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Public science and social software

I'm currently smitten with DEMOS - "the everyday democracy think tank" - and despite having never met any of the people involved, and not knowing terribly much about them, I fantasise about running away and joining such a circus. (Note to self: see if there is a Canadian equivalent.)

This morning I read a recent report of theirs: The Public Value of Science, Or how to ensure that science really matters by James Wilsdon, Brian Wynne and Jack Stilgoe.

Produced within their nanodialogues project, partly funded by the UK's Sciencewise initiative, the report begins:

"Even in long-established democracies, people do not feel that they have ownership, control or even much influence over the technologies that are exploited by their governments and by commercial enterprises...The scientific community is beginning to realise, but often reluctantly accept, that we scientists need to take greater notice of public concerns, and relate and react to them. Expressions of despair at public ignorance, impotent polemics about the advantages of technology, assertions that our economy is threatened by reactionary attitudes, attempts at manipulation of the press, are all totally inadequate responses. Neither will mere lipservice about the value of public engagement be helpful...The time is right for examining the means and the details of public engagement. One step forward might be for the scientific community to accept that it does not own the science that it pursues. Another step may be for government to place more value on proper public dialogue, and to facilitate it better...In this pamphlet, we argue that despite the progress that has been achieved over the last five years, a fresh injection of energy and momentum is now required. Otherwise, we will end up with little more than the scientific equivalent of corporate social responsibility: a well-meaning, professionalised and busy field, propelled along by its own conferences and repo

Social Machines
By Wade Roush August 2005



(Editor note: While writing this feature for the magazine, senior editor Wade Roush added footnotes to the story. But, he also solicited reader feedback which was then incorporated here. Throughout the text, readers can mouse over the bold text in the article to see what others helped contribute. If you are unable to click on the link in the contribution, simply click on the bolded word in the article, which will take you to the appropriate page.)

My boss, Jason Pontin, caused a minor ruckus in May while attending D3, the Wall Street Journal's third annual "All Things Digital" conference outside San Diego. The editor in chief of Technology Review, like many executives, entrepreneurs, engineers, and students these days, doesn't go anywhere without his wireless gear--meaning, at a minimum, a Wi-Fi-enabled laptop and a cell phone. At D3, Jason was using his laptop to file blog (or Web log) posts "live" from the conference floor, summarizing talks by Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Sun Microsystems CEO Scott McNealy, and other computer-industry celebrities. But on the third day, he couldn't find a signal. The Wi-Fi network he'd been accessing was on by mistake, a conference staffer told him. She explained that the hosts of the conference--Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher, two of the Journal's technology writers--had decided that no one should have Internet access from the main ballroom.

Jason, naturally, wrote a new blog post

Blog post: See pontin.trblogs.com/archives/ 2005/05/d3_suppressing.html.

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about the incident (from the hallway this time). Forbidding live blogging at a technology conference, he remarked, "seems a very retrograde move." Mossberg responded hours later. "It is untrue that Kara and I banned live blogging at D3, from the ballroom or anywhere else," he explained. "We merely declined to provide Wi-Fi, to avoid the common phenomenon that has ruined too many tech conferences--near univ