One of the fun things about EurekAlert is that it allows you to trace the full life cycle of the publicization of science in a way that used to be impossible for a regular person. For example, take the recent “Ring of Dark Matter” story.
First, there’s a rumor of a result. This first stage lasts about a week, and if all goes well, it manages to generate a little buzz, and maybe even some divination.
The rumor, warmed by the buzz, will then hatch, giving rise to a press release. Dependning on the species, you may get two, and for highly collaborative research, you can generate even more.
In collaborative subjects, the different types of press release are easy to tell apart because of their distinctive markings. A government release will generally include a picture, and its distinctive call (or “headline“) will include only the name of the large publicly-funded instrument used to make the measurement. The academic press release is generally smaller and more drab in coloration, but has a louder call, trumpeting the name of the institution behind the release for all to hear.
If all goes well, the press release stage of the cycle lasts 3-4 days, during which time the release finds a reporter. Upon encountering a reporter, the release will crawl into his or her brain (generally via the optic nerve), and enter the pupal stage. In this state, it will incubate for a few hours, or as long as a couple of days, depending on deadlines. At the end of the incubation period, the transformed release will hatch and crawl back out of the reporter (generally via the fingers, but sometimes via the mouth, in the form of a four-paragraph squib in the New York Times.
These four-paragraph squibs are almost immediately caught and consumed by bloggers and citizens. Their role in the reproduction of the results is not clear, but it’s widely believed in the funding community that the digestion of squibs releases nutrients that foster the growth of rumors through some sort of spontaneous generation process, like maggots forming out of rotting meat.