Thanks for pointing out to the new CPE guide! I still have some questions though, regarding chapter "Contributions to the profession", section "Create New Industry Knowledge", on page 15.
There is a differentiation between the activities of writing an article, worth up to 20 CPEs as author, and writing a white paper, worth up to 10 CPEs as author. All the other categories are pretty clear to me, however I have a hard time to distinguish these two.
Is article "simply" an security-related article that is published in a magazine of any kind? Or is it an article/paper in a peer-reviewed research journal? And how does a white paper correlate to those two? What are the differences? White paper implies kind of self-publication, similar to a blog post?
My gut feeling would say that article strictly implies an article in a peer-reviewed journal and alike (e.g. ACM, IEEE, etc.), considering the efforts with literature research and so on. Comparing that to a "simple" magazine article (InfoSec magazine? 
), the awarded CPEs seem to be a bit odd. However, I miss experience when it comes to writing magazine articles, maybe they involve more effort than I can imagine?
Thanks for the support!
@Andreas_Haamann wrote:Thanks for pointing out to the new CPE guide! I still have some questions though, regarding chapter "Contributions to the profession", section "Create New Industry Knowledge", on page 15.
There is a differentiation between the activities of writing an article, worth up to 20 CPEs as author, and writing a white paper, worth up to 10 CPEs as author. All the other categories are pretty clear to me, however I have a hard time to distinguish these two.
Is article "simply" an security-related article that is published in a magazine of any kind? Or is it an article/paper in a peer-reviewed research journal? And how does a white paper correlate to those two? What are the differences? White paper implies kind of self-publication, similar to a blog post?
My gut feeling would say that article strictly implies an article in a peer-reviewed journal and alike (e.g. ACM, IEEE, etc.), considering the efforts with literature research and so on. Comparing that to a "simple" magazine article (InfoSec magazine?
Thanks for the support!
Andreas,
You ask an excellent question, and one that likely should be addressed by staff clarification and in the next CPE Handbook update. I recommend you re-post this note as the first message in a new thread here in Member Support, with a title that all attract staff and members to read it. As a new thread, with informative Subject, you are more likely to get attention to your question. Consider "How are Article and White Paper Different? (p. 15)"
Because of your note here, I realized the importance of each question needing direct attention, so I edited my starter message above to suggest new threads.
Next, here is my personal opinion on a possible useful distinction between an article and a white paper. An article has to have been actually published (not simply submitted) by an external web site or print publication, not affiliated with the author or the author's employer, subject to editor and preferably peer review prior to publication. A white paper is an informative paper released in electronic or print form directly by the author or the author's employer, without review and approval by an external editor. Your suggestion that a blog post might be a white paper is a grey area, given the length of most blog posts (including my own). I would expect a white paper to have more length and depth than most blog posts.
[If you repost your question in a fresh thread, I will reply with a version of the above paragraph there, too.]
Good work, Andreas; I appreciate your understanding and application fo the ideas in this thread!.
Best regards,
Craig
