Invited poster by Mark Parsons presented at the 2013 Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union in the session "Collaborative Frameworks and Experiences in Earth and Space Science"

1. The value of friction, tension, and disparity in global collaboration
rd-alliance.org
Mark A. Parsons
Friction is inevitable and necessary in
collaboration.
Misunderstandings; conflicting
goals; competition for limited
funds; differing world-views,
agendas, ideals… These types of
“friction” are inevitable in
national and global collaboration.
And while friction can create
tension and conflict, it is not
inherently bad. It is at these
points of interaction and tension
where we sometimes gain the
most insight.
There is no reason to think that collaborators
have common goals.
Student of Politics: “And what be reely this yere Coalition they do
be talking about?”
Oldest Living Local Authority: “Well it’s like this. Some parties says
this an’ some say that an’ t’other. But what I says, there’s no
knowins nor no tellins, an’—mark my words! I bain’t fur wrong.”
from Punch, 1910
Collaboration across difference
can produce surprising results.
It is not the strongest of
the species that
survives, nor the most
intelligent that survives.
It is the one that is the
most adaptable to
change.
Charles Darwin
The Research Data Alliance
provides a neutral place to
take advantage of friction.
Research Data Alliance
!
Vision
Researchers and innovators openly share data across
technologies, disciplines, and countries to address the grand
challenges of society.
!
Mission
RDA builds the social and technical bridges that enable open
sharing of data.
Foster “weak ties” as critical to
connecting communities.
!
Guiding Principles:
Shared principles can unite a
community, but that is insufficient.
Collaborators do not necessarily
have common goals. Alliances are
created through dynamic, coalitionstyle politics. We move forward
through both compromise and
competition.
Like a jury assessing a trial,
community understanding comes
through multiple lines of evidence
that wind through disparate views
and describe a greater story.
Marcel DuChamp’s Bicycle Wheel
photo © nuzz—www.flickr.com/photos/nuzz/
“A wheel turns because of its
encounter with the surface of
the road; spinning in the air it
goes nowhere.”
cover notes for
Friction—An Ethnography of Global Connection
by Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing3
William Ashby teaches us that “only variety absorbs variety,” and network
theory shows the value of increased interconnection. “Weak” ties that connect
different communities become critically important1. Similarly, relationships,
interfaces, and “bridges” of all types are the key to developing common
infrastructure.2
Achieving the understanding that comes through both unity and disparity is an
implicit goal of the Research Data Alliance. RDA provides a “neutral place” or
“social gateway” where frictions can be identified, addressed, and understood
in order to improve data sharing..
RDA brings disparate groups together under core principles and a broad
mission yet requires local implementation through focussed tiger-team-style
Working Groups.
RDA provides mechanisms for collaboration and guides technical
harmonization, but it mandates no one approach. The work of RDA and its
Working and Interest Groups is driven by community needs and goals.
10 December 2013
Map of the internet by the Opte
Project [CC-BY] via Wikimedia
Commons
Slugs Need Hugs
Mica Angela Hendricks & 4-year-old daughter
busymockingbird.com
It’s about taking that thing
you love and placing it in
someone else’s hands, and
trusting that everything will
be okay.
Mica Angela Hendricks
Chance favors the
connected mind.
Steven Johnson from
Where Good Ideas Come From4
It only takes only a few
links per node to create a
highly interconnected
network (“six degrees of
separation”).
“Weak ties” are important. Robust networks include
multiple hubs and less connected nodes. Connectors are
very important – “people who know people.”
!
• Openness – Membership is open. RDA community
meetings and processes are open, and the deliverables
of RDA Working Groups will be publicly disseminated.
• Consensus – The RDA advances by achieving
consensus among its membership. RDA processes and
procedures include appropriate mechanisms to resolve
conflicts.
• Balance – The RDA seeks to promote balanced
representation of its membership and stakeholder
communities.
• Harmonization – The RDA works to achieve
harmonization across data standards, policies,
technologies, infrastructure, and communities.
• Community-driven – The RDA is a public, communitydriven body comprised of volunteer members and
organizations.
• Non-profit - RDA does not promote, endorse, or sell
commercial products, technologies, or services.
Who is RDA?
• 1,057 individual members from 55 countries. Most
members are from the US and Europe.
• 32 organizational partners from large and small
companies, non-profits, and affiliate organizations.
• Six active Working Groups, six more in development.
• 21 Interest Groups, four more in development.
We must act “glocally” to succeed
Glocalization “means the
simultaneity—the co-presence—of
both universalizing and and
particularizing tendencies.”
Roland Robertson5
References:
1Barabási A-L and R Albert. 1999. “Emergence of scaling in random networks”. Science 286 (5439): 509-512.
2Edwards, Paul N., Steven J. Jackson, Geoffrey C. Bowker, and Cory P. Knobel. 2007. Understanding Infrastructure: Dynamics, Tensions, and Design. http://hdl.handle.net/2027.42/49353
3Tsing, Anna Lowenhaupt. 2005. Friction: An Ethnography of Global Connection. Princeton University Press.
4Johnson, Steven. 2010. Where Good Ideas Come From. New York: Riverhead Books.
5Habibul Haque Khondker, 2004. “Glocalization as globalization: Evolution of a sociological concept.” Bangladesh e-Journal of Sociology. 1(2).
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Support from National Science Foundation under Grant
Number NSF/OCI 12491. Any opinions, findings, and
conclusions, are those of the author alone.