ABSTRACT

The impact of the data deluge is affecting all disciplines – from the humanities to largescale science. Making data openly available allows us to approach global challenges holistically. In many cases we need to assess human factors alongside the legal, medical and technology issues: for example, in the field of world energy demand. So there is a need for common standards for preservation and access in order to ensure interoperability. Yet the field is developing very fast, with many funders arguing that publicly funded research must be made publicly available. This does not simply mean that the data is dumped somewhere: it must be accessible to other researchers in an intelligible manner. Some large international projects are trying to solve these issues, and there is increasing evidence that governments have woken up to the issues. A key challenge will be for the researchers themselves. Projects in biodiversity, for example, require individual researchers to come together – physicists, space scientists and computer scientists working alongside biologists and environmental scientists. The management of such projects requires skills that few possess at present. Hence the need is urgent to look at how researchers are trained, how they manage such projects and the role of the data specialist. How will democracy work if data is publicly available in the future? This chapter seeks to open up these and many other issues that will affect society in fundamental ways. Informed debate is needed in order to ensure that the immense opportunities offered by the data deluge are not lost for future generations.

Introduction

We hear continuously the slogan ‘data deluge’; but what does it mean, why has it suddenly become important and is it really going to affect the way in which research will be done and communicated to others in the future? Concerns about being overwhelmed by a flood of data have focused both on the impact of so-called e-science and its implications, and on the scale and complexity of many of the ‘grand challenges’ facing the research community and society at large.