Center for Knowledge Infrastructures

We use ethnographic methods to follow the builders and users of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), known as “the human genome project of astronomy.” SDSS was designed as an open data project and it is among the most successful big data projects in science. We are spotting the indicators of how well astronomers are riding the big data wave - and when they are wiping out - with consequences for other creators, users, analysts, managers, and funders of big data systems. http://ipp.oii.ox.ac.uk/2012/programme-2012/poster-session/ashley-sands-christine-l-borgman-laura-a