I thought you might be interested in this note from richard.price@academia.edu found on sci.engr.mech today:
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Dear all,
I recently finished my Ph.D at Oxford on the philosophy of perception.
With a team of people from Stanford and Cambridge, I've just launched
a website, Academia.edu, which does two things:
- It shows academics around the world structured in a 'tree' format,
displayed according to their departmental and institutional
affiliations.
- It enables academics to see news on the latest research in their
area - the latest people, papers and talks.
We are hoping that Academia.edu will eventually list every academic in
the world -- Faculty Members, Post-Docs, Graduate Students, and
Independent Researchers. Academics can add their departments, and
themselves, to the tree by clicking on the boxes.
Academics are joining the tree rapidly. More than 24,000 academics
have added themselves in the last four months. Some professors on the
site include:
We're trying to spread the word about Academia.edu as much as
possible. It would be terrific if you could visit the site, and add
yourself to your department on the tree at http://www.academia.edu/signup?sciengrmech.
If your university is not there, you can add it.
Independent researchers - if you are a researcher that is not
associated with a university, I encourage you to add yourself to the
"Independent Researchers" portion of the tree at http://independent.academia.edu.
And do spread the word to your friends and colleagues if you can.