from community website to
(social) knowledge base?
The Influence and Impact of Web 2.0 on e-Research Infrastructure,
Applications and Users (25/03/2009)
Dr Torsten Reimer
Centre for e-Research, King’s College London
Centre for e-Research
– Contributing to the College wide e-research and
teaching agenda; developing a VRE for King's
– Research centre: e-infrastructures, e-research methods
– Postgraduate teaching and training in digital asset
management
– Host for national and international projects and services
– Provider of consultancy, training, and services for data
creation, curation and preservation
Centre for e-Research
• Based at King’s College London
• The Centre Previously Know As AHDS
(Executive) and ICT Methods Network
• Main areas of operation:
arts-humanities.net
Centre for e-Research
• A community portal for
the arts and humanities
• Mission: advance and
support digital research
methods and the use
and creation of digital
resources
• Web 2.0 technologies / approaches
such as user contributed content, wiki,
blogs, content aggregation and user
profiles
the
past
Origin: Methods Network
– To promote, support and develop the use of
advanced ICT methods in the arts and
humanities
– To support, and provide a forum for, the crossdisciplinary network of practitioners from the UK
– To develop a programme of activities and
publications on advanced ICT tools and methods
– To ensure the broadest participation by means of
an open call for proposals
• Funded some 50 seminars, workshops
and conferences
• Published case studies, working
papers, reports and a book series
Centre for e-Research
• AHRC ICT Methods Network
• AHRC funded programme, 2005-2008
• Remit, aims, programme:
Interdisciplinary Network
Literature
History
Music
Media
Information
Religion
Philosophy
Language
Performance
Visual Arts
Law
Centre for e-Research
Archaeology
MN Community Site
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
Centre for e-Research
• Support events and
activities (before,
during and after)
• Keep outputs alive
(through contribution)
• Virtual support for
communities
• Facilitate networking
=> Capture (outputs),
expand and sustain
the Network
the
present
A New World
Centre for e-Research
• Simultaneous end of funding for both
Methods Network and AHDS
• Community and sustainability gone
• JISC to the rescue
Merger with ICT Guides
–
–
–
–
Projects
Tools
Training
Methods
• Taxonomy of
Methods
Centre for e-Research
• Knowledge
base:
Statistics
988 registered users
17 user groups
2200+ postings
200-300 unique visitors per day
Most popular content:
– job adverts
– events calendar
– digital tools (software) descriptions
Centre for e-Research
•
•
•
•
•
Cataloguing Projects and Tools
Centre for e-Research
Users and Projects Records
Centre for e-Research
Case Studies etc.
Centre for e-Research
Bibliography etc.
Centre for e-Research
Wiki
Centre for e-Research
Events Calendar
Centre for e-Research
Discussion and Blogs
Centre for e-Research
Methods Taxonomy
Centre for e-Research
vs. Folksonomy
Centre for e-Research
RSS
Centre for e-Research
Networking
Centre for e-Research
User Contributed Content
• Members willing to contribute/share
• Quality control no issue - quantity is
• Almost no spam or ‘misbehaviour’
• Controversial content encourages
debate
• Activity needs to be encouraged
Centre for e-Research
– where they see benefit (recognition)
– when it is easy (UI)
– when ‘encouraged’
Sense of Community
Centre for e-Research
• Very wide and diverse field, makes
common goal on a-h.net hard to define
• Closer sense of community among
members of centres and with specific
communities of practice
• Concern about own reputation
and (visual) identity
• Individual members not visible enough
• Community does not ‘happen by itself’
the
future
Community-built Knowledge Base
Centre for e-Research
• Work with and (help to develop) those centres
and communities that are actively concerned
with the wider field of digital arts and
humanities
• Develop specific projects and collaborations
and build community around it
• Improve UI (task oriented and focus on
members) and structure (research lifecycle)
• Content distribution channel (aggregation)
Community 1: DARIAH
Centre for e-Research
Community 2: NoC
Network of Expert Centres
•
A collaboration of centres with expertise
in digital arts and humanities, in the
sense of data creation, curation,
preservation, management, access and
dissemination, and methodologies of
data use and re-use.
•
Supporting its members in:
•
–
the advocacy and promotion of the value,
understanding and use of ICT in arts and
humanities research
–
the development and exchange of
expertise, knowledge, standards and
best practices
–
awareness raising, dialogue with relevant
stakeholders, identifying and
representing the needs of the research
community.
Participants: ADS; CCH and CeRch;
CDDA; HDS; HATII; HRI; OTA; VADS
http://www.arts-humanities.net/noc
Centre for e-Research
•
Project 1: Shared Taxonomy
Centre for e-Research
• Methods Taxonomy
• Document research
projects/outcomes
• DHO and other
national and
international partners
• Build and develop a shared resource
• Exchange of content and mapping
between partners
Project 2: Aggregate & Disseminate
=> Reduce need for (duplicated) user
activity
Centre for e-Research
• Events calendar (automatic tagging and
categorisation; avoid duplicates) and
event distribution channels
• Tie in more closely with social
networking services
• Collaborate more with those
providing relevant resources
Summary: Lessons on ‘Users’
Clear benefit of contributing
Clearly structured
UI clearly focused on tasks
Contributors clearly recognisable
Bring together a clear core group
of active contributors
Centre for e-Research
•
•
•
•
•
the
end