Thank you.

First of all I’d like to say a big thank you (like the one above, but larger) to every single person who took part in #RealTimeChem week this past week. I never believed when I started running this hashtag on Twitter back in October last year that so many chemists (about 700+ of you!) would get on board with this project and share your chemistry (apparently there have been about 5000-ish tweets this week). I feel rather humbled to be a part of this community.

I hope that everyone who participated found it to be a worthwhile endeavour and got some enjoyment from sharing and discussing their chemistry with other like minds in the online community. Personally, I  had a great time reading your tweets, watching videos and reading the many blog posts that were written this week. I’m pretty sure I still have some catching up to do! The week reminded me yet again just how wonderful the world of chemistry is and the people that populate it. I know that some are going through the stats and crunching the numbers at the moment (I’m not all that knowledgeable on such things) so hopefully I’ll be able to share some data on the event on this blog in the future.

I’d like to send some special thanks to the following people who helped make this week such a success:

The first has to go out to @JessTheChemist – Frankly, this week couldn’t have happened without Jess. She has supported #RealTimeChem from day 1, giving up a lot of time to promote the event, run the #RealTimeChem blog carnival, break storify for the week, starting some great trends like #Freehandrings during the week and lots more. I’ve actually never met her face to face, but I’m pretty sure I owe her a drink or two. Thanks also to @V_Saggiomo for the trailer for #RealTimeChem week, which was spectacular. Cheers to @_byronmiller for his enthusiasm and suggestions, and his excellent #chemclub classics paper series this week.

Further thank yous go out to @rkiddr & @chemconnector (plus the rest of the teams @RSC_comms and @chemistryworld etc) – Richard and Tony have given me great support with #RealTimeChem since I joined the RSC, some excellent advice and suggests for the week and the future of #RealTimeChem. I look forward to collaboration with them to  keep growing #RealTimeChem so that it can continue to be a platform where chemists across the globe can come and share their experiences and feel part of one big chemistry family (in addition thank you to @aclarkxyz for getting #realtimechem added up on the ODDT app, I never believed I’d be part of an app someday!)

To @stuartcantril and @naturechemisty who have been huge supporters of #RealTimeChem since it’s inception and continue to blow the proverbial trumpet for the project. Kudos to @carmendrahl for her fabulous article on #RealTimeChem and @cenmag for their backing. 

There’s probably people and organisations that I’m forgetting, so sorry for that and plese refer to that big thank you at the top of the page!

Okay, onto something a little important. While I run the @RealTimeChem account on Twitter, this blog and I generally have organised things, one of the great features of #RealTimeChem is that it is at heart a community based project. If it were not for you the chemists taking part….

This is as much yours as it is mine. So if you want to help me out and want to see #RealTimeChem continue then I’d love to get your feedback on the week that just happened and the project in general.

What can #RealTimeChem as a community project do for you? What aspects do you like/dislike? Do you have any suggestions to make it better in the future?

Let me know in the comments section of this post.

For the immediate future, there’s still the “Tweets of the week” to sort out (with the ChemSpider lab coat prizes to be decided!), which will be announced next Saturday (4th May), then after that I plan to take a few weeks off from #RealTimeChem on this blog (although not on Twitter) in order to focus on other matters and also digest the feedback and think about future direction for the project. Suffice to say that I think the adventure is only just beginning and the best is yet to come.

So in the words of J.K. Rowling….

Mischief managed.

-Doctor Galactic & The Lab Coat Cowboy-