding campaign to support Trial By Error is just shy of 30% of the goal, with more than 230 donations.

The funds will cover my academic position at the Center for Global Public Health from July through December of this year.
https://crowdfund.berkeley.edu/project/25504

TO DONATE, PLEASE USE THE ABOVE LINK!

(DO NOT CLICK ON THE "READ UPDATE" BUTTON BELOW! That default button is automatically included in this message and will take you to last fall's completed campaign--not to the page for donating now.)

And a project update: The Journal of Health Psychology has just published a paper I co-authored with my friend and colleague Brian Hughes, a psychology professor at National University of Ireland Galway. In the paper, we analyze a recent study supporting cognitive behavior therapy, whose five authors include Professor Sir Simon Wessely and Professor Trudie Chalder, and we explain why it is crap and requires corrections.

Thanks much for your support!--David
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@dave30th , not sure how understandable the wording of my question posted here was, and anyway, it maybe just is too complicated to do, but:

It would be great if the text on the crowdfunding site could include the links to the (recent) articles and papers mentioned.

Thanks for your work -- and looking forward to:

Another co-written paper is current under view, and a couple more are in the works. While I have devoted most of my time to reporting, it is important that scientifically illiterate studies are also debunked in the medical literature and not just in journalism or blogging venues
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MSEsperanza said:
It would be great if the text on the crowdfunding site could include the links to the (recent) articles and papers mentioned.

Thanks for your work -- and looking forward to:
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Yes agreed. For a moment I thought someone had made a massive donation, which if someone did not realise, they could mistakenly think there is no need to donate further as the target has already been hit.
 
Barry said:
Yes agreed. For a moment I thought someone had made a massive donation, which if someone did not realise, they could mistakenly think there is no need to donate further as the target has already been hit.
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The template isn't great. For example, it doesn't allow me to take all previous donors and send a current update. The update headline is always for the past crowdfunder. And so on. Maybe I should add newer links to the actual appeal itself. Good idea.
 
dave30th said:
The template isn't great. For example, it doesn't allow me to take all previous donors and send a current update. The update headline is always for the past crowdfunder. And so on. Maybe I should add newer links to the actual appeal itself. Good idea.
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i always get reminders and other emails from berkley which i do not mind considering some very interesting work that goes on there . so i was an early donator this time around . grateful for the work that you do .
 
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