MSSISS 2015

The MSSISS 2015 keynote speaker is Dr. Myron Gutmann of the University of Colorado, Boulder (formerly of the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan).

The world of data has changed in the last two decades, and it continues to change rapidly. Driven by rapid increases in computing and communication capacity, new kinds and quantities of data, new expectations for sharing, and new means of access, the research enterprise has been transformed, giving researchers entirely new ways of working. The infrastructure that supports those data has undergone just as rapid and head-spinning a change, so that the ways that we get access to data are as shockingly different from what they were twenty years ago as are the data themselves.  The future promises to be transformed in even more novel and interesting ways. This keynote address tells the story of the past and present of social science data infrastructure, and then attempts to chart a future. Four themes stand out in the ways that data infrastructure has changed. First, data have become ubiquitous, leading to more and better access, and to innovation as new kinds of data have become available. Second, standards for data infrastructure have emerged, and they have enabled effective responses to newly created requirements for data and information sharing. Third, dynamic cooperative networks have popped up, making enhanced data sharing and analysis possible. And fourth, privacy and confidentiality are being effectively protected in research data (if not in commercial and organizational data). These are significant accomplishments, but the future cries out for more. The next generation of research will call for yet “bigger” data, but the dramatic change will be the integration of data and analysis across research domains. That will require new metadata, improved data management systems, new analytic capabilities, and access to better computing hardware. Researchers will also need a repository network that allows us to easily cross scientific boundaries. Finally, the research community will need to find even better ways to protect privacy and confidentiality, because the complexity of the data may reveal more about our research subjects than we might have hoped. The innovations needed are in the hands of the next generation of researchers, who will be the right people to bring these changes about.