[Air-L] Cyberscience 1.2

[Nentwich, Michael]

Dear colleagues,
my working paper dealing with the question "Cyberscience 2.0 or 1.2? 
The Web 2.0 and Science" has just appeared:
http://epub.oeaw.ac.at/ita/ita-manuscript/ita_09_02.pdf
It is written in German though. I am working on an English version, 
the preliminary abstract reads:

Author: Michael Nentwich
Title: Cyberscience 2.0 or 1.2? Web 2.0 and Science
Keywords: Cyberscience, Web 2.0, social media, Twitter, Blogs, 
Wikipedia, Second Life, social bookmarking, social tagging
Abstract: This contribution focuses on the possible impact of Web 2.0 
on science and research. In the introduction, I describe the notions 
"Cyberscience" and "Web 2.0" and their relation to each other. In the 
main part, I analyse typical Web 2.0 services from the perspective of 
use in academia: social network services, virtual worlds, Wikipedia, 
(micro-)blogging and social tagging. On this basis I ask the question 
how functional Web 2.0 tools would be for research praxis and which 
potential consequences of their hypothetical universal usage we may 
have to expect. I come to a cautious and reserved conclusion: Given 
the early stage of usage - many services only exist for less than 
three years and are not fully discovered by scientists - an 
assessment of the potentials is barely feasible. However, there are a 
few weighty arguments that speak against rapid diffusion (lack of 
time, of incentives, low benefit expectations etc.). While the first 
steps on the path of developing cyberscience further have been taken, 
the potential impact on science seem not to go beyond what has 
already been discussed in advance of the Web 2.0 hype. Using the 
software jargon, Web 2.0 lets us expect an "update to Cyberscience 
1.2", rather than a "new release to Cyberscience 2.0".

If you happen to work on this issue, too, I am looking forward to 
your feedback or any hints to published articles on that matter. Many 
thanks in advance!

Best wishes,
Michael Nentwich


*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*
PD Dr. Michael NENTWICH
Director
Institute of Technology Assessment of the
Austrian Academy of Sciences, 
A-1030 Vienna, Strohgasse 45/5
Tel. +43 1 51581 6583
Fax. +43 1 7109883
mailto:mnent at oeaw.ac.at
Personal homepage: http://eiop.or.at/mn/
Institute: http://www.oeaw.ac.at/ita/

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