Discussions

European Citizen Science via the web: potentials, expectations and way ahead

  • Sven Schade profile
    Sven Schade
    5 November 2015 - updated 4 years ago
  • 3 comments
    Total votes: 1

We envision a web-enabled European Citizen Science facility that opens research supported by the European Union for collaborations with the public. It should re-use existing platforms, methods, tools and services. Our initial investigations concentrate on environmental sciences and sustainability research in order to support the living within the limits of our planet (see also this contribution to the Journal of Brief Ideas).

This activity shall advance science by (i) providing easy access to data, services, models, publications, etc.; (ii) listening to emerging debates and areas of interest; and (iii) enabling deep engagement in scientific processes for anybody interested. Web technologies will be a key element in order to reach a wide audience, enable re-use of available resources in innovative applications, and foster collaboration beyond the physical space.

We hope to address questions such as:

  • Which web-tools would allow you to get as involved in science as desired?
  • What should be done within Europe in order to support European and non-European citizen?
  • What would you expect as the European Commission’s contribution to a Citizen Science Platform?

An Open Research Accelerator at MozFest2015 in London should help to identify and shape expectations, collect potential components and promising approaches, and avoid developments into undesired directions. This first activity of awareness raising and co-design should initiate a collaborative process beyond the event itself.

As part of this outreach, we would like this discussion thread to continue the debate from London and open it up to a wider audience.

You are kindly invited to share your thoughts about the topic, provide answers to the questions above, or propose new ones.

Tags: 
citizen scienceOpen Knowledgeopen sciencedigital scienceOpen DataSocial Engagement

Comments

Log in to post comments
Fermin Serrano Sanz's picture
Fermin Serrano Sanz,
10/11/2015 20:06

Dear Sven,

great topic, it's great to see that you encourages us to create this citizen science facility at European scale. I think it is pertinent what we did in Spain some years ago when we created Ibercivis Foundation, the Spanish citizen science facility at national scale (including science funders such as the ministry of economy/science and regional governments as well as the main research institutions such as CSIC or CIEMAT).

In our case, we came from the e-science field, infrastructures. So we understand public engagement like a cross-cutting concern, like a transversal facilitator of science. Just like technologies. Just like cloud computing or HPC, citizen science can be applied to any scientific field. Of course, having in mind the limitations and challenges but leveraging the power of connecting silicon resources and human capabilities.

Following what was already out there in the field of e-science, mainly taken from initiatives like e-IRG at EU scale or Ibergrid at Spanish-Portuguese scale, we wanted to include volunteers-based resources in the main pyramid of resources. At that time, it was promoted the idea of having one single window which collected all the request for public resources so that evaluators schedule each experiment to the most suitable resource. Our vision was to promote evaluators to consider citizen-science resources as another option to be taken into account.

At this moment, I think we are still far from integrating CS and other e-science paradigms in Europe. Anyway, it was great to see Socientize highlighted in the brochure for D4Science, thanks again!. Also, I see that EGI Engage is taking very nice steps towards open science commons. So I think this idea of having a shared pool of resources, sharing data/projects/volunteers/resources/tools.... among players and to have clear evaluation procedures would help to increase the efficiency of CS actions in Europe. I encourage readers to consider this vision, our experience in Spain with Ibercivis, as well as other recommendations for these kind of initiatives following what was published in the White Paper on Citizen Science.

One anecdote: last week we met the team who worked with the White House in the States to create something similar in that country. I loved when they encouraged us, the Europeans, to take into account what we have done locally/nationally and to upscale it at EU level.

Saludos

Fermin

Total votes: 1
Tiziana Ferrari's picture
Tiziana Ferrari,
12/11/2015 01:58

One question to both given the experience at operating at national level. Who represents citizen science when it comes to gathering requirements, involving people in co-design, and delivering services?
How this user group is internally organized?

Total votes: 1
John Magan's picture
John Magan,
06/11/2015 15:15

Very good initiative, Sven!
One comment: I think the second question should be understood as
"What should be done within Europe in order to support European and non-European citizen science?"
or even
"What should be done by Europe in order to support citizen science?"
given as it really knows no boundaries and has the potential to benefit everyone, wherever they are! :-)
John

Total votes: 1