Digital Data Practices and the Long Term

Ecological Research Program

Helena Karasti, Karen Baker & Katharina Schleidt

FinLTSER, US LTER, ALTER-Net

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Let the voyage continue…

From the 20th century of ’data’

into a 21st century with … dataspaces, …knowledge provinces, … digital universes … cyberspace

Outline of talk

• Introductions Author partnership LTER Network

• Data Characteristics• Data Practices• Data Curation• Recent Developments and Changing Scopes

• Global Science and Changing Practices Semantic work

• Concluding Words and Perspectives The long term

Our Partnership

• Karen Baker: What I learned about the work of informatics together with science studies Familiarity with processes of information infrastructure building Experience with design, collaboration, & articulation Knowledge of historical contexts & comparative cases Awareness of multiple perspectives & invisible work Skills with the qualitative including ethnography

• What I started to ask: * What opportunity does design present for

new types of information environments new types of learning environments data stewardship

DMlocal global

present

futuretechnology

science

data

metadata

• Helena Karasti: What I learned about the long-term: LTER concept of doing science

Long-term Data sharing Large-scale collaboration

Long-term perspective permeates everything Balancing tensions between the needsof data, science and technology

Multiple temporalities The notion of infrastructure and

the work of infrastructuring

• What I started to ask: What does long-term mean

for information systems?

Our Partnership

Technology

Science

Data

IM

service

designmanage

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Helena Karasti: What I started to ask: What does long-term mean for Information Systems? How to integrate long-term and infrastructure thinking into

systems design?

Long Term and Information Systems

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Designand Local Information

Environments• Karen Baker: What I started to ask:

* What opportunity does design present for new types of information environments? new types of learning environments?

Environmental Systems

Human Systems

Design StudioInformation InfrastructureLocal Information EnvironmentEcosystems

LTER 5 year planGlobal Information Environment

iTeam Information InfrastructureLocal Information Participants

Designand Local Information

Environments• Karen Baker: What I started to ask:

* What opportunity does design present for new types of information environments? new types of learning environments?

Environmental Systems

Human Systems

Design StudioInformation InfrastructureLocal Information EnvironmentEcosystems

LTER 5 year planGlobal Information Environment

iTeam Information InfrastructureLocal Information Participants

Long Term Ecological Research Networks (I)

US LTER since 1980A social network:• 2100 participants • 26 site biomes• Network Office

A technological network:• 26 information managers• Loose network supporting

local site data repositories• Sites work in collaboration on

Network Information System• Instrumenting the ecosystem

national international

Long Term Ecological Research Networks (II)

International LTER • Since 1993• Several regional networks• 38 national networks (2007)

LTER-Europe• Established in 2007 through merger

of regional European networks

ALTER-Net • NoE (6FP) to build LTER-Europe (2004-2009)

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Salient Characteristicsof LTER Data (I)

Long-Term Ecological Research Network

• Long Term: invisible present

• Ecological: invisible place

• Research: ecosystem(s)

• Network: relationships

retrospective prospective

local global

Entities&events

Flows &processes

competition cooperationhuman natural

• Wide variety of data types

• Ongoing updates to datasets

• Field science manual data taking and increasingly automated data collecting

Salient Characteristics of LTER Data (II)

static dynamic

automated manual

homogeneous heterogeneous

simple complex

experimental observational

LTER Data Practices (I)Uses and Reuses

• Open access to primary research data since mid 1990s

• Long-term datasets can have multiple relationships with other datasets and research questions during their life-cycle

• Multiple data users & uses Local data use Collection use Public data reuse

use reuse

LTER Data Practices (II)Data Description

“We are finding now that the structured metadata is much more useful in terms of producing machine readable information but the narrative often times contains more information.” (IM)

standardizedinformal

• LTER data requires intensive description“You have certain levels of metadata … if someone within the site was using the data, they know a lot about the whole collection system and the research system at the site, so you can give them less metadata … but to somebody outside or for somebody 20 or 30 years down the road, then it’s going to be more and more critical that this whole story unfold.” (IM)• More standardized metadata approaches crucial

“[Ecological Metadata Language] really excites us ... we can actually leverage the ecological community at large to provide higher level tools for analysis, and modeling to our researchers as well as to make our data and metadata available for cross-site studies.” (IM)

Data Curation Approach (I):Extended Temporal Horizon

Karasti, Baker et al. 2006

past futurepresent

Recovering legacy datasets

Atte n ding to o n g o in g data co llect ion

De s ig n in g for t h e futu re

“I was trying to d ocu m en t a lo t o f h is toric s tu ff bec a use the PI [pr incip a l inves tiga tor] was co m ing on wi th Al z he imer ’s a nd I kn e w tha t he wa s go ing to retir e . I had a series of in terv iews wit h h im a nd I got in credibl e do cu m en tat io n for th ese early cor p or a te d a ta. ” (IM)

“Ge t ting s cie nt ist s ’ d a ta in to o ur s ys te m fro m th e ver y beg in ning … wh et her it is to h elp the m with data e nt ry fo rms, se t t ing up data en tr y progr am s, all the way f ro m QA/ QC progr a ms to g e t t ing it arch ived in to o ur s yst e m and a cce s sible o n th e in te rne t .” (IM)

“We e nvi s io n al s o that we’ll also b e add ing the EML [Ecological M e tad a ta Lan g uag e ] … a nd s or t o f of te n go back an d for th betw e en whe the r we wan t to do th a t fro m the A SCII files or th e d a tabase … bu t a t a ny rate we ’ll s ome how m a ke E ML available dy na mical ly o n t h e Inte rne t to the gr o up at large. ” (IM)

Ret ro s pec t ive On g o ing Pro s p ec tive

“It is a constant battle to stay current in technology” (IM)

“Information managers

continue to come back to assessing whatever projects they want to develop to whether it is really going to support the research at the site.” (IM)

“The experience we have had… the issue isn’t how you do it, it’s how do you maintain it and how do you make it so that it is easily maintainable” (IM).

“You need to convert them into thinking that putting data in our databank and on the web is something they really want to do. If they don’t have the mindset that they want to share the data, it is really difficult to make them do it… It’s been a massive process of sort of education and badgering, to get people to think that it’s important.” (IM)

Data Curation Approach (II): Local Information Management

“Data are best managed at a site by people who know them ... as far as quality control and assurance, and understanding the ways in which they were collected and the sites that collected them. There is a real feeling at sites that the best place for data is at sites.” (IM)

“It’s helping the investigators with a lot of issues involving data, technology, computers or others, … helping people to get their thing done, from little to big things.” (IM)

Technology

Science

Data

IM

service

designmanage

Karasti & Baker HICSS 2004

Data Curation Approach (III): Information Management

Committee• Information managers from each site join in a network-level Community-of-Practice sharing, learning, reflection collaborative efforts developing professional identity

site network

“LTER information managers have taken the time that fosters an integrative, sustainable approach with technology, ensuring that we learn together” (IM)

IMC is “really pivotal in leading the entire LTER community in recognizing the value of information technology and information management” (IM)

Recent Developments in LTER Scope

• ‘Global science pull’: Global issues give rise to scaling up networks considering human dimension

Urban sites (USA) and LTSER sites (Europe)

• Spectrum of disciplines involved has increased Ecological sciences to social sciences Computer to information sciences

• ‘Technology push’: New technology opportunities of e-Science/Cyberinfrastructure offer new directions Automated data generation/collection Expansion of data scope

Recent Developments in Data Practices (III)

• Data Description & Relations

U.S.LTER - metadata, EML

ALTER-Net - proto ontological

SEEK - ontological

Data relations involve language, models, and systems as ways of representing, processing, and communicating information

Concluding Words:New Digital Dataspaces

• Transition vs augmentation• Complex negotiations, mediations, and

alignments Technical, Organizational, Social

• Two points emerge1. In addition to creating new practices, we should also

carefully study what is at stake in existing practices• Emergent roles• Emergent vocabulary2. ‘Manual data taking’ and ‘automated data taking’ represent

different data curation paradigms

New types of cross-fertilization Informatics, Social Informatics, Computer Supported

Cooperative Work, Infrastructure Studies, Social Studies of Science and Technology

Concluding Perspectives:New Knowledge Provinces

* Baker and Millerand, ASIST 2007

Concluding Perspectives:New Ways of Thinking

• Long Term• Information Systems• Design• Information Environments

• Interdisciplinary Global Science• Information Infrastructure Building• Community Building

• Collaborative Partnerships

In theory In practice

A long term voyage

“The long-term has the advantage that you know that you are going to come back to things, or if a thread slows downor is dropped, down the road you can pickup that thread, because you will be on thesame project … You will re-address something the next day, week or year. Youare always related, affiliated, associated. LTER has that continuity.” (IM)

U.S.LTERhttp://lternet.edu

International LTER: http://ilternet.edu

LTER-Europe: http://www.lter-europe.ceh.ac.uk/

ALTER-Net: http://www.alter-net.info/

FinLTSER: http://www.environment.fi/syke/lter