Web Science - what, why, where and how?

As hundreds of folk gather in Evanston, Illinois for the fourth web science conference, its time to ask once more a few defining questions about the topic.

On Wednesday 21st June, I was one of three academics leading a pre-conference workshop titled 'Teaching the Web'.

We had a good turn out for the workshop, although unfortunately it clashed with a meeting of the WSTNet so a few key people were not able to attend

Following on from the workshop I would like to set out a challenge. We discussed how we introduce people to web science and agreed there were a few questions which would like to have answered.

So, your challenge, should you choose to accept it….

• What is Web Science?
• Why would students follow web science, what future careers and employment might they follow?
• Where do you find web science? How is it practiced? and indeed, where is it taught
• How do we practice web science? What methods do we use?

you could try to answer any or all of the questions,

The answers to these questions can be used to consolidate our understanding of Web Science in a way which can allow us to better design and suggest a plausible model for the Web Science Curriculum.