Kicking off the #OpenScience convergence workshop in Washington DC.
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Kicking off the #OpenScience convergence workshop in Washington DC. Looking forward to the panel, lightning talks and particularly the discussions of this afternoon!
How can we accelerate and build upon the existing efforts so that we can move #OpenScience further?
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We have our first panel kicking off on 'Perspectives on Open Science Coordination Efforts' with Chelle Gentemann (NASA TOPS)
Tiffany Straza (UNESCO)
Nokuthula Mchunu (National Research Foundation, South Africa) and Kamran Naim (CERN).What are the challenges in the adoption of #OpenScience?
1. Language
2. Replicating exciting challenges (#OpenAccess fees)
3. Resources
4. Lack of trust in the research system.
5. risks of Open Science are not the same for everyone -
6. No rewards for coordination efforts with focus on publications
7. Underfunding of #OpenScience infrastructure
8. Fragmentation of funding landscape
9. Lack of collective actionAfter this semi-depressing list, what are the opportunities? What can organisations represented here do?
1.Engage earlier in the process. It is not about sharing the outputs but opening up the process. Whom and when are you engaging?
2. Look outside your circle and reach out beyond. -
3. Incentives for career promotion need to change. Publications are no indication of actual impact. We need meaningful metrics that drive this change
4. Publishing less.
5. Community governed infrastructure.
6. Dialogue and co-design
7. APC caps
8. Focusing on regional/local challenges that may eventually offer global solutions -
How can we meet people where they are?
1. We need to go outside of the #OpenScience church to other churchers to get the message across.
2. Make it easy to do (see the @turingway hehe)
3. Do things on the technical side to lower barriers
4. Educate people
5. Pay attention to who is missing and understand their needs and risks
6. Open Science is a spectrum, not an on off button.
7.Connect with shared values and principles.
8. Have the next meeting in Africa. -
We haven't figured out how to measure real impact. What do we mean when we want to measure the impact of #OpenScience? How do we define success?
There is a document out for feedback on this now: https://www.unesco.org/en/articles/call-inputs-global-consultation-draft-principles-open-science-monitoring
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Q&A.
Yo Yehudi is raising the challenges with Visas to attend meetings.
Vincenzo Tozzi is raising the possibility of holding the meeting in a community space instead of in a conference venue.
Tshiamo Motshegwa: We need more candid discussions like this. UNESCO's recommendation focuses more on CARE principles than other initiatives. But there is little Indigenous representation in conferences. The importance of science in decision making requires more than #OpenAccess
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Samuel Volchenboum is raising the issue of how we will achieve cultural change. A Dean once said to him that you do not get tenure for being a good manager.
Nokuthala Mchunu is raising the point that the onus of change is on academics. Coara serves a purpose but people in the organisations need to change.
Chelle is mentioning that higher levels are interested in change - but we need a mechanism to invest time and resources on implementing changes.
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Moving on to Lightning talks!
Laura Trouille is introducing Zooniverse: the worlds largest platform across disiciplines to work on research projects: https://www.zooniverse.org/
Citizen Science sits at an intersection between science and the public, helping to create dialogue between scientists and the public. There is understandable mistrust from the public in scientific topics, particularly machine learning. What licences do people use for ethical reuse?
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Simine Vazire talking about #OpenScience in Psychology or SIPS. There is a tension between standing for something and incorporate criticism. One of these were criticisms around conference locations. There are advantages in terms of visas versus LGBTQ inclusivity. How does this fit into the vision?
There is a tradeoff between bringing people along incrementally before making policy changes, and moving to slow. Optional openness in a journal led to a hidden curriculum....
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.. For example, if people open up their process which allows for criticism, is this fair compared to people that close of their science and get the benefit of the doubt? Therefore they moved to obligatory policies to level the playing field in transparency.
Now psychology can also be a case study to other fields, such as quantum nanoscience (nice talk/event that I should find the link for..)
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Noor Johnson and Roberta Turraq Glenn are now introducing ELOKA (Exchange for local observations and knowledge of the Arctic, https://eloka.nsidc.org/eloka).
ELOKA prioritises Indigenous governance in research and are thinking about how to organise events and workshop in a more equitable manner. Do other people have best practices they can share?
Roberto works in the Alaska Arctic Observatory and Knowledge Hub (AAOKH), working on user agreements to get access to data.
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One way to hold journals more accountable is to ensure that policies are in place that contribute to the quality of research and link this to the prestige system - instead of expecting the system to change overnight.
We also need to shift from building new tools that bloat the system - also mentioned by Juan Pablo Flores during the panel Q&A: what about resources for maintenance? You can also get corporate funding onboard to increase sustainability.
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Karthik Ram (Navigation Fund):
#OpenScience can bridge the differences between different organisations and industries. We need better infrastructure to enable this. On the one end there are profit driven tools and on the other end well intentioned mission driven tools, that are not financially sustainable.
The navigation fund aims to support new and existing tools/infrastructures that aim to give researchers more agency.
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Tony Ross-Hellauer highlights how #OpenScience is a bundle of different practices with different challenges.
PathOS (https://pathos-project.eu/) is trying to identify and quantify impact of Open Science to support informed policy making.
Current level of robust evidence is actually low, and lots of streetlight effects, and publication bias.
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Kathleen Fitzpatrick is highlighting the Knowledge Commons, a platform that is free to use by users. How do we keep platforms like this sustainable?
Sustaining members get a voice in the governance processes. Transforming the platform to a truly open source community would allow further sustainability but is difficult for the small team leading the effort.
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Malcolm Macleod talks about the UK reproducibility network, discussing all of the relevant parties involved in such a network. The network is primarily UK focused to be able to receive funding.
The local network leads are the 'terrorist wing,' trying to change the world. The network tries to leverage their energy and bring them together to share best practices.
There are now reproducibility networks, supported by the original network where possible.
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At some point you start to only look for further funding to remain sustainable.
IF there is no funding, some other initiative should start anew and refresh. This is difficult for organisations to do, but organisations need to accept that this change may be needed.
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Now Ting Xu is presenting the Chinese #OpenScience Network (COSN, https://open-sci.cn/). They organise trainings, seminars and hackhatons.
"We do what we can do" ensures that the network can remain sustainable.
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Hong Phuc Dang from FOSS Asia presents on a project: 'Pocket Science Lab'.
Open source can offer tools to scientific research and citizens.
This started from a network of people that cared about education.
This has led to an affordable price for the technology and adoption across multiple fields.
The documentation could use more love. And funding.