Image source: EU Projects Office Cern
The first part of 2019 was pretty exciting for Edgeryders and its Research Network. Two Horizon 2020 projects were officially launched in January – POPREBEL and NGI Forward, and four new proposals submitted in March and beginning of April. A lot of energy was put in building these applications, especially EPICS where @alberto is the principal investigator. The main aim of doing this is not only to work on topics we care about, but also to improve upon our research methodology and, perhaps most importantly, bring in new opportunities for our community at large.
Edgeryders’ role in these European research projects is that of a conveyor of large online conversations. We offer a coherent set of activities (called a workpackage in EU research lingo) dedicated to building online communities, to reach the voices of the people on the ground and to involve a wide range of stakeholders. This process includes an effective engagement strategy adapted to the targeted groups of each project as well as Semantic Social Network Analysis as a unique methodology to analyze conversations and get the “big picture” of the problem at hand. Our contribution has proven to be valuable for research and it feeds in the work of other partners in the consortia.
So, here is a short overview and the reasoning behind these four projects:
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CYcle of Creativity: a Leading Open intellectual Property System for the European Union (CYCLOPS) / Topic: DT-GOVERNANCE-13-2019: Digitisation, Digital Single Market and European culture: new challenges for creativity, intellectual property rights and copyright.
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WHY? The idea of the project is to produce a better evidence-base for public and private copyright policy and general guidelines for copyright in a context of digitisation which is bringing changes throughout the creative industries making creative works available to anyone with Internet access. More people become creators but it may become harder to make a living from creativity.
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HOW? CYCLOPS is based on a circular, dynamic notion of creativity and innovation. A mix of complementary, qualitative and quantitative methods will help establish a more efficient Digital Single Market and develop a clear, sustainable and widely acceptable copyright system. By employing participatory research, descriptions of attitudes, problems and solutions adopted among a broad range of stakeholders will be developed. Capturing important variations in copyright systems and mapping out various stakeholders directly affected by digitisation and copyright will serve to provide insights into the challenges they face and the solutions they have come up with so that adequate business models and strategies can be identified. Finally, fundamental policy recommendations on how to reconcile disparate interests for a more sustainable, harmonised copyright system will be developed.
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WHO? DIW Econ, Germany (coordinator); Erasmus University Rotterdam, Netherlands; Rooter, Spain; University of Alcalá, Spain; DELab, University of Warsaw, Poland.
In this project, Edgeryders leads work package 2 (WP2), “Giving all stakeholders a voice” which consists of three sets of tasks focused among others on collecting ethnographic data online. We have also taken on the leading role of another workpackage (WP9), related to communication and dissemination. This will allow us to create an effective strategy to maximise the visibility of the project and its results as well as to build prototypes of Toolkits, in collaboration with Rooter, to help very small and small to medium enterprises and non-profit enterprises in setting up their activities. Lastly, the final impact conference will be an opportunity to further engage members of the community. It will target not only academics, but also – and especially – creators, fan-fiction makers, activists, politicians, data journalists. It will contribute to systematizing the existing experiences, learning from each other and boosting the creative sector by giving extra tools to the people in its frontline.
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EPistemological Insights on Citizen Science (EPICS) / Topic: SwafS-17-2019 - Consolidating and expanding the knowledge base on citizen science
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WHY? Considering that citizen science has a large potential for positive societal change which is currently not being realized, EPICS aims to investigate the strengths, limits and impact of citizen science to gain a deeper understanding of how it works, and how it could work better for its protagonists and society at large. Bringing together professional and citizen scientists may bring substantial benefits to science and society as a whole.
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HOW? By using state-of-the-art ethnographic methods and participatory design which is at the centre of the strategy. Ethnography will help us understand citizen science from the point of view of its protagonists. EPICS itself will be a citizen science project – by doing “citizen science on citizen science” using citizen ethnography it will become even more participatory and open. This will allow us to explore epistemological innovation, reproducibility and accountability in citizen science. Through participatory design techniques we will explore how communities of citizen scientists can enhance their own effectiveness, resilience and their impact. Finally, since our working hypothesis is that citizen science as a participatory practice has an added democratic legitimacy, and therefore an added value for policy makers, the aim is also to influence and support policy decisions.
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WHO? Lisbon Council, Belgium (coordinator) ; T6 Ecosystems, Italy; Glimps, Belgium; Polytechnic Milan, Italy; Ellinogermaniki Agogi, Greece; University of Ghent, Belgium; TANT Lab, Denmark; Counter Culture Lab, US
Edgeryders is leading WP2 “Citizen Science Online Community” and WP5 “A Citizen Ethnography of Citizen Science”; having an important role in WP4 “A Professional Ethnography of Citizen Science” and in WP7 “Communication and Dissemination”.
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Understanding the EVolution of sociEty and scieNce through ciTizen Science (EVENTS) / Topic: SwafS-20-2018-2019: Building the SwafS knowledge base - First Stage
Elements of the EPICS proposal were adapted to apply for another, two-phase call. EVENTS project is basically keeping the main general objective of EPICS: looking at the relationship between science and society through the lens of citizen science focusing on using advanced ethnographic methods and a fellowship program to support the grassroots initiatives. However, there are methodological variations, and the impact mechanism is completely different.
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Arts Inspired Socio-Economic Transformation (AI SET) / Topic: TRANSFORMATIONS-17: Societal Challenges in the Arts
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WHY? AI SET is a study about the power and impact of performance-based community art practices as processes of socio-economic transformation. It is focused on and inspired by community activities particular for a specific region in Portugal (Moliceiro region, Estarreja, Aveiro). AI SET is based on the assumption that art can be thought, planned and implemented as a tool for human development.
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HOW? The project will measure the impact of a large scale experimental performance artwork specifically created and designed as a research and innovation tool, focusing on Moliceiro shipbuilding tradition and its natural environment. A series of community art activities will be developed and implemented to engage local, regional, European and global communities to explore the living symbiotic relationships between Art and Life in a specific context in which ancient manufacturing and digital transformation are combined through artistic practices.
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WHO? Artshare Investigação Tecnologia e Arte, Portugal/Belgium (coordinator); University of Aveiro, Portugal; Institut Pro Digitalni Ekonomiku, Czech Republic; Companhia de Mùsica Teatral, Portugal; Vento di Venezia, Italy; Estarreja Municipality, Portugal.
This proposal was led by the Culture Squad. Edgeryders has a leading role in WP4 “Online/offline Community Conversation and Co-production” aiming to map ethnographically and at a network level the European cultural actors - direct and indirect participants in place based artistic revitalization and community arts, and insert community engagement and co-production techniques at the heart of artistic experimentation. This will include collective residencies in Portugal and around Europe. Through a co-created community festival, new online/offline processes for co-producing art and cultural activities in a place will be tested.
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Hopefully, in a couple of months we will get some positive news. In any case, with each new application we really learn a lot. Not only about how to satisfy the formal requirements of a specific call, but also about human aspects of engaging in this co-writing process. The right recipe for a successful application would definitely be trust among the partners of the consortium which has been built, if not based on a previous experience of working together, then on the shared values and work ethics. Choosing well whom to work with and starting on time makes the proposal automatically stronger - which is exactly what the Edgeryders Research Network will do for the upcoming calls this year.
Feel free to reach out for any suggestions!
