Research group highlights of 2020, and hopes for 2021

This time last year on 18th December 2019, following our usual tradition, the Centre for Social Informatics staff and students marked the end of the year with an ‘All centre’ celebration of their achievements of the previous six months. This kind of get-together is completely impossible under the current pandemic restrictions. So, instead of the usual hilarity in room C34a of Napier’s Merchiston campus, during which I use my enormous egg timer to time five minute updates from everyone around the table over the course of two hours (glass of wine in hand), yesterday afternoon we gathered online for just 30 minutes of social fun. Continue reading

The Data Foundry at the National Library of Scotland: a presentation by Dr Sarah Ames

Data Foundry National Library of Scotland Last Wednesday on 9th December the Digital Scholarship Librarian at National Library of ScotlandDr Sarah Ames – was a visiting speaker at the weekly (online) gathering of staff and PhD students of the Centre for Social Informatics. On this occasion we were also joined by some of our other colleagues from the wider School of Computing at Edinburgh Napier University. Continue reading

RIVAL network event 3: preview

RIVAL logoAfter two postponements and a decision to move to virtual delivery, we (myself, Dr Bruce Ryan and our Edinburgh Napier PhD student helpers Rachel Salzano and Katherine Stephen) will (finally) be hosting the third RIVAL network event next week on Thursday 19th November 2020. Continue reading

Catching up with conferences in autumn 2020

autumn, trees, bruntsfieldIt currently feels like we have reached the peak of the autumn conference season. An array of events of interest to those of us working in Social Informatics and related areas are taking place this week. These include: Continue reading

All set for #asist20

ASIST2020 logoFollowing three days of virtual pre-conference workshops and the annual doctoral colloquium, the annual meeting of the Association for Information Science and Technology 2020 ‘proper’ opens today.  The opening keynote speaker is Houman Haddad, Head of Emerging Technologies, United Nations World Food Programme (Nobel Peace Prize winner). He will present to the online audience on blockchain technology for humanitarian assistance at 09:00 EDT (13:00 GMT in the UK).

Several members of the Centre for Social Informatics are making co-authored contributions to ASIST 2020: Continue reading

RIVAL goes virtual on 19th November 2020

RIVAL logoAfter two unsuccessful attempts to postpone the third of our RSE-funded RIVAL network events, Dr Bruce Ryan and I have admitted defeat. With the support of the RIVAL project board members, we have decided to keep Thursday 19th November 2020 as the date for RIVAL event 3 and run it as a virtual meeting that afternoon. Continue reading

Join the Ada Scotland Festival online on Tuesday 13th October

Ada Scotland Festival flyerThe Ada Scotland Festival is a series of online events focused on addressing the gender imbalance in Computing Science. The launch event takes place online on Tuesday 13th October on Ada Lovelace Day 2020. Continue reading

All set for #isic2020

ISIC 2020 banner logo

The 2020 Information Seeking in Context (ISIC) conference is hosted this week by our colleagues at the Department of Information Science, University of Pretoria, South Africa.

Had circumstances been different, several members of the Centre for Social Informatics would be in South Africa now. The PhD students would be joining today’s doctoral workshop in person, and everyone preparing to present their papers and posters face-to-face over the course of the main conference from Tuesday to Thursday this week (as has been the case at past ISIC conferences, e.g. 2018 in Kraków, Poland, 2016 in Zadar, Croatia, 2014 in Leeds) . Continue reading

Katherine Stephen introduces her PhD on metaskills maturity for future workplaces

Katherine Stephen SDS presentation 2020Amongst the doctoral studies undertaken within the Centre for Social Informatics are a number that are co-funded by the ESRC and Skills Development Scotland (SDS). To date, we have: Continue reading

Centre for Social Informatics contributions to Information Seeking in Context 2020 #isic2020

ISIC 2020 banner logo

Hosted by the Department of Information Science at the University of Pretoria, Information Seeking in Context 2020 (#isic2020) takes place as a virtual conference between 28th September and 2nd October 2020. As has been the case in the past (e.g. 2018 in Kraków, Poland, 2016 in Zadar, Croatia), colleagues from the Centre for Social Informatics at Edinburgh Napier University are looking forward to the opportunity of presenting some of their research at the ISIC conference. Continue reading