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"Making the Web Work for Science" - NCI CBIIT | PDF
making the web 
work for science 
kaitlin thaney 
@kaythaney ; @mozillascience 
NCI / 15 oct 2014 
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doing good is part of our code 
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help researchers use the 
power of the open web to 
change science’s future. 
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(0) 
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power, performance, scale 
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our current systems are 
designed to create 
friction. 
despite original intentions. 
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current state of science 
articles 
data 
patents 
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some have a firehose 
articles 
data 
patents 
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traditions last not because they are 
excellent, but because influential 
people are averse to change and 
because of the sheer burdens of 
transition to a better state ... 
“ 
“ 
Cass Sunstein 
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downside of output-driven 
recognition systems 
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“There’s greater reward, 
and more temptation to 
bend the rules.” 
- David Resnik, bioethicist 
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(1) 
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leveraging the power of 
the web for scholarship 
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“web-enabled research” 
- access to content, data, code, materials. 
- emergence of “web-native” tools. 
- rewards for openness, interop, collaboration, sharing. 
- push for ROI, reuse, recomputability, transparency. 
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what do we mean by 
“open research”? 
community technology practices 
collaborative interoperable open review 
participatory discoverable data 
management 
recognition open tools sharing / reuse 
mentorship designed for 
reuse 
documentation / 
versioning 
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we’re rewarding the 
wrong behavior. 
at the sacrifice of scientific progress. 
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Source: Michener, 2006 Ecoinformatics. 
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Source: Wolkovich et al. GCB 2012. 
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“... up to 70 percent of research from academic labs cannot be 
reproduced, representing an enormous waste of money and effort.” 
- Elizabeth Iorns, Science Exchange 
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wasted ... 
$$$ 
time 
resource 
opportunity 
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“research hygiene” 
instill best 
(digital, 
reproducible) 
practice 
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(2) 
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shifting practice takes a 
multi-faceted approach. 
looking beyond “open” science. 
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infrastructure layers for 
efficient, reproducible research 
research social capital capacity 
open tools 
standards 
best practices 
research objects 
scientific software 
repositories 
incentives 
recognition / P&T 
interdisciplinarity 
collaboration 
community dialogue 
training 
mentorship 
professional dev 
new policies 
recognition 
stakeholders: universities, researchers, 
tool dev, funders, publishers ... 
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freedom to prototype 
and innovate. 
(connecting the dots.) 
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our systems need to 
talk to one another. 
leveraging open technology, existing infrastructure. 
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code as a research object 
what’s needed to reuse ? 
http://bit.ly/mozfiggit 
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code as a research object 
http://xkcd.com/285/ 
http://bit.ly/mozfiggit 
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(community driven) 
metadata for software discovery: JSON-LD 
http://bit.ly/mozfiggit 
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(3) 
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our practices are 
limiting us. 
how to further adoption of 
open, web-enabled science? 
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infrastructure layers 
social 
software 
hardware 
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“web-enabled science” 
- access to content, data, code, materials. 
- emergence of “web-native” tools. 
- rewards for openness, interop, collaboration, sharing. 
- push for ROI, reuse, recomputability, transparency. 
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“web-enabled science” 
what’s missing? - access to content, data, code, materials. 
- emergence of “web-native” tools. 
- rewards for openness, interop, collaboration, sharing. 
- push for ROI, reuse, recomputability, transparency. 
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current activity: 
235+ instructors 
(60+, training) 
4000+ learners 
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rethinking 
“professional development” 
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focus on building capacity, 
not just more nodes. 
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fostering a (sustainable) 
community of practitioners 
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(4) 
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shifting practice 
(and getting it to stick) 
is challenging. 
(takeaways and closing caveats.) 
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can we do the same 
for research on the web? 
63 nations 
10,000 scientists 
50,000 participants 
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what are the necessary components? 
tools and technology 
cultural awareness, best practice 
connections, open dialogue 
skills training 
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Source: Piwowar, et al. PLOS. 
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1. bake reproducible 
practices into the fabric of 
research. 
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2. design to unlock latent 
potential of our systems. 
(the technology is already there.) 
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3. rethink how we reward 
researchers and support 
roles. 
(and don’t be afraid to hit refresh.) 
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4. be mindful of jargon/ 
semantics traps. 
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we’re here to help. 
teach, contribute, learn. 
http://mozillascience.org 
sciencelab@mozillafoundation.org 
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kaitlin@mozillafoundation.org 
@kaythaney ; @mozillascience 
special thanks: 
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"Making the Web Work for Science" - NCI CBIIT