Open AccessSpecial issue on peer-to-peer and user-led science: invited comments
Author(s) -
Alessandro Delfanti
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
jcom, journal of science communication
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.495
H-Index - 17
ISSN - 1824-2049
DOI - 10.22323/2.09010301
Subject(s) - peer production , encyclopedia , peer review , power (physics) , public relations , knowledge production , process (computing) , point (geometry) , hacker , sociology , peer to peer , balance (ability) , internet privacy , computer science , political science , world wide web , psychology , knowledge management , library science , law , mathematics , computer security , physics , geometry , quantum mechanics , neuroscience , operating system
In this commentary, we collected three essays from authors coming from different perspectives. They analyse the problem of power, participation and cooperation in projects of production of scientific knowledge held by users or peers: persons who do not belong to the institutionalised scientific community. These contributions are intended to give a more political and critical point of view on the themes developed and analysed in the research articles of this JCOM special issue on Peer-to-peer and user-led science. Michel Bauwens, Christopher Kelty and Mathieu O'Neil write about different aspects of P2P science. Nevertheless, the three worlds they delve into share the "aggressively active" attitude of the citizens who inhabit them. Those citizens claim to be part of the scientific process, and they use practices as heterogeneous as online peer-production of scientific knowledge, garage biology practiced with a hacker twist, or the crowdsourced creation of an encyclopedia page. All these claims and practices point to a problem in the current distribution of power. The relations between experts and non-experts are challenged by the rise of peer-to-peer science. Furthermore, the horizontal communities which live inside and outside the Net are not frictionless. Within peer-production mechanisms, the balance of power is an important issue which has to be carefully taken into account.