back to Social Technology for Biodiversity workshop page [0]
Below are the notes from our brainstorming and discussion.
Christina Pikas posted notes on her blog [1].
Barriers
Starting up
Infrastructure and process
visualizing data
long distance inhibits casual contact and socialization
if you decide to incorporate social technologies, how do you staff and scale this if it gets widely used?
implementation of software and maintenance of website
running a large site -- scaling and incorporating new tech -- on a shoestring budget with small staff
sustainable funding -- exciting donors
maintaining visibility within a sea of "similar" entitities
learning curve
older professors unfamiliar with new tools
generational gaps
users don't want to learn new methods
not sure where on a site to go to contribute
entering data
audience
differences in needs of various user groups, and differences in needs of various stakeholders (micro-level vs. macro level research scientists vs. decision-makers)
Is it important to explain the reason for a link? Would People? Connect 2 things? Why?
Developers don't prioritize user perspective
users don't communicate issues
sustaining
culture
scientists don't want to open site up to "unwashed masses" a la wikipedia (but realize it could be powerful)
unwillingness to share/distribute data
unwillingness to go out on a limb publicly
conservation practitioners want to be outside
fear of new methods and letting go of the old
institutional culture -- i.e., no support for cross-boundary collaboration
enlisting scientists to get involved in EOL
lack of emergence of community leader(s)
slow takeup on descriptive tagging
community buy-in . . . lack of usage
rewards
competing expectations at home institutions
mismatch with academic rewards e.g. publications
no rewards for sharing information expertise -- no publishing ethic
lack of time & credit
IP
IP barriers to accepting contributions
Feedback but avoiding controversy
concerns about evolution controversy (or rather, "creationist infiltrators") if you open up a biodiversity site for public participation (EOL, ADW, etc)
providing mechanism for general public to provide feedback
feedback loops (people point out errors, and those need to be routed to data providers, who may or may not fix them)
Then what? Staying relevant
evolution of thought -- are reference citations sufficient or is the focus on them counter-productive
Success stories
Face-to-face
audience-specific trade shows, demos, other channels
building community through workshops and meetings
motivation/connection
homogeneous communitites
We got people using a blog to keep remote members up to date
collaborative workspaces allowed disparate teams to work together across organizations
Activation
exciting people about EOL
regular communication with target audience
editors as trainers . . . real world "one of us" advocates
Getting started
proof of concept website
low "barrier to entry" -- copy/paste, borrowing tools
sustaining feedback
reading weblogs to find problems
emailing users with suggestions
after posting on a subject outside direct expertise, got extensive blog comment clarifying correcting and teaching -- formed collaboration
Questions for the future
Content
what roles can linking to/from or incorporating the literature take in SCTs for scientists
How successful are computer-generated taxonomies?
Are there any success stories in the "co-creating knowledge" part of collaboratories
How much structure is necessary for the contributions to be useful? e.g. Twitter vs. structured blogging via templates
Interaction with online real world learning process
Training
What is the best way to structure training and workshops (especially for sustained engagement)
How can we (as institutions) get participants to learn about social networking
Why will users spend more time learning Nintendo than learning a work tool?
Incentives
Why won't users report problems?
How do you create incentives for collaboration where individuals are not rewarded at their home institution for sharing info or expertise
What are the incentives to participate?
Why would anyone prefer an email listserv to a bulletin board?
Healthy metrics
metrics for the success of the collaboration
How large is my target community? What is the best way to find out
Do students maintain energy/committment over time?
When should a community die/disperse? Do participants recognize it?
How to
How do we mitigate the disciplinary exclusivity
How do you prevent unhealthy rivalries (between citizens and scientists, for example?)
What factors determine the success of a social networking site?
How do you indicate that content is still "in progress"?
What are mechanisms that can be used for triage, to conserve experts' time?
Is it possible to try audio blogging for field data collection?