Cameron Neylon

Last week I was lucky enough to spend five days in North Carolina at the
[Triangle Scholarly Communications
Institute](http://trianglesci.org/2015-institute/), an [Andrew W. Mellon
Foundation](https://mellon.org/) funded initiative that brings teams
together on a retreat style meeting to work on specific projects. More
on that, and the work of our team, at a later date but one thing that
came out of our work really struck me. When we talk about the web and
the internet, particularly in the context of scholarly publishing we
talk about how the shift from an environment of scarcity limited by the
physical restrictions of the print world to a world of abundance. Often
we focus on how thinking shaped in that old world is still limiting us
today, often invoking that deity of disruption, Clayton Christenson in
the process. So far so obvious.

What struck me as we prepared for our final presentations was that these
narratives of scarcity don't just limit us in the world of publication.
I am lucky enough to have been to quite a few meetings where great
people are sequestered together to think and discuss. These meetings
always generate new ideas, exciting projects and life changing insights
that somehow dissolve away as we return to our regular lives. The
abundance of these focussed meetings, abundance of time, abundance of
expertise, abundance of the attention of smart people gives way to the
scarcity of our day to day existence. The development of these new ideas
falters as it has to compete with scarce time of individuals. When time
can be found it is asynchronous, and patchy. We try to make time but we
never seem to be able to find the right kind of time.

Many of us reflected that it was a shame we couldn't always work like
this, focussed periods bringing groups together to do the work. But it
struck me that, just as the web provides a platform, an infrastructure,
that makes publication cheap, that the Mellon Foundation through the SCI
Program has also provided an infrastructure that creates an abundance of
time and attention. The marginal cost of each project is minimal
compared to investment in the program. It is the program that makes it
possible. Could the same be true of that archetypal form of scarcity in
research, the grant? Could we imagine infrastructures that make the
actual doing of research relatively cheap? Is that possible in a world
of expensive reagents and equipment? Are the limitations that we see as
so self evident real, or are they imposed by our lack of imagination?

And yet there's also a dark side to this. It is a privilege to attend
these meetings and work with these people. And I mean "privilege" with
all the loaded and ambivalent connotations it has today. The language of
abundance is the language of the "disruptors" of Silicon Valley, a
language of techno-utopianism where, with the money you made from your
dating app for Bay Area dogs you can now turn your attention to "solving
someone else's problem" with a new app or a new gadget. It can be
well-meaning but it is limited. The true challenge is create the
opportunities for abundance where it wasn't before, supporting the
creation of new infrastructure and platforms that truly create abundance
for those who will most appreciate it. [Tim
O'Reilly](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_O%27Reilly "Tim O'Reilly"){.zem_slink
target="_blank" rel="wikipedia"}'s "X as a Platform" agenda pointed in
this direction but in a limited context. The web is not (yet) that
platform as the rumbling debate over the [Wikipedia
Zero](https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Wikipedia_Zero) program
shows.

Each time I look at [the question of infrastructures I feel the need to
go a layer
deeper](http://cameronneylon.net/blog/what-exactly-is-infrastructure-seeing-the-leopards-spots/),
that the real solution lies underneath the problems of the layer I'm
looking at. At some level this is true, but its also an illusion. The
answers to questions of biology do not lie in chemistry, nor do the
answers of chemistry do not lie in physics. The answers lie in finding
the right level of abstraction and model building (which might be in
biology, chemisty, physics or literature depending on the problem).
[Principles and governance
systems](http://cameronneylon.net/blog/principles-for-open-scholarly-infrastructures/)
are one form of abstraction that might help but its not the whole
answer. It seems like if we could re-frame the way we think about these
problems, and find new abstractions, new places to stand and see the
issues we might be able to break through at least some of those that
seem intractable today. How might we recognise the unexpected places
where it is possible to create abundance?

If only I could find the time to think that through...


Last week I was lucky enough to spend five days in North Carolina at the Triangle Scholarly Communications Institute, an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation funded initiative that brings teams together on a retreat style meeting to work on specific projects.

Messaggi di Rogue Scholar

Abundance Thinking