One of the most interesting thing of the workshop for me, for a Phd Philosophy of Law student is the consideration of the open science like a process to obtain advances in different areas of knowledge, and produce this advances collaboratively.
The open science represents a new mentality about the property of the innovations. Is no an effort to obtain incomes, is an effort to offer utilities to the society. And the philosophy that underlies this concept is a collaborative and democratic philosophy. The advances of science and ours societies will be sustained in cooperations and shared knowledge.
Today, in a world in which the data is one of the most rewarding product, talk about open science is a disruptive topic out of the universities, and this is one of the most important handicap. Sharing data is a interest initiative is a valuable initiative to allow academics to evolve and grow in their research, but the impact in the society will be limited as long as the private companies protect their database.
In the case of social science, the utilities are potentially infinite, but there are important problem, the social data is produced by the citizens, and all of us have rights, and the privacy is one of them. In fact, the contemporary law protect more and more the comercial use of the social data. We need to focus on finding the balance between the open science and the use of the data and the right to privacy.
The final question is, With is the future of open science? Without any doubt the science, at least at the university, is walking along the way of opening, and is an excellent opportunity to walk more and more quickly, to avance quicker than in any other period of the history.
Open Science still needs more time to progress. For me the most important is to academic organizations understand Open Science as a new way to do Science and the benefits to make research open as part of our democratic society. Our responsibility is to keep doing baby steps to promote and engage with Open Access and Scholarly Communication.