“We’re the bridge builders in the brave new world of data,” the president of RDA mentioned as part of her opening remarks.  If RDA community members are the bridge builders, it is important to be cognizant and aware of what is being built – by design – into these systems. The keynote at the RDA plenary 13, Dr. Julia Stoyanovich highlighted the multiple layers embedded in the increasingly popular discussion about the in-built biases in algorithms and machine learning. Is it that there is statistical bias in the model, societal bias in the data, or is it in fact the world is “incorrect”?

On 22nd May 2019, members of the Jisc Open Research Hub team held a webinar in the UK which presented a set of design options around the assigning of more than one licence or access type to a repository deposit. The aim was to get feedback to help the design team decide which approach to develop. 

Although the webinar concentrated on the UX aspects on the solution for the Jisc Research Repository, the overall problem that is being addressed is an international one and has cropped up recently at workshops in the UK and overseas. 

We all know data should be FAIR—findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable. This has become a rallying cry of our community. It is not a new concept, but the catchy phrasing has given it new visibility and urgency. Nonetheless, most research still has antiquated approaches to data sharing. That is changing in the Earth and space sciences at least.

The RDA project “Engaging Researchers with Research Data - What works?”, part of the Libraries for Research Rata Interest Group,  aims to collect information on data engagement activities undertaken by different stakeholders, to possibly identify patterns relevant to the type and size of organisations mapped to specific requirements and difficulties encountered in successfully running these activities.

Responsibility is something everyone has to deal with every day. On one hand, responsibility means that there are organizational duties to carry out such as finishing projects in time or taking care of working resources. On the other hand, responsibility is always linked to power, as it means to control something and someone - or better expressed by a famous quote connected to the Spiderman comics: “with great power comes great responsibility”.