Durch Automatismen wird ein nicht genutzter Account bei Researchgate nach 16 Monaten als Autor von 431 Publikationen aufgeführt und kommt damit ins 97% Perzentil der Researchgateuser und während einer Periode von 12 Monaten hat Researchgate dem nicht aktiven user 980 Mails geschickt.

Many scholarly social networking sites targeting an audience of academicians and researchers have appeared on the Internet in recent years. Their vision is to change the way researchers connect, share and collaborate to solve real world problems. Despite the hype, however, their impact on higher education is unclear. Studies exist that address the benefits of these sites, but studies that investigate the implications of how scholarly social networking systems vet information, including data related to user profiles and uploaded content, is nonexistent. This paper chronicles the system management of user information for an inactive user of a scholarly social networking site. The paper shows what can happen to user profile data when a user remains dormant and data correction is reliant upon system users. The quality and accuracy of information provided on a scholarly social networking site are paramount to its success and effectiveness.