So What is Web Science?

A science of the Web arguably comprises the study of the networks that underpin the Web (thus Network Science, Internet Science), the vast quantities of information/transactions that are generated by this global artefact (thus Data Science and Big Data) as well the various ways in which both humans and artificial constructs produce, consume and react to the data (thus ML, AI, Psychology, Sociology) and the larger scale impact and management of such systems (thus Law, Ethics and Philosophy). Not to forget perspectives on education, health, politics, innovation/business et al we see how broad, interdisciplinary and universal the Web Science perspective can be.

"The interdisciplinary study of the technological and social constructs behind large networks such as the World Wide Web"

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Social Machines

comprising human and non-human elements which interact and influence each other at web scale in ways that the designers  and participants may not have intended. This involves the study of emergence. 

Big Data

“Messy”, complex data sets so large that no single human could ever directly read/check them and yet which we must routinely trust to drive/manage vital social functions and processes. 

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Machine Learning

Creating pragmatic processes which can learn to “do the right thing” using the observation of desirable/undesirable scenarios without requiring an understanding of why an answer is deemed to be (in)correct. 

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AI

 Seeking to reproduce understanding which guides apparently “intelligent” behaviour such as the ability explain/justify why a decision was made.

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Ethics

Informing decisions on the nature of rights/responsibilities, reasonable intention, culpability and design approaches parameters for complex constructs people and artificial agents in global systems.

Web Science touches virtually all areas of modern society in line with the places that large networks have infiltrated and grown in society since the later 20th Century and the invention of the Internet platform and the more accessible and socially engaging world-wide web.

Click here to find out more about our Web Science publications and the most recent version thinking around the objectives and goals for Web Science