Stéphane Goldstein, Radicalism and data, Research Information Network blog, undated but recent.
Greetings from Edinburgh, where I'm attenting the 4th International Digital Curation Conference [December 1-3, 2008]. ... I was struck in particular by a number of presentations around the broad theme of radical data sharing as a means of transforming science.
This is ambitious stuff, and examples were set out to describe environments and/or tools geared to encouraging and promoting the imaginative sharing and curating of research data, in plant biology (iPlant Collaborative), neurophysiology (CARMEN project) and open notebook science. Cameron Neylon, in his persuasive case for open notebook science, stressed how he felt such services could ultimately promote innovation by curating the relationships between digital objects (and not just the objects themselves), and hence drive citation levels. The challenge, of course, is to persuade researchers that there is much to gain from taking advantage of these developing opportunities. Appealing to their self-interest is one way of doing it, but - as highlighted later in the day by John Willbanks, from Science Commons, there are well-entrenched control mechanisms (legal, cultural, financial) that work against change. I might add that the competitive nature of the research funding process, which contributes to the fostering of protective and posessive attitudes to data outputs, doesn't necessarily help. Would it be controversial to suggest an investigation of the relationship between research competition and reluctance to share? ...
My feeling is that the key to more effective data sharing and curation is to demonstrate, as far as possible, that it yields benefits (and not least economic benefits) to researchers, their funders and their employers. To build on Cameron's contention, it would be nice to show the extent to which openness does indeed encourage innovation. Another area to investigate perhaps? ...
Posted by
Gavin Baker at 12/05/2008 01:28:00 PM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
