They say good news never comes alone, and so it is. We’ve just announced the countdown towards the release of Papers2 for Mac, a moment we’ve been working towards for the past two years. But in those two years time hasn’t stood still and our Papers user base has grown tremendously. To the point where it started taking its toll. Having to answer over 30.000 emails a year, keeping track of 20.000 forum posts, releasing 15+ updates, AND having to build the next major version of Papers is not an easy feat.

We figured we needed help. We needed a Papers Genius. What is a Papers Genius you might ask? Well something like this:

“We’re looking for a talented and enthusiastic new team member who wants to help us improve every imaginable aspect of Papers.
You would help us provide better support, an awesome website, great tutorials, and guide both new and pro Papers users. And you would be key in helping us launch the exciting new features and products we’ve been working on!”

We had no clue what kind of person would respond or whether someone would respond at all. Luckily we were blown away by the reactions, the next day we received an email from Dan Quintana, a PhD student neuroscience at the University of Sydney, Australia. The description we had put up fit him perfectly, Dan’s a big Papers fan and has tons of ideas how to improve the program. Unfortunately he is still in the beginning of his PhD and therefore couldn’t join us full-time. We’re very pleased that he nonetheless has agreed to help us out a number of hours per week as a volunteer. You will soon start to see the first improved Papers for iOS tutorials that Dan has produced.

Almost at the same time as Dan’s email we received one from Christine Buske, a final year PhD student at the University of Toronto, Canada. I don’t think we could have found a more suitable person as our first official Paper Genius! Christine is a self-proclaimed Papers addict and she couldn’t wait to join us in making Papers even better and help us launch Papers2.

Christine’s story is in many ways familiar to that of many of us; although she kind of liked working in the lab she quickly discovered that it was not the thing that kept her up at night. Instead, she has taken on an impressive list of activities outside the lab, including copywriting, producing TV commercials, translating research articles and marketing materials, and creating her own websites.

All those skills will come in perfectly handy in her role as Papers Genius. It will be exciting to see Christine join the team and work with Dan and all of us to improve Papers. Not only do we now have an official Papers Genius on board, Christine will also without doubt add some necessary girl power!