Web Science Trust
The Web Science Trust is a UK Charitable Trust with the aim of supporting the global development of Web science. It was originally started in 2006 as a joint effort between MIT and University of Southampton to formalise the social and technical aspects of the World Wide Web. The Trust coordinates a set of international "WSTNet Laboratories" that include academic research groups in the emerging area of Web science.
It was first announced at MIT on 2 November 2006 as the Web Science Research Initiative, changing its name in 2009 to the Web Science Trust. Tim Berners-Lee originally led this program, now run by a Board of Trustees, which aims to attract government and private funds to support their many activities. The Web Science Trust supports curriculum development in universities and research institutions to train future generations of Web Scientists. Given the similarities between Web Science and Information Science, Web Science overlaps with the interests of the ISchool movement, particularly in the United States, but focuses more specifically on the Web itself. The annual Web Science conference brings together participants from many fields including those studying both the social and the computational aspects of the World Wide Web.
Areas of interest include:
- Social networks
- Social machine
- Collaboration
- Understanding online community
- Analyzing the human interactions inherent in social media
- Web observatories
- Developing "accountability" and other mechanisms for enhancing privacy and trust on the Web.
Key personnel
- Wendy Hall
- Nigel Shadbolt
- Daniel Weitzner
- James Hendler
- Noshir Contractor
- JP Rangaswami
- George Metakides
- John Taysom
- Anni Rowland-Campbell
- Joanna Lewis
- Tim Berners-Lee
- Sir John Taylor
- Rennie Fritchie, Baroness Fritchie
Conferences
| Conference | Date | Place | Keynote speakers | registrants |
| 27-30 May 2018 | , Amsterdam | Tim Berners-Lee, John Domingue | ||
| 26–28 June 2017 | Troy, NY, USA | Steffen Staab, Jen Golbeck | ||
| 22–25 May 2016 | Hannover, Germany | Daniel Miller, Andrew Tomkins, Daniel Olmedilla, Ricardo Baeza-Yates, Jure Leskovec, Helen Margetts | ||
| 28 June–1 July 2015 | Oxford, UK | Markus Strohmaier, Mia Consalvo, Rachel Gibson | ||
| 23–25 June 2014 | Bloomington, Indiana, USA | Wendy Hall, J.P. Rangaswami, Laura DeNardis, Daniel Tunkelang | ||
| 2–4 May 2013 | Paris, France | Vint Cerf, Cory Doctorow | ||
| 22–24 June 2012 | Evanston, Illinois, USA | Luis von Ahn, Sinan Aral, danah boyd, Jon Kleinberg, Sonia Livingstone, Siva Vaidyanathan | 200 | |
| 14–17 June 2011 | Koblenz, Germany | Barry Wellman, Jaime Teevan | 190 | |
| 26–27 April 2010 | Raleigh, North Carolina, USA | Sir Tim Berners-Lee, Jennifer Chayes, Melissa R. Gilbert | ||
| 18–20 March 2009 | Athens, Greece | Noshir Contractor, Nigel Shadbolt, Jacques Bus, Sir Tim Berners-Lee | 300+ |