 After applying a few finishing touches that morning, the Commons of Science Conference was ready to kick off its first day at the National Academies. The venue was set - audio equipment tested, the registration table strewn with nametags and stocked with conference binders. After months of preparation in order to ensure that invitations were sent to the necessary parties and to lock in a program that packed two full days, all we needed was the attendees.
One-by-one, leading scientists and policy makers began to make their way into the lobby of the Keck Center just outside the Capitol in Washington, DC. From Paul Uhlir (NAS) and George Strawn (NSF) to Shuichi Iwata (CODATA, Univ. of Tokyo) and Tim Hubbard (Sanger Centre), participants arrived, ready for what would prove to be a productive and eye-opening two day meeting (full list of attendees at the Conference site).
Seeing the attendees pour through the door was certainly a relieving and exhilarating experience ' witnessing these distinguished folks from across disciplines and from a number of governmental organizations gather to discuss open science initiatives.
The two-day, invitation-only event, hosted by the National Academies of Science, officially kicked off on Tuesday 3 October.
The conference was moderated by Tom Wilbanks of Oak Ridge National Labs, and featured an array of speakers providing a diverse cross-section of the various disciplines. Myron Gutmann (ICPSR) spoke regarding efforts from the social sciences, Eric Kansa (Alexandria Archive) for anthropology and archeology, Andrew Lawrence (Univ. of Edinburgh) for astronomy, astrophysics and physics, and Brian Athey (NCIBI) for biological sciences.
As predicted, the diversity of backgrounds played to the success of this gathering, opening the lines of communication between those on both on the policy side and those embroiled in the technical aspect of the matter. The program not only identified obstacles to creating a commons for science, but also highlighted existing efforts and visions that are in play.
Moderated by MacKenzie Smith (MIT Libraries), Chris Greer from NSF's Office of Cyberinfrastructure kicked off the next session, discussing the organization's approach to infrastructure for cross-discipline sharing. Paul David (Oxford, Stanford) picked up where Greer left off in discussing the economic and legal aspect, introducing the concept of an 'anti-commons' to the participants. To close this session, Peter Schroeder from the Ministry of Education and Science for the Netherlands touched on the potential downsides to data sharing, allowing for a well-rounded presentation.
The participants later broke into a series of four working groups in hopes of clarifying the main obstacles to our goal of moving towards a more open science model. What we got from those breakout sessions was remarkable ' not only a number of previously unmentioned problems impeding our aim but a variety of recommendations useful in helping us tailor our 'vision.'
This conference served an important role in not only getting out the Science Commons message regarding open access models and initiatives, but in gathering such a distinctly diverse crowd for a government sponsored event (NAS) in order to help lay out a game plan for the future. That vision will surely change forms in the coming future, but at least for now we successfully provoked some thought ' and in time, hopefully action ' about making scientific data more available.
UPDATE:
Commons of Science Conference audio now up
Presentation audio and accompanying slides from the Commons of Science Conference are now available on the site's program page. Check it out!
Photograph: Image of Keck Centre, by wilbanks, CC BY-SA 2.0
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