1 00:00:00,030 --> 00:00:07,600 Good morning, everybody, and let me welcome you to this session on Human-Centered Futures, the critical role of the social sciences. 2 00:00:07,600 --> 00:00:13,500 I think that my fellow panellists and I have been really struck over the last few 3 00:00:13,500 --> 00:00:19,350 days about how I am probably more frequently than we originally anticipated. 4 00:00:19,350 --> 00:00:25,950 The word social science has come up and how we've heard from a number of speakers about the the 5 00:00:25,950 --> 00:00:34,320 really fundamental importance of some of the of a deep understanding of factors like ethics, 6 00:00:34,320 --> 00:00:38,130 behaviour, the law and culture, 7 00:00:38,130 --> 00:00:48,030 and how they're really critically essential to our ability to fight and tackle some of the greatest challenges 8 00:00:48,030 --> 00:00:55,830 that our society is facing today and in order to get really under the skin of some of those things. 9 00:00:55,830 --> 00:01:02,340 I'm joined by a really fantastic panel of speakers from both sides of the Atlantic 10 00:01:02,340 --> 00:01:09,180 who together bring a really rich body of expertise and experience from funders, 11 00:01:09,180 --> 00:01:19,170 higher education institutions and industry. So we have Daniel soyou from the University of Arkansas, Mike Wilson from Facebook, 12 00:01:19,170 --> 00:01:23,670 Georgia Chow from the National Science Foundation and University of Michigan. 13 00:01:23,670 --> 00:01:28,590 And from here in the UK, we have Rick Elbridge from Cardiff University. 14 00:01:28,590 --> 00:01:33,000 And together, what they're going to be trying to do is to really answer two questions. 15 00:01:33,000 --> 00:01:38,790 So firstly, why the social sciences are critical in the fourth industrial revolution. 16 00:01:38,790 --> 00:01:49,920 And secondly, to highlight and to discuss some of the really innovative things that are happening in order to bring together industry, 17 00:01:49,920 --> 00:01:58,950 social sciences and funders to create genuinely innovative solutions to the world's challenges today. 18 00:01:58,950 --> 00:02:05,550 So each speaker will be speaking for 10 minutes and then we'll be having a plenary discussion at the end. 19 00:02:05,550 --> 00:02:11,250 So if I can ask you to hold on to your thoughts and until then. 20 00:02:11,250 --> 00:02:15,540 So first of all, I'd like to welcome to the stage Daniel Sui, 21 00:02:15,540 --> 00:02:22,710 who is a distinguished professor of geography and vice chancellor for research and innovation at the University of Arkansas. 22 00:02:22,710 --> 00:02:42,750 Daniel was previously division director for Social and economic sciences at the US National Science Foundation. 23 00:02:42,750 --> 00:02:50,520 Good morning, thank you, Bridget, for the introduction to the for organising this wonderful panel. 24 00:02:50,520 --> 00:03:01,260 And so in that it's very gratifying to hear the social sciences have been mentioned multiple times during their past, they in half. 25 00:03:01,260 --> 00:03:10,470 So I understand I may run the risk of preaching to the choir, but I am reminded of times that the choir is full of sceptical non-believers, 26 00:03:10,470 --> 00:03:14,250 so it's sometimes necessary to still preaching to the choir. 27 00:03:14,250 --> 00:03:19,200 So in the ten minutes I have, I want to make three quick points. 28 00:03:19,200 --> 00:03:23,640 One. Social scientists need to work industry closely. 29 00:03:23,640 --> 00:03:34,800 Second, business in these industries needed to fully embrace social science and but to accelerate to the social science and industry partnership. 30 00:03:34,800 --> 00:03:44,250 We need to overcome some barriers and there are things remains need to be done on both sides in order to make the partnership work. 31 00:03:44,250 --> 00:03:54,540 OK, to talk about social science, I cannot resist a quote from one of my high school heroes, Ernest Rutherford. 32 00:03:54,540 --> 00:03:58,410 He once said, I hope this resonated with some of you. 33 00:03:58,410 --> 00:04:07,110 He once said the only possible conclusion the social sciences can draw is some do, some don't. 34 00:04:07,110 --> 00:04:15,480 So that's a reflection of the perception of a social size by, you know, the physical sciences. 35 00:04:15,480 --> 00:04:26,190 But but. I the point I want to emphasise is that the social sciences say, you know, during the past two decade have changed quite dramatically. 36 00:04:26,190 --> 00:04:31,800 So, for example, I come from studying problems, still solving problems, 37 00:04:31,800 --> 00:04:42,300 from using small datasets to analysing large heterogeneous datasets and also from lonelier lone scholar, 38 00:04:42,300 --> 00:04:51,240 isolated scholar, type of model to organise a large scale, collaborative, interdisciplinary, also lifestyle research teams. 39 00:04:51,240 --> 00:04:58,350 Last but not least, you know, social scientists have also been moving from purely academic pursuits, 40 00:04:58,350 --> 00:05:04,830 very inward looking to aiming for more broader public impacts on policies, 41 00:05:04,830 --> 00:05:10,260 industry about major problems that you know, facing society and both individual and collective level. 42 00:05:10,260 --> 00:05:17,700 So in other words, social scientists or during the past decade also are becoming at least the in terms of how we 43 00:05:17,700 --> 00:05:24,060 conducted the research are more aligned with the physical sciences and engineering fields. 44 00:05:24,060 --> 00:05:29,070 So with this transformation, I think more than ever, 45 00:05:29,070 --> 00:05:35,850 social scientists in the industry for the following reasons one industries demands the R&D funding. 46 00:05:35,850 --> 00:05:42,320 And before I left the NSF last of October, my colleagues data and CSIS, 47 00:05:42,320 --> 00:05:48,670 the National Centre for Engineering Statistics, they compiled the latest figure lacking in 2016. 48 00:05:48,670 --> 00:05:53,880 U.S. industries spent approximately three hundred sixty five billion dollars. 49 00:05:53,880 --> 00:05:58,950 That safari exceeds all the federal R&D dollars combined. 50 00:05:58,950 --> 00:06:05,940 So with federal funding for research, we will remain relatively flat in the foreseeable future. 51 00:06:05,940 --> 00:06:16,650 I think an industry sponsored R&D will be very crucial to you for the success of basic research conducted by academia. 52 00:06:16,650 --> 00:06:26,670 Secondly, I think Industry University Partnership will also increasingly play important role in terms of supporting educational programmes. 53 00:06:26,670 --> 00:06:35,250 For example, the most recent one, the Star Park, teamed up with Arizona State, you know, for both the undergraduate and graduate programme. 54 00:06:35,250 --> 00:06:38,280 And thirdly, the student placement. 55 00:06:38,280 --> 00:06:49,920 So during the past decade or so, we have seen more and more social science majors have find career paths a viable career path industry. 56 00:06:49,920 --> 00:06:56,160 Last but not least, these days, industry control more data than government. 57 00:06:56,160 --> 00:07:03,420 So to be a social scientist conducting cutting edge research, you have to. 58 00:07:03,420 --> 00:07:09,690 They cannot get away from industry if they want to have access to the data industry controls. 59 00:07:09,690 --> 00:07:13,560 So I don't I know Michael will talk about this as well. 60 00:07:13,560 --> 00:07:20,100 So I want to put it on your radar that there is this new industry academic partnership model for data access. 61 00:07:20,100 --> 00:07:28,950 Gary King, a very famous political scientist at Harvard, he founded a data breach along with multiple other social science disciplines. 62 00:07:28,950 --> 00:07:35,820 He has been pushing in recent months that this a new model to allow social 63 00:07:35,820 --> 00:07:42,330 scientists in academia to access this massive amount of big data industry controls, 64 00:07:42,330 --> 00:07:47,010 but without assigning the traditional non disclosure agreement. 65 00:07:47,010 --> 00:07:50,680 So you can google this report out online. 66 00:07:50,680 --> 00:08:00,300 You take a closer look so we can probably have some conversation about how this model may or may not work. 67 00:08:00,300 --> 00:08:02,850 So now let me switch gears to industry. 68 00:08:02,850 --> 00:08:14,040 I think the business world is also changing as a marker of all potheads, you know, so convincingly illustrated to us. 69 00:08:14,040 --> 00:08:21,960 You know, we are in the middle of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and the new digital and the platform 70 00:08:21,960 --> 00:08:29,320 economy serving our higher human needs are increasingly driven by four leading technologies. 71 00:08:29,320 --> 00:08:39,160 I tend to characterise it as ABCD A for AIB blockchain, c cloud of computing, the data analytics, the data science. 72 00:08:39,160 --> 00:08:46,860 So David Gergen mentioned that the new dilemma of this new digital economy poses. 73 00:08:46,860 --> 00:08:51,990 But I want to emphasise that more than ever for this new economy, 74 00:08:51,990 --> 00:08:57,900 businesses and industries in need of social science are for two simple reasons Why is social 75 00:08:57,900 --> 00:09:04,530 science can help create and drive new businesses and new industries and new business models? 76 00:09:04,530 --> 00:09:16,190 And secondly, we can also use the insights gained by social science research to enhance and improve traditional business practises so including. 77 00:09:16,190 --> 00:09:20,450 Like at the growing source of so-called the precision business, 78 00:09:20,450 --> 00:09:29,240 utilising the recent insights about team dynamics and the art of a collective level and are also at the individual level, 79 00:09:29,240 --> 00:09:33,980 you know, the most recent studies on human motivation, the behaviour, 80 00:09:33,980 --> 00:09:42,230 all those social science insights and results that could be used to enhance the traditional business operations. 81 00:09:42,230 --> 00:09:51,770 So I guess I have seen in terms of a social size success, businesses of Facebook is a great example. 82 00:09:51,770 --> 00:09:58,610 I don't know whether you have ever wondered where, you know, Mark Zuckerberg got his inspiration. 83 00:09:58,610 --> 00:10:03,410 So I have tried to follow it for a while, so I just show you one example. 84 00:10:03,410 --> 00:10:12,110 I think sometime last year, he sort of unveiled 23 books that had a greater impact on his thinking. 85 00:10:12,110 --> 00:10:18,800 And here's the other 23 books I did. A quick counting 19 out of the 23 books are social science fiction. 86 00:10:18,800 --> 00:10:23,570 Many books, not a single computer science book or tech. 87 00:10:23,570 --> 00:10:29,910 So in particular, I'm really intrigued. Like he read Gang Leader for a day. 88 00:10:29,910 --> 00:10:34,580 That's a very well-written book by a sociologist. 89 00:10:34,580 --> 00:10:40,400 You know, it's, you know, you go down the list of from the end of power to varieties of religious experience. 90 00:10:40,400 --> 00:10:52,100 It's a it's it's a give you a hint in terms of how future businesses may be shaken up and where they are drawing their inspiration. 91 00:10:52,100 --> 00:11:01,440 And so at two months ago, we were very pleased that the host, in collaboration with Xu ITBP, 92 00:11:01,440 --> 00:11:07,670 a workshop for university industry engagement for non-metropolitan areas. 93 00:11:07,670 --> 00:11:15,050 And during the workshop, we had some fascinating discussion about this a long tail, a theory, you know, for the social scientists, 94 00:11:15,050 --> 00:11:20,480 you know, the 80 20 rule, you know, since the perito, the highest we have known data for over 100 years. 95 00:11:20,480 --> 00:11:25,670 But now all of a sudden it has of becoming the 20 thing you know, for the digital economy, 96 00:11:25,670 --> 00:11:31,610 especially if you are thinking about the user defined it solutions vs. vendor defined solutions. 97 00:11:31,610 --> 00:11:38,510 So it's also gave you sort of us in after a review of those businesses are based upon, you know, 98 00:11:38,510 --> 00:11:44,090 from the transition from the physical goods and services to a hybrid to digital services. 99 00:11:44,090 --> 00:11:51,920 So, so one of the sort of solutions that you promoted to reduce it to narrow the 100 00:11:51,920 --> 00:11:57,620 geographical disparity is really to creatively apply this long tail theory. 101 00:11:57,620 --> 00:12:01,130 So probably that's another topic for the discussion. 102 00:12:01,130 --> 00:12:08,900 So to in to accelerate the social science, the industry partnership, I think as I mentioned in the very beginning, 103 00:12:08,900 --> 00:12:15,320 I think there are barriers to changes that need to be made on both sides first for academia. 104 00:12:15,320 --> 00:12:22,820 I think a higher education needs some fundamental changes about its culture, especially about the existing, 105 00:12:22,820 --> 00:12:28,850 you know, reward recognition system through their tenure in the promotion process. 106 00:12:28,850 --> 00:12:33,950 So, so for example, whenever I try to talk to our social science faculty about the industry, 107 00:12:33,950 --> 00:12:37,820 engagement to some of the junior faculty told me that I'm sorry. 108 00:12:37,820 --> 00:12:43,890 I really, you know, don't have time to do that because of my department head who told me before I got tenure. 109 00:12:43,890 --> 00:12:50,690 Do not mess with industry money because that's paper money that's in Canada for my tenure promotion. 110 00:12:50,690 --> 00:12:55,070 I have to focus on NSF for an eight year proposal, so. 111 00:12:55,070 --> 00:13:00,890 So that's apparently something you know, we needed to tweak already to make it work. 112 00:13:00,890 --> 00:13:02,330 And for industry, 113 00:13:02,330 --> 00:13:12,920 I think we need needed to really define what it means to work and also transform future businesses to work more fulfilling human needs, 114 00:13:12,920 --> 00:13:16,880 human, social, aesthetic, intellectual and even spiritual needs. 115 00:13:16,880 --> 00:13:27,500 So, you know, in that regard, I think social science and humanities scholars can play a leading role because not all these dilemmas are facing 116 00:13:27,500 --> 00:13:34,460 the world is that high today can be completely resolved by technology because they are at a fundamentally, 117 00:13:34,460 --> 00:13:40,790 as Tony mentioned, and that that is essentially a fundamental change of human condition and that we need. 118 00:13:40,790 --> 00:13:46,640 It's social science and the humanities scholars have to tackle those thorny issues. 119 00:13:46,640 --> 00:13:53,510 And also moving forward, I think our government funding will be also crucial, you know, 120 00:13:53,510 --> 00:13:58,700 promoting convergence research process, the more discipline based enquiries. 121 00:13:58,700 --> 00:14:06,830 And I'm very pleased to see that tied to a former I i p division director. 122 00:14:06,830 --> 00:14:14,880 That's industrial innovation in a partnership division director here, that they have multiple programmes. 123 00:14:14,880 --> 00:14:21,380 One. This in this regard, and last but not least, 124 00:14:21,380 --> 00:14:29,840 I think the role of a professional organisations that can also play a very important role in terms of industry engagement. 125 00:14:29,840 --> 00:14:36,080 So just very quickly, a convergence researcher has other interesting component that you have to demonstrate 126 00:14:36,080 --> 00:14:41,480 stakeholder synergy involving both actually all three major players in government, 127 00:14:41,480 --> 00:14:45,410 academia and industry. So, well, I was at NSF. 128 00:14:45,410 --> 00:14:53,330 I think there are some exciting examples like this are you? CRC is a centre for advanced research or forensic science and social behaviour, 129 00:14:53,330 --> 00:14:58,340 or assigning scientists who played a very leading role in the UK last year. 130 00:14:58,340 --> 00:15:05,150 You know, through the Research England Connecting Capability Fund, they funded this aspect. 131 00:15:05,150 --> 00:15:12,260 That's a commercialisation for a platform, you know, for social science entrepreneurialism. 132 00:15:12,260 --> 00:15:20,450 And you know, I think moving forward, you see if you can work more closely with the Kosar, 133 00:15:20,450 --> 00:15:26,000 that's the consortium of Social Science Association in the United States. 134 00:15:26,000 --> 00:15:33,260 So I want to conclude by bringing you attention to this report, because that's another aspect. 135 00:15:33,260 --> 00:15:41,330 I spend quite a bit of time working at NSF to address the reproducibility and the replicate ability crisis. 136 00:15:41,330 --> 00:15:48,530 And we funded the project through the National Academy of Sciences. They finally have a report, if you read of the report. 137 00:15:48,530 --> 00:15:57,950 Between the lines, you will pick up the key message and I don't know what you think, but I think that'll be me. 138 00:15:57,950 --> 00:16:03,710 Think of Ernest the roof Rutherford coat I mentioned at the very beginning. 139 00:16:03,710 --> 00:16:11,570 That is especially if you look at all the social process of the STEM field, the engineering biomedical field research. 140 00:16:11,570 --> 00:16:15,410 There are really not so fundamentally different from social science. 141 00:16:15,410 --> 00:16:22,700 So I would like to end the cold by a slide to motivate a modification from Ernest Rutherford. 142 00:16:22,700 --> 00:16:29,660 I think the only possible conclusion sizes can draw is some do and some don't. 143 00:16:29,660 --> 00:16:35,750 So let's let's work out those conclusions that we can draw from the cutting edge of science regarding regardless whether 144 00:16:35,750 --> 00:16:42,440 it's a physical social sciences and the work closely with the industry and it to make a bigger impact on society. 145 00:16:42,440 --> 00:16:51,420 Thank you. Thanks, Daniel. 146 00:16:51,420 --> 00:16:56,130 I think there's some really practical things that we can focus on and work on there. 147 00:16:56,130 --> 00:16:58,930 And I'd now like to welcome to the stage. 148 00:16:58,930 --> 00:17:07,210 I'm Mike Wilson, who is associate general counsel of Facebook in the IP Licencing and Open-Source legal team. 149 00:17:07,210 --> 00:17:14,650 He was previously the technology transfer chief at Stanford University's SLAC National Accelerator Lab. 150 00:17:14,650 --> 00:17:20,710 Thanks, Mike. Thanks, Bridget. 151 00:17:20,710 --> 00:17:26,230 And special thanks to Tony and Phil USDP in Oxford for this fantastic event. 152 00:17:26,230 --> 00:17:30,100 It's been really great. We've been working together. We've been dining together. 153 00:17:30,100 --> 00:17:38,050 We've been staying here together, going on organised runs. I feel like we should all become Facebook friends. 154 00:17:38,050 --> 00:17:44,980 So again, I'm Michael Hudson. I'm an attorney with Facebook. My main client at Facebook is Facebook. 155 00:17:44,980 --> 00:17:50,920 Research was a research. Org. And as you can imagine, working at Facebook is not without its challenges. 156 00:17:50,920 --> 00:18:00,610 But what's great about my job is I feel like my day to day work is involved in identifying win win scenarios with Facebook and universities. 157 00:18:00,610 --> 00:18:05,440 So at the end of the day, I feel like if I identify a successful partnership, we both win. 158 00:18:05,440 --> 00:18:10,170 It's not a zero sum game, so it can be a really satisfying line of work. 159 00:18:10,170 --> 00:18:16,650 So I want to start by demonstrating a heatmap. Any guesses about what this represents? 160 00:18:16,650 --> 00:18:22,300 I'll give you a hint. It's not the number of lawsuits filed against Facebook in the past year. 161 00:18:22,300 --> 00:18:26,500 You know you. Now, vice president. 162 00:18:26,500 --> 00:18:30,240 It's Friends Connexions on Facebook. 163 00:18:30,240 --> 00:18:39,100 So no surprise there's concentration in geographic regions, but you can also see there's international connexions spanning the globe. 164 00:18:39,100 --> 00:18:47,530 And so despite the origin story of Facebook started by Mark in his dorm at Harvard, we're undeniably a global company now. 165 00:18:47,530 --> 00:18:55,060 We have over 40 international offices, 1.5 billion daily users, two point five billion monthly users. 166 00:18:55,060 --> 00:19:02,780 So undeniably, we have a global presence. We're no longer a small start-up company. 167 00:19:02,780 --> 00:19:10,520 OK, and our mission. Just real briefly, Facebook's mission is to give people the power to build community, to bring the world closer together. 168 00:19:10,520 --> 00:19:11,630 Mission accomplished. 169 00:19:11,630 --> 00:19:19,430 No, and often repeated slogan at Facebook is our job is only a one percent done, meaning that the vast majority of work is ahead of us. 170 00:19:19,430 --> 00:19:27,770 And I think that's definitely true. And in case you're not familiar with Facebook, first of all, welcome to 2019. 171 00:19:27,770 --> 00:19:35,390 And here's our here's a list of our of our brands. So on the left work workplace, which is basically a a corporate, ah, 172 00:19:35,390 --> 00:19:43,640 internal version of Facebook that has all the functionality of Facebook but is intended for sort of a closed environment or standalone messaging app. 173 00:19:43,640 --> 00:19:51,230 WhatsApp, what we call the Big Blue app, Facebook Messenger and Instagram and not pictured here is Oculus, 174 00:19:51,230 --> 00:19:57,620 which the augmented reality virtual reality consumer product, which if you haven't tried, is absolutely fantastic. 175 00:19:57,620 --> 00:20:04,160 No bias. It's really great that you did so at Facebook research. 176 00:20:04,160 --> 00:20:09,030 Our research agenda can be broken out of these categories. Now there's a lot of depth to a lot of these. 177 00:20:09,030 --> 00:20:16,970 I'm not going to go into detail, but I invite you to check out research that FT.com that goes into a lot of detail about all these research areas. 178 00:20:16,970 --> 00:20:22,370 For purposes of the presentation today, I'm going to talk about some of our challenges and successes. 179 00:20:22,370 --> 00:20:29,930 For example, in Facebook AI research, data science, human computer interaction, 180 00:20:29,930 --> 00:20:36,080 user experiences with privacy being the through line to all of our research initiatives. 181 00:20:36,080 --> 00:20:41,030 Now I get asked a lot internally and externally why we partner with academia. 182 00:20:41,030 --> 00:20:47,960 And the answers I usually give are universities have unique capabilities that we often don't have. 183 00:20:47,960 --> 00:20:53,660 Sometimes we're doing some exploratory research. Someone in the research org pitches a new problem. 184 00:20:53,660 --> 00:20:56,450 We want to evaluate it to see if we want to put resources behind it. 185 00:20:56,450 --> 00:21:02,510 Universities with the place for that, but probably more importantly, is independence and credibility of universities. 186 00:21:02,510 --> 00:21:09,950 We publish a lot. We commission a lot of publications and depending on the topic, social sciences in particular. 187 00:21:09,950 --> 00:21:15,440 We if we publish the results of whether or not it's safe for youth to use Instagram, 188 00:21:15,440 --> 00:21:20,030 for example, if that's a Facebook publication, that's going to be viewed with scepticism. Fair enough. 189 00:21:20,030 --> 00:21:24,410 So we want universities to independently study that and publish that. 190 00:21:24,410 --> 00:21:32,740 And in that way, we essentially leverage the independence and credibility of universities. 191 00:21:32,740 --> 00:21:38,590 So just real briefly, a few examples of the way that we engage with academia for students. 192 00:21:38,590 --> 00:21:48,690 We have a fellowship programme, Emerging Scholar Awards for Faculty Research Awards, also known as unrestricted gifts. 193 00:21:48,690 --> 00:21:52,680 Where I spent the vast majority of my time research collaborations. 194 00:21:52,680 --> 00:22:00,480 So we have a respectable network of universities, some people who are represented here, but it's not big enough Facebook research. 195 00:22:00,480 --> 00:22:05,730 There's only been around about five years, so we're still growing, we're still building our network of universities. 196 00:22:05,730 --> 00:22:14,310 So our goal is to greatly expand that network and partner with as many important universities as we can to advance our research agenda. 197 00:22:14,310 --> 00:22:19,530 We have visiting researchers and postdocs, and this is an interesting topic we're working on right now. 198 00:22:19,530 --> 00:22:28,920 Tony mentioned this yesterday morning. We're exploring ways where we can increase mobility from Facebook to universities, not just. 199 00:22:28,920 --> 00:22:33,540 Not just faculty coming to Facebook. Maybe on a sabbatical to do some research. 200 00:22:33,540 --> 00:22:37,710 But how would a researcher at Facebook spend a year at a university and maybe do some 201 00:22:37,710 --> 00:22:41,730 research at that university as a current challenge that I'm dealing with right now? 202 00:22:41,730 --> 00:22:48,930 And in research award recipients? And again, this is available on research that FT.com. 203 00:22:48,930 --> 00:22:57,310 Here's some videos explaining a few of our projects and programmes relating to social sciences, for example, privacy, social connectedness, 204 00:22:57,310 --> 00:23:09,420 etc. So we, as a social media company, we spend a lot of energy and resources on research, on social sciences research. 205 00:23:09,420 --> 00:23:17,080 And of course, you know, I don't want to. I don't want to claim that we're being altruistic by publishing the results of all 206 00:23:17,080 --> 00:23:21,810 this because obviously we use the results of this research to improve our app, 207 00:23:21,810 --> 00:23:25,950 to increase our user base and just continue to be more successful. 208 00:23:25,950 --> 00:23:33,510 But, you know, Facebook wasn't the first company to come up with a social media platform. 209 00:23:33,510 --> 00:23:36,180 We were probably at the right place at the right time. 210 00:23:36,180 --> 00:23:42,630 And so I feel like because of the size we've grown to, we do have a responsibility to do research in these areas, 211 00:23:42,630 --> 00:23:49,580 not just to improve our app, but to address some of these issues that have really risen to the surface with the growth of social media. 212 00:23:49,580 --> 00:23:53,600 So specifically on Human-Computer Action and user experiences. 213 00:23:53,600 --> 00:24:00,500 So again, we do a lot of research in ways we can understand and improve the social experiences of our users, 214 00:24:00,500 --> 00:24:04,280 which that research by definition, is cross-disciplinary. 215 00:24:04,280 --> 00:24:10,580 And so we struggle with questions like, for example, we have end to end encryption in WhatsApp. 216 00:24:10,580 --> 00:24:17,750 People love that do. Should we have ended encryption in all of our messaging platforms, Instagram and Facebook Messenger? 217 00:24:17,750 --> 00:24:22,580 How important is that to users? That could be the subject of a of several studies. 218 00:24:22,580 --> 00:24:27,260 And again, another issue we're currently contending with cross-platform messaging. 219 00:24:27,260 --> 00:24:33,560 What a user who's on Instagram want to be able to send a message to someone on an on using a Facebook app? 220 00:24:33,560 --> 00:24:37,400 Would they want to receive messages from a Facebook app to their Instagram account? 221 00:24:37,400 --> 00:24:46,940 A lot of people on on purpose keep independent IDs from Instagram and Facebook, so that's something we need to continue to explore. 222 00:24:46,940 --> 00:24:51,740 And so here's again, a few examples of our of our recent publications, 223 00:24:51,740 --> 00:24:59,510 we have about 800 publications, some authored by Facebook, most are jointly authored. 224 00:24:59,510 --> 00:25:06,650 As you can see, there's a lot relating to Air VR, a lot relating to safety, some relating to accessibility. 225 00:25:06,650 --> 00:25:18,350 But Publications is an area that that we intend to significantly grow over time as a result of partnering with more and more universities. 226 00:25:18,350 --> 00:25:24,740 OK, so what do our users care about when it comes to the type of research we do, 227 00:25:24,740 --> 00:25:32,210 our users care about privacy on the platform, they care about safety, authenticity and integrity transparency. 228 00:25:32,210 --> 00:25:39,320 And what do we care about? We care about what our users care about. We also care about clearly defining upfront intellectual property rights. 229 00:25:39,320 --> 00:25:44,270 We care about facilitating open collaboration between academics and Facebook. 230 00:25:44,270 --> 00:25:47,420 Setting up environments where that can take place and be effective. 231 00:25:47,420 --> 00:25:52,880 And so just a few examples of ways we've accomplished that in ways we are still figuring it out. 232 00:25:52,880 --> 00:25:56,720 First, in the air space. So we recently put together, we helped. 233 00:25:56,720 --> 00:26:02,960 We helped UC Berkeley architect the Berkeley Air Research Commons, which is an environment. 234 00:26:02,960 --> 00:26:05,660 It's an open, collaborative environment at UC Berkeley, 235 00:26:05,660 --> 00:26:13,970 where students and faculty and industry affiliates can openly collaborate on air topics that are generally pitched by students. 236 00:26:13,970 --> 00:26:18,020 And there are no IP rights resulting from the work that happens in this open space. 237 00:26:18,020 --> 00:26:19,400 Everything is published. 238 00:26:19,400 --> 00:26:26,630 So when you join that initiative as an industry member, you have to come in with the expectation that everything's going to be openly published. 239 00:26:26,630 --> 00:26:32,330 And what's great about that is if a student comes up with a really interesting topic that resonates with an industry member, 240 00:26:32,330 --> 00:26:36,560 they can take that out of the Commons. The industry member can fund that research. 241 00:26:36,560 --> 00:26:39,920 You can define IP rights in whatever way works for you. 242 00:26:39,920 --> 00:26:47,420 But at Facebook, we take an open science approach to all of our A.I. research, where we seek to just broadly publish everything. 243 00:26:47,420 --> 00:26:52,640 We don't seek proprietary IP rights. That's just the general approach we're taking in the air space. 244 00:26:52,640 --> 00:27:00,470 And then in the social sciences area, there's a few, a few interesting projects that won't go into, but I invite you to check them out. 245 00:27:00,470 --> 00:27:07,790 The Facebook journalism project, which is that Facebook journalism project Gqom, where we're working with media companies. 246 00:27:07,790 --> 00:27:11,630 One example of what we do there is trade media companies and how to effectively 247 00:27:11,630 --> 00:27:16,550 use social media to do reporting and investigating and things like that. 248 00:27:16,550 --> 00:27:19,700 And then the Election Research Commission that Daniel mentioned. 249 00:27:19,700 --> 00:27:28,370 So that's sort of a brand new model of how we can collaborate with third parties and the two issues there are data sharing and independence. 250 00:27:28,370 --> 00:27:35,990 And so we want this commission to define the research agenda of how they explore topics such as spreading of fake news. 251 00:27:35,990 --> 00:27:40,010 Manipulation of election results not just in the U.S. but worldwide. 252 00:27:40,010 --> 00:27:47,600 So and the issue there is we have a massive amount of data going back to, for example, the 2016 presidential election. 253 00:27:47,600 --> 00:27:53,300 How do we share that data? As I mentioned that $5 billion fine from the FTC. 254 00:27:53,300 --> 00:28:00,020 It comes with a lot of restrictions on how we can share data, and so we're really restricted in how we can share data. 255 00:28:00,020 --> 00:28:08,060 And so that that initiative is a process to figure out how we can share this data in a way that we're not violating our agreement with the FTC. 256 00:28:08,060 --> 00:28:13,730 And in a way that researchers can use that data and it's not anonymized to the point where it's useless. 257 00:28:13,730 --> 00:28:19,580 And then having the independence of the of that commission to define the research agenda means 258 00:28:19,580 --> 00:28:24,950 that independent academics are going to come up with results that we have no review rights over. 259 00:28:24,950 --> 00:28:30,440 We don't do pre-publication review. We don't set the topics. It's completely independent from Facebook. 260 00:28:30,440 --> 00:28:37,490 So what is that done? Now we're still struggling with some of the differential privacy issues, the way we share that data. 261 00:28:37,490 --> 00:28:46,110 So again, our job is one percent done. So thank you. 262 00:28:46,110 --> 00:28:53,700 We're now going to turn our attention to the UK, and I'm delighted to welcome Rick Bridge, who is dean of research, 263 00:28:53,700 --> 00:29:01,060 innovation and enterprise at Cardiff University and professor of organisational analysis at Cardiff Business School. 264 00:29:01,060 --> 00:29:06,240 And he has led the development of the world's first social science research park. 265 00:29:06,240 --> 00:29:18,690 Thanks, Rick. OK, thank you, colleagues, thank you for the invitation to be here this morning and thank you for attending. 266 00:29:18,690 --> 00:29:27,630 My role, I think, is to try and bring a particular institutional example of some of what we've heard from our from our colleagues and describe in 267 00:29:27,630 --> 00:29:35,340 some detail how Cardiff University is responding to the opportunities and challenges that you've already heard outlined so well, 268 00:29:35,340 --> 00:29:43,680 I hope you'll get from my presentation, for example, is a sense of how Cardiff University's responding to Daniel's challenge that business as 269 00:29:43,680 --> 00:29:50,250 usual won't see us get achieve the potential of working together in interdisciplinary, 270 00:29:50,250 --> 00:29:51,780 cross-sectoral ways. 271 00:29:51,780 --> 00:29:58,560 You'll hear a little bit about how we're responding to Mike's observation that we need to create spaces and opportunities for interaction, 272 00:29:58,560 --> 00:30:04,290 embedding all our researchers in companies or having companies come and spend extended periods of 273 00:30:04,290 --> 00:30:12,330 time with us and George's comments around cross-sectoral embracing the public and third sector, 274 00:30:12,330 --> 00:30:21,960 and an emphasis on what we would call public value or public good, as well as economic value in the innovation activities that we engage in. 275 00:30:21,960 --> 00:30:30,570 So the picture you can see there on the right hand side is a translational research facility for physical scientists, 276 00:30:30,570 --> 00:30:34,770 particularly working in catalysis and on compound semiconductors. 277 00:30:34,770 --> 00:30:42,090 The building on the left is the innovation central building that is currently under construction and that will be home to, 278 00:30:42,090 --> 00:30:50,010 as you said, the world's first social science park. If you want to know more about that, then I wrote about that as a concept a few years ago, 279 00:30:50,010 --> 00:30:58,500 and thanks to the very hard work of a large number of people, we're now seeing that physical space come out of the ground. 280 00:30:58,500 --> 00:31:06,240 So as I've said, we take a view that innovation is about creating value, but value can come in a variety of different forms. 281 00:31:06,240 --> 00:31:14,730 And in particular, we feel that the co-location of collaborators from across different parts of the economy and across different parts of 282 00:31:14,730 --> 00:31:22,500 the academy allows the opportunity to open up new ways of looking at well-established societal challenges and problems. 283 00:31:22,500 --> 00:31:26,340 And so the Spark initiative in particular, is around supporting interdisciplinary, 284 00:31:26,340 --> 00:31:33,720 working with a focus on challenging, dealing with sorry, some of society's most established challenges. 285 00:31:33,720 --> 00:31:40,710 And that we feel is really a key role for social science in contributing to an innovation 286 00:31:40,710 --> 00:31:45,840 agenda that is more attuned with some of what will actually deliver for society. 287 00:31:45,840 --> 00:31:52,920 But I think the first key point I'd like to emphasise is that whilst reference to interdisciplinary 288 00:31:52,920 --> 00:31:58,890 working reference to societal challenges is certainly permeated the science policy discourse in the UK, 289 00:31:58,890 --> 00:32:06,070 at least, I'm sure elsewhere we don't see, in my view, yet enough. 290 00:32:06,070 --> 00:32:12,610 Difference in how funding bodies and how institutions are taking on these, these challenges we're not seeing. 291 00:32:12,610 --> 00:32:18,890 I don't think innovative practise following the the exhortation to change. 292 00:32:18,890 --> 00:32:22,460 I want to try and just give you a flavour of what we're doing in Cardiff to try and deliver that. 293 00:32:22,460 --> 00:32:26,740 Now I'm I'm conscious, having shared the stage with my colleagues from the US, 294 00:32:26,740 --> 00:32:31,060 my my figures are in millions of pounds colleagues, not billions of pounds. 295 00:32:31,060 --> 00:32:35,470 I have to say, but these are sizeable sums of money for the Cardiff University, 296 00:32:35,470 --> 00:32:44,410 and we're investing 56 million pounds in creating a new physical space designed with and for our researchers, 297 00:32:44,410 --> 00:32:51,280 social science led applied research teams working on the economy, public health, crime and security, children's social care, 298 00:32:51,280 --> 00:32:55,600 public services, innovation, public policy, climate change sustainability, 299 00:32:55,600 --> 00:32:59,650 bringing those research groups together with their research partners from the public, 300 00:32:59,650 --> 00:33:10,540 private and third sector, and locating them alongside a business innovation centre which will host Start-Up Spin out and other industry collaborators. 301 00:33:10,540 --> 00:33:17,710 And we are persuaded of the value of that opportunity for close physical interaction and 302 00:33:17,710 --> 00:33:22,130 close proximity because we feel part of the challenge to deliver this interdisciplinary 303 00:33:22,130 --> 00:33:27,460 cross-sectoral working is building a sense of shared enterprise and a common language that we 304 00:33:27,460 --> 00:33:32,800 can take forward and work together on projects that are focussed on some of these challenges. 305 00:33:32,800 --> 00:33:43,040 The physical space is large. It will be home to around 800 people once when construction is completed in around 15 months time or so. 306 00:33:43,040 --> 00:33:47,150 So we see the importance of communication in building the sense of common purpose, 307 00:33:47,150 --> 00:33:51,470 building a sense of mutual learning and trust developing that shared understanding and also, 308 00:33:51,470 --> 00:33:58,100 of course, the promotion of the serendipitous positive outcome somebody said to me from our advisory board the other day. 309 00:33:58,100 --> 00:33:59,150 What would success like? 310 00:33:59,150 --> 00:34:06,560 And I said, Well, we have in mind the computer scientists will work with medical science as much as as you've heard George to describe. 311 00:34:06,560 --> 00:34:10,430 But what would really be success for me would be when I showed people around in five years time, I say, 312 00:34:10,430 --> 00:34:16,010 Well, I never imagined that these guys would get together with these people to work on this project. 313 00:34:16,010 --> 00:34:20,990 So it's that opportunity to explore the the unknown collaborations as well. 314 00:34:20,990 --> 00:34:27,740 I think that's exciting. One of the research groups that will enter the building is the Crime Security Research Institute. 315 00:34:27,740 --> 00:34:34,340 They work very closely with a number of industrial partners, including IBM Research, and a quick example of some of that work. 316 00:34:34,340 --> 00:34:42,890 Was there a partnership with the local police service when South Wales hosted a of summit a number of years ago, 317 00:34:42,890 --> 00:34:48,980 and they were involved with IBM research monitoring social media tracking the emotions 318 00:34:48,980 --> 00:34:53,000 that were captured in a variety of different tweets that referenced the NATO's summit. 319 00:34:53,000 --> 00:35:01,520 And at one point, there appeared to be quite an upturn in negative commentary and activity on social media around the summit, 320 00:35:01,520 --> 00:35:10,520 which suggested that there might be to use a technical phrase, something kicking off in the city nearer one of the local government buildings. 321 00:35:10,520 --> 00:35:13,370 But because we're combining computer science with social science, 322 00:35:13,370 --> 00:35:20,660 we had ethnographers on the ground in in the location and they were able to confirm that actually was very low level. 323 00:35:20,660 --> 00:35:25,220 There were very few people there and therefore the police service didn't need to respond. 324 00:35:25,220 --> 00:35:31,190 And quite a lot of the work that these guys have done is in informing police responses to different to different events. 325 00:35:31,190 --> 00:35:37,550 And that's, I think, a small but good example of working across these disciplinary boundaries. 326 00:35:37,550 --> 00:35:43,370 These guys are a really committed to the opportunities that the that the Spark initiative will bring them, 327 00:35:43,370 --> 00:35:51,170 and in fact, they've already relayed out their own space. It's a mirror of the physical space they'll move into in 15 months time, 328 00:35:51,170 --> 00:35:54,710 and they're already finding the benefits of hot desking with external partners 329 00:35:54,710 --> 00:35:59,450 from the police service or from industry and having their physical scientist. 330 00:35:59,450 --> 00:36:03,740 Researchers spend more time with the with the social scientists. 331 00:36:03,740 --> 00:36:10,310 And of course, at least in the UK context, we have an agenda the set and driven through the Research Excellence Framework, 332 00:36:10,310 --> 00:36:17,390 which looks to capture some of the broader benefit to society of research through the impact that that work makes. 333 00:36:17,390 --> 00:36:24,770 And they're finding this is a list. The spaces are very helpful to them in developing that agenda. 334 00:36:24,770 --> 00:36:28,070 Another example of the collaboration we've undertaken is with Nesta, 335 00:36:28,070 --> 00:36:32,570 a UK based innovation foundation, and this works in particular on public services, 336 00:36:32,570 --> 00:36:41,360 innovation and a project we've been working on in the last two or three years with Welsh Government sees us work with partners from the public 337 00:36:41,360 --> 00:36:49,160 and third sector on projects that will take cost out of the delivery of public services in ways that can be returned as catchable savings. 338 00:36:49,160 --> 00:36:56,210 And the research team with those partners to ensure that the project is sufficiently ambitious and innovative in its nature, 339 00:36:56,210 --> 00:37:02,240 and is also carefully evaluated to demonstrate the returns on those investments. 340 00:37:02,240 --> 00:37:09,470 We've worked with around 15 projects so far, and we've got two initiatives currently in the in the lone stage. 341 00:37:09,470 --> 00:37:16,310 Well, there was interesting just to touch on a couple of the projects that speak to the agenda of this morning's panel. 342 00:37:16,310 --> 00:37:25,850 We work with Innovate Trust, the small local charity, to see how the application of of off the shelf digital assistants like Amazon's Alexa could 343 00:37:25,850 --> 00:37:31,880 be helpful to people with adults with learning disabilities to innate the independent living, 344 00:37:31,880 --> 00:37:35,060 possibly in in shared housing spaces. 345 00:37:35,060 --> 00:37:43,970 Another example a very recent initiative using the new technology developed by a local start up firm called Serpell, 346 00:37:43,970 --> 00:37:49,400 working with a local city council to use digital applications to monitor and 347 00:37:49,400 --> 00:37:56,060 manage energy usage in public buildings with a view to being more sophisticated, 348 00:37:56,060 --> 00:38:01,430 more accurate and therefore more effective in terms of energy usage. 349 00:38:01,430 --> 00:38:08,090 A search for an interesting example the last example I want to just mention they 350 00:38:08,090 --> 00:38:14,990 were created through a local entrepreneurship programme led by Alacrity Foundation. 351 00:38:14,990 --> 00:38:20,000 And the conversation I'm currently having with the 10 local government authorities in the Cardiff City 352 00:38:20,000 --> 00:38:26,150 Region is around a project that would see us take entrepreneurial start ups in digital and tech, 353 00:38:26,150 --> 00:38:36,650 embed them in the lab, work on public services innovation to see what digital applications can generate improvements in public services delivery, 354 00:38:36,650 --> 00:38:41,380 but also create the opportunities for new start-up and spin out businesses working alongside. 355 00:38:41,380 --> 00:38:49,150 Only those two projects with public sector procurement staff to try and open up the public sector 356 00:38:49,150 --> 00:38:55,480 procurement purse in South Wales and using a set of challenge price to generate new insights, 357 00:38:55,480 --> 00:39:00,820 new input into public services, innovation, delivering better services for citizens, 358 00:39:00,820 --> 00:39:06,670 but also creating new commercial opportunities through the application of digital technologies. 359 00:39:06,670 --> 00:39:14,410 That's an initiative that we're still in discussion with, but I hope will better report back on progress and successful outcomes in the future. 360 00:39:14,410 --> 00:39:22,600 So to sort of summarise and sum up, the Cardiff University approach to social science led innovation in producing economic and 361 00:39:22,600 --> 00:39:27,580 public value is one that sees the value of collaboration across heterogeneous sets of actors, 362 00:39:27,580 --> 00:39:33,280 but sees that that needs support, facilitation and business as usual won't deliver that on its own. 363 00:39:33,280 --> 00:39:40,630 So are creating spaces and opportunities to interact and to partner to facilitate the shared 364 00:39:40,630 --> 00:39:49,360 problem definition of of a of a of a more complex and more interactive programme of activity. 365 00:39:49,360 --> 00:39:57,640 Developing shared language and theoretical concepts in iterative processes of dialogue, testing experiments and experimenting with interventions. 366 00:39:57,640 --> 00:40:05,650 And hopefully generating and co-creating a knowledge that will work for our citizens and also generate economic and other forms of value. 367 00:40:05,650 --> 00:40:10,780 Thank you very much. 368 00:40:10,780 --> 00:40:22,300 I have a question about a spark when you when we put it to the partners together, co-location and setting it up, but how do we enable people working? 369 00:40:22,300 --> 00:40:25,300 Truly working together has a lot to do with the roles, 370 00:40:25,300 --> 00:40:30,580 responsibilities and the nature of the partnership and what kind of leadership structure really works. 371 00:40:30,580 --> 00:40:36,310 Would you like to comment on that? OK, thank you. Yeah. 372 00:40:36,310 --> 00:40:46,480 So the advantage we have is that the research groups that were moving into the physical space already exist and already work with external partners. 373 00:40:46,480 --> 00:40:51,310 That was part of how they were selected to be involved in the initiative in the first place. 374 00:40:51,310 --> 00:40:54,580 What I think it's fair to say is that there's a variety of different approaches 375 00:40:54,580 --> 00:40:58,000 to how they've been working with the organisations they already work with. 376 00:40:58,000 --> 00:41:05,690 What we've been doing at an institutional level is beginning to try and broaden out the ambitions of the individual research groups. 377 00:41:05,690 --> 00:41:09,370 So for example, we run something called the Spark Challenge workshops, 378 00:41:09,370 --> 00:41:14,260 where we get external organisations from the public or private sector to bring a 379 00:41:14,260 --> 00:41:18,220 problem or a challenge or an issue that they've been they've been struggling with. 380 00:41:18,220 --> 00:41:23,260 Or they recognise that they would like to know more about where we know we've got expertise 381 00:41:23,260 --> 00:41:27,490 across a variety of different schools and disciplines that might be useful to them. 382 00:41:27,490 --> 00:41:33,670 And we hosted a half day a day or a two day workshop or hackathon where we bring 383 00:41:33,670 --> 00:41:37,750 together people from the external partner from from within the university, 384 00:41:37,750 --> 00:41:44,410 and then we can provide some seed funding if those conversations look like they've got some, some value in being followed up. 385 00:41:44,410 --> 00:41:52,990 So my view is that it's it's quite light touch work to bring together organisations and people that might not otherwise have the 386 00:41:52,990 --> 00:42:00,730 opportunity to speak to each other and provide them with some pump priming resource to allow them to explore those opportunities further. 387 00:42:00,730 --> 00:42:08,170 And in the U.K., we're reasonably well placed because of a variety of different challenge funds that have been made available, 388 00:42:08,170 --> 00:42:15,910 and I use the Impact Accelerator account we get from from the government to support some of that seed funding activity. 389 00:42:15,910 --> 00:42:21,670 And then there's the wider pots of money, no doubt along the lines that we heard from colleagues in the states with NSF, 390 00:42:21,670 --> 00:42:30,190 but would then allow those promising conversations to move forward in more substantial and practical ways. 391 00:42:30,190 --> 00:42:32,050 Mike, I wondered if from that, 392 00:42:32,050 --> 00:42:41,170 you mentioned the fact that you're looking to expand the exchange of your research teams and research teams outside of Facebook is there. 393 00:42:41,170 --> 00:42:47,190 I wondered what it was that you feel that you're missing at the moment that that kind of proximity will allow you to achieve? 394 00:42:47,190 --> 00:42:54,160 No, it's a good question. And I was thinking about that when I heard about Spark and how we can enable that kind of collaboration. 395 00:42:54,160 --> 00:43:01,540 I think from our standpoint, we either need to have an understanding like like the bear programme that I described. 396 00:43:01,540 --> 00:43:06,460 We're going in with the understanding that this is all open. We have other industry members in there. 397 00:43:06,460 --> 00:43:10,570 We're going to hear what we're talking about. We're not getting any IP rights or anything. 398 00:43:10,570 --> 00:43:13,720 We set the parameters for that collaboration. That's fine. 399 00:43:13,720 --> 00:43:21,040 There are some topics that we discussed that we need input from academics on that are kind of sensitive, right? 400 00:43:21,040 --> 00:43:25,240 And so we need to have what I call like a safe space where we can figure out a way where we can 401 00:43:25,240 --> 00:43:30,280 have an open dialogue with the understanding that until we're ready to commission some research, 402 00:43:30,280 --> 00:43:37,780 what we discuss in the sort of the ideation phase that's not necessarily going to leave the room because we might be, 403 00:43:37,780 --> 00:43:43,540 you know, as I said, we have a responsibility to not even verbally disclose certain types of user data. 404 00:43:43,540 --> 00:43:49,360 And if we can freely discuss some of these issues in the context of specific user data, for example, 405 00:43:49,360 --> 00:43:54,130 I think that would lead to a more productive discussion that would lead to some more good research projects. 406 00:43:54,130 --> 00:43:58,060 But how we structure that, I'm not a hundred percent sure. 407 00:43:58,060 --> 00:44:03,070 I mean, we've done some very topically specific meetings where we've brought in experts. 408 00:44:03,070 --> 00:44:11,890 For example, one thing we're working on now, which Mark has announced is an independent appeals board that's going to review appeals to our content 409 00:44:11,890 --> 00:44:17,890 removal decisions where a user who had their content removed say it's deemed to be hate speech. 410 00:44:17,890 --> 00:44:22,810 They can appeal it. But I don't think this was hate speech, which can be very subjective. 411 00:44:22,810 --> 00:44:25,870 This appeals board is going to review that based on our community standards, 412 00:44:25,870 --> 00:44:32,200 make an independent judgement that we have no oversight into, and we would we would implement whatever their judgement is. 413 00:44:32,200 --> 00:44:36,580 And so we brought in subject matter experts from the media and macadamia all 414 00:44:36,580 --> 00:44:43,210 these different experts under NDA under that very agenda driven collaboration, 415 00:44:43,210 --> 00:44:47,560 open discussion. But that's very specialised discussion. 416 00:44:47,560 --> 00:44:51,160 It wouldn't be like, let's kick around some ideas, sort of thing. 417 00:44:51,160 --> 00:44:57,970 Yeah. So getting there, I think we'd like to get there, but I think there's some challenges ahead to do exactly that to enable that. 418 00:44:57,970 --> 00:45:03,120 So getting people in in proximity, but under the right side, right? 419 00:45:03,120 --> 00:45:11,340 Dan, do you do you have anything to add on that point about kind of exchange or proximity? 420 00:45:11,340 --> 00:45:16,690 I don't know, I mean, NSF has these dear colleague letters or I mean, 421 00:45:16,690 --> 00:45:29,260 these solicitations that may be targeted for specific kinds of exchanges, but other than, you know. 422 00:45:29,260 --> 00:45:35,140 I think to make this sort of, you know, interdisciplinary team to work, 423 00:45:35,140 --> 00:45:43,810 co-location is one thing, but to really build the social network is also really important. 424 00:45:43,810 --> 00:45:49,600 So on our campuses, since I came on board, I have been in it's. 425 00:45:49,600 --> 00:45:58,660 For example, blockchain. You know, we have a faculty so interested in blockchain research, you know, scattered all over our campus. 426 00:45:58,660 --> 00:46:05,170 So we've been trying to establish a series of like a year for faculty working groups. 427 00:46:05,170 --> 00:46:11,960 So we are not I wish I could have the, you know, your effort to facilitate to put them together. 428 00:46:11,960 --> 00:46:19,360 But right now we run out of space. But through the, you know, the informal like a faculty network, you know, 429 00:46:19,360 --> 00:46:26,980 they meet on a regular basis and then some meaningful work and collaboration could follow. 430 00:46:26,980 --> 00:46:40,720 I think we have. Yes. No question. If you take me at the conference for me was the see the dissolution of the difference between basic 431 00:46:40,720 --> 00:46:47,110 and applied sciences tending to be some kind of difference between both along the same lines. 432 00:46:47,110 --> 00:46:52,330 We talk about the physical sciences and the social sciences. Here's what I've learnt. 433 00:46:52,330 --> 00:46:54,940 Do you think it's also might be feasible at somewhere in the future? 434 00:46:54,940 --> 00:46:59,110 We talk about sciences and no longer about any difference in the type of science here. 435 00:46:59,110 --> 00:47:02,340 I'd like to get your perspective on that. 436 00:47:02,340 --> 00:47:11,750 This question, so the I think the question was in the future, could we be talking about sciences as a home, I suppose altogether, 437 00:47:11,750 --> 00:47:16,550 as opposed to just differentiating between the physical sciences, biological sciences and social sciences? 438 00:47:16,550 --> 00:47:22,880 So kind of broadening the church in a more linguistically inclusive way, I guess. 439 00:47:22,880 --> 00:47:29,030 But if you look at the stories, it sounds like social sciences still have to prove their value to society in some way, 440 00:47:29,030 --> 00:47:38,060 which is kind of an oxymoron to me because the social sciences. So to what extent can we kind of semantically make that, but it's a lot easier to do? 441 00:47:38,060 --> 00:47:42,250 Well, I I have a number of observations I could make out. 442 00:47:42,250 --> 00:47:54,680 I'll keep it brief. So as your question suggests, there is a power differential and a resource differential across the academy, 443 00:47:54,680 --> 00:47:59,900 and I've had a role across the whole of my university as a social scientist for the last seven years. 444 00:47:59,900 --> 00:48:06,590 And certainly David in the room can attest look banged on a lot about the value of social sciences in the context where that's not necessarily a 445 00:48:06,590 --> 00:48:16,280 default position that those that those those aspects of the academy have a contribution to making some of the spaces we've been talking about. 446 00:48:16,280 --> 00:48:20,630 So I think there is a political agenda that means we should fly the flag for social sciences. 447 00:48:20,630 --> 00:48:24,110 And I think there would be a danger in collapsing differentiation, 448 00:48:24,110 --> 00:48:30,590 which would mean that the social sciences got swamped by the larger and more powerful physical sciences. 449 00:48:30,590 --> 00:48:38,570 But I also think there's a question around whether your aspirations are interdisciplinary or post disciplinary in nature. 450 00:48:38,570 --> 00:48:43,610 Are you some work by a guy called John Brewer in setting up the concept of the social science park? 451 00:48:43,610 --> 00:48:46,160 And he actually advocates post disciplinary. 452 00:48:46,160 --> 00:48:53,760 But I I would pull back from that and say, Well, actually, I think what we're talking about is building from the firm foundations of the disciplines. 453 00:48:53,760 --> 00:48:58,040 Now, sometimes those disciplines morph into new disciplinary spaces. 454 00:48:58,040 --> 00:49:04,400 But I think it's in my view, it's preferable to retain the focus on the value of the disciplines and then 455 00:49:04,400 --> 00:49:08,270 understand how they can be brought together in productive and complementary ways, 456 00:49:08,270 --> 00:49:12,320 rather than perhaps looking to move beyond those disciplinary foundations. 457 00:49:12,320 --> 00:49:16,700 But that's a personal take. Yeah, yeah. 458 00:49:16,700 --> 00:49:20,390 I think I kind of agree. 459 00:49:20,390 --> 00:49:29,330 I think we're moving forward. I think we need to both the discipline of research and interdisciplinary research. 460 00:49:29,330 --> 00:49:35,150 So, well, I was. NSF has been quite a bit of time. 461 00:49:35,150 --> 00:49:40,040 Promoting the big finale is convergence of research. 462 00:49:40,040 --> 00:49:43,280 You can't just be saying that he is trying to bring all the, you know, 463 00:49:43,280 --> 00:49:50,570 the horizontal dimension calls for transdisciplinary, deep intellectual integration. 464 00:49:50,570 --> 00:49:56,150 But but in order to do that, you have to have a scholarly piece of research just off the top. 465 00:49:56,150 --> 00:50:00,350 So it's a dialectical process, so we need both. 466 00:50:00,350 --> 00:50:05,510 It's not one of the other because, you know, moving forward, 467 00:50:05,510 --> 00:50:13,340 I think it's both the convergence and divergence in both the discipline base and of disposition work of that. 468 00:50:13,340 --> 00:50:21,130 Is that a dynamic? So, you know, we will probably have more innovative work. 469 00:50:21,130 --> 00:50:26,700 This is not an NZDF story, but I had one engineer come up to me and say, Hey, 470 00:50:26,700 --> 00:50:36,610 I want to do some research with the research team together and let's go, you know, and I said, Well, you want to see research teams? 471 00:50:36,610 --> 00:50:41,530 He goes, Yeah, engineering research teams, that's why you came to the that's fine. 472 00:50:41,530 --> 00:50:47,350 And he said, Well, that's easy. Teams do just get together and then go. 473 00:50:47,350 --> 00:50:51,670 And I said, No, they don't just go, you know, I mean, to be honest. 474 00:50:51,670 --> 00:50:56,380 And he said, Well, what? We did learn about teams and I said, Well, how do you select the team? 475 00:50:56,380 --> 00:51:01,670 You know, how do you Trinity, how do you do that dynamical team processes that emerge over time, you know? 476 00:51:01,670 --> 00:51:05,740 And and then his eyes glaze over. He goes, No idea. 477 00:51:05,740 --> 00:51:13,420 There was a whole social science on teams, and I thought, Duh, you know, I mean, we talk about engineering. 478 00:51:13,420 --> 00:51:19,240 I would never say I had no idea. There's a whole engineering thing about designing this thing. 479 00:51:19,240 --> 00:51:24,400 You know, this piece of equipment? I mean, as a social scientist, I would never say that. 480 00:51:24,400 --> 00:51:28,990 But the physical sciences, they often do say that about the social as well. 481 00:51:28,990 --> 00:51:32,940 Leadership is just the leader would tell the follower what to do. And then you're done. 482 00:51:32,940 --> 00:51:41,910 No, you know, I mean, we all know and as a psychologist, I know quite well that, no, you just don't tell somebody and they do it and then you're done. 483 00:51:41,910 --> 00:51:44,860 It's it's far more complicated. 484 00:51:44,860 --> 00:51:54,100 And so there is a need to to be an expert in the field, you know, like dance with, you know, the deep in your discipline. 485 00:51:54,100 --> 00:52:05,620 But there is also a very real need to be is the discipline and the new assistant director for social, behavioural and economic sciences at NSF. 486 00:52:05,620 --> 00:52:17,050 He said I am now a sense in terms of pushing the social science value to the physical sciences instead, the hard times because they need to be. 487 00:52:17,050 --> 00:52:22,480 They need to understand that mindset. And you all are the choir. 488 00:52:22,480 --> 00:52:28,480 I mean, it's just been great to hear how this group understands the value of social science. 489 00:52:28,480 --> 00:52:39,340 But there are a lot of people who aren't singing at all on this, and they need to be pushed on off. 490 00:52:39,340 --> 00:52:50,350 That's only. Perhaps next time you can ask the engineer to read in the copy currently for a day. 491 00:52:50,350 --> 00:53:03,930 Okay. Gentlemen, we have a lot of tech transfer people here in the audience and the members of panel have examples where 492 00:53:03,930 --> 00:53:10,500 social sciences research has been critical for the successful commercialisation of new technologies. 493 00:53:10,500 --> 00:53:16,480 Or maybe people in the audience too. Rick? 494 00:53:16,480 --> 00:53:26,430 Well, my favourite example, which may not speak to the specifics of your question is the work that we did in collaboration with the 495 00:53:26,430 --> 00:53:33,900 University of Bristol around taking a programme into schools to persuade children not to take up smoking. 496 00:53:33,900 --> 00:53:43,350 And that programme has been spun out as a not for profit organisation and is working now independently of Semi Samuel Thomas of the university. 497 00:53:43,350 --> 00:53:51,090 Another example would be called if the school was the UK, home to a lot of research around lean production in the 1990s, 498 00:53:51,090 --> 00:54:00,090 and we've subsequently spun out a training and competency competency development firm that trains people in lean 499 00:54:00,090 --> 00:54:06,450 management techniques so that they're not examples where social science has been the load bearer for technology. 500 00:54:06,450 --> 00:54:13,770 There are examples where social science has been the basis of new businesses or new activities in its own right, 501 00:54:13,770 --> 00:54:22,050 which I think is is where I'd like to see more activity. Daniel mentioned the aspect programme that's funded by Research England in Cardiff 502 00:54:22,050 --> 00:54:27,270 is a non funded participant since we're in Wales of the Of the Aspect programme, 503 00:54:27,270 --> 00:54:34,110 which is directly addressing the potential commercialisation opportunities from social science research. 504 00:54:34,110 --> 00:54:37,140 So that's where my interests have been, but I'm sure there are. 505 00:54:37,140 --> 00:54:44,940 There are lots of examples where social science comes together with technologists to deliver business opportunities, 506 00:54:44,940 --> 00:54:52,170 by the way, that's an excellent question. That was the first question I received during my first week at NSF. 507 00:54:52,170 --> 00:55:01,230 When my boss asked me the first call, I was to do the congressional testimony for FY 2017 budget. 508 00:55:01,230 --> 00:55:05,130 So she asked me the motivations to gave her some examples. 509 00:55:05,130 --> 00:55:13,170 Are there any real examples as so social you guys have funded rather have led to a commercially successful commercialisation? 510 00:55:13,170 --> 00:55:19,380 So I mobilised my entire division, all the four day programme officers, to help me on that. 511 00:55:19,380 --> 00:55:24,120 So, so in the end, you know, we come up with two examples. 512 00:55:24,120 --> 00:55:28,710 I think she used both examples in her testimony. 513 00:55:28,710 --> 00:55:40,620 So one is a lot of people didn't know that her of Google actually was a funded by the social side me because they're the two co-founders of Google, 514 00:55:40,620 --> 00:55:46,350 Sergey Brin, Larry Larry Page of both of them were as a graduate student. 515 00:55:46,350 --> 00:55:50,730 Well, they were all working on the page rank algorithm. 516 00:55:50,730 --> 00:55:58,080 They were funded by graduate assistant shaper through the digital library project Alexandra, 517 00:55:58,080 --> 00:56:07,020 a project that was the money primarily from HP and also in the development of a page rank algorithm. 518 00:56:07,020 --> 00:56:15,300 He was more inspired by the social network analysis, which was developed by sociologists rather than by computer scientists. 519 00:56:15,300 --> 00:56:26,830 So that was a good example. And the second example is social fund data and CGA National Centre for Geographic Information and Analysis. 520 00:56:26,830 --> 00:56:28,530 So that was my own field. 521 00:56:28,530 --> 00:56:39,870 That was really handy because of that two five year funding that really led to the growth of our two billion dollar industry, the geospatial industry. 522 00:56:39,870 --> 00:56:55,380 Now, these days, that is a very robust thing as it has been continue to grow. 523 00:56:55,380 --> 00:57:00,420 And one of the things that's going on in the UK at the moment is SSA very keen to 524 00:57:00,420 --> 00:57:06,960 increase the amount of business engagement in post inside PhDs in social sciences. 525 00:57:06,960 --> 00:57:10,980 And I think that's something that we could be doing more of. 526 00:57:10,980 --> 00:57:16,770 You see a lot co-sponsor PhDs in the in this kind of the physical sciences bill, but less so in social. 527 00:57:16,770 --> 00:57:23,010 So I was just wondering what were the only good examples that you aid from the US or UK where where we've seen a lot of good, 528 00:57:23,010 --> 00:57:26,190 good industry engagement Ph.D.s or whether, you know, 529 00:57:26,190 --> 00:57:32,490 from a Facebook point of view or an industry point of view, that's something that you guys are looking at. 530 00:57:32,490 --> 00:57:43,890 Yeah, sure. So we are, as I mentioned during my session, we are exploring ways to increase mobility between academia and Facebook, 531 00:57:43,890 --> 00:57:50,580 and we're pretty good about going one direction, bringing in faculty to be a visiting researcher, things like that. 532 00:57:50,580 --> 00:57:54,420 But one area we're currently trying to figure out, as I mentioned, 533 00:57:54,420 --> 00:58:00,690 is how do we have researchers who as has been brought up a few times during this conference? 534 00:58:00,690 --> 00:58:07,860 People leave their PhD programme before they're done because a company like Facebook gives them an offer they can't say no to. 535 00:58:07,860 --> 00:58:14,610 And now they want to go back and get their Ph.D., for example. How do we enable that where we keep them employed at Facebook? 536 00:58:14,610 --> 00:58:17,250 They can pursue their Ph.D. 537 00:58:17,250 --> 00:58:24,360 Maybe they have joint advisors because, you know, we have an advisor at Facebook Advisor University and they can be somewhat controversial. 538 00:58:24,360 --> 00:58:32,760 But how do we enable that to happen? And so I think we are looking at ways we can enable that kind of engagement with universities where we can take, 539 00:58:32,760 --> 00:58:36,930 you know, highly ranked researchers at Facebook who frankly, 540 00:58:36,930 --> 00:58:45,120 we would benefit from them getting a Ph.D. and they would benefit as well, sending them to a university and obtaining their Ph.D. and social science. 541 00:58:45,120 --> 00:58:50,880 We have a lot of social science researchers that certainly would be an area that would be eligible for that kind of programme. 542 00:58:50,880 --> 00:58:55,770 We're just at that really early stages of testing the waters in this space. 543 00:58:55,770 --> 00:59:00,480 So I understand if Facebook is doing lots of work on UC Berkeley campus. 544 00:59:00,480 --> 00:59:04,610 So, so can you elaborate a little bit more detail how that is work? 545 00:59:04,610 --> 00:59:12,480 What are the mechanisms? Right? So, yeah, so we have a relationship with UC Berkeley in other ways, sponsor research, et cetera. 546 00:59:12,480 --> 00:59:19,930 But the The Bear Commons is sort of a new mechanism to, like I said, it creates an open, 547 00:59:19,930 --> 00:59:25,650 collaborative space where the understanding is we don't obtain industry members, don't obtain any IP rights. 548 00:59:25,650 --> 00:59:32,010 The university doesn't seek IP protection. So that causes a lot of collaboration in that open collaborative space. 549 00:59:32,010 --> 00:59:36,150 But what's great about this space is it's really driven by the students. 550 00:59:36,150 --> 00:59:41,340 So the students drive the research agenda, drive the discussions in the Commons. 551 00:59:41,340 --> 00:59:43,650 If there's a project that's proposed, 552 00:59:43,650 --> 00:59:52,950 it has to be proposed by a student and then a panel made up of of faculty and industry members review these ideas and they might vote on it and say, 553 00:59:52,950 --> 00:59:58,680 this is something that we Facebook. Maybe we're interested in a deeper dive on this topic. 554 00:59:58,680 --> 01:00:05,730 And so then we take that out of the Commons Fund, some sponsored research, and we could have proprietary rights resulting in that. 555 01:00:05,730 --> 01:00:10,770 But as I mentioned in the air space, we tend to just publish everything and don't seek IP rights. 556 01:00:10,770 --> 01:00:20,070 But I think what's different about this is it allows for an open, collaborative space, but that the entire agenda is driven by students. 557 01:00:20,070 --> 01:00:28,530 And we, of course, will use that as a mechanism to identify talent when they're done with their PhD programme or whatever it is. 558 01:00:28,530 --> 01:00:32,280 Maybe that's a candidate that we want to talk about coming to Facebook, 559 01:00:32,280 --> 01:00:37,320 so we get a lot of benefits just from interacting more closely with students along the way. 560 01:00:37,320 --> 01:00:46,350 So it's it's been up and running for not even a year now, but so far I think it's going pretty well. 561 01:00:46,350 --> 01:00:48,990 Just a couple of quick observations, I think I mean, 562 01:00:48,990 --> 01:00:56,740 the Cardiff heads up the Wales DHCP and we've been very successful in developing collaborative Ph.D. student ships with partners, 563 01:00:56,740 --> 01:01:05,970 primarily those from the public sector. And I think you're right, there's a there's a there's a current gap where we'd like to do more with industry. 564 01:01:05,970 --> 01:01:13,260 But I think as Mike's been articulating there, that often comes from building relationships and developing those relationships 565 01:01:13,260 --> 01:01:18,300 over a period of time where where the potential for shared interests is clearer. 566 01:01:18,300 --> 01:01:25,290 The other thing like that, though, is that Cardiff does well in knowledge transfer partnership proposals. 567 01:01:25,290 --> 01:01:31,110 But I do think that the default expectation with the CPP's is a science model 568 01:01:31,110 --> 01:01:37,440 and a linear model of knowledge is transferred into the industrial partner. 569 01:01:37,440 --> 01:01:45,520 And I think if we're going to see more success with social scientists, we need a broader conception of the relationship between the external partner, 570 01:01:45,520 --> 01:01:54,890 the the university and the nature of knowledge to help get more traction in social sciences. 571 01:01:54,890 --> 01:02:04,060 Just a quick MSF does have a foundation programme in that allows doctoral students to work in industry, 572 01:02:04,060 --> 01:02:07,630 you know, as an internship and a separate fund that you know, 573 01:02:07,630 --> 01:02:17,850 so there are ways that you can kind of bridge the the academic research side with the industry work experience side. 574 01:02:17,850 --> 01:02:23,130 I can see Tony to be circling, so I'm going to I'm going to wrap this up, 575 01:02:23,130 --> 01:02:27,690 but I'm we're conscious and one of the things that we've been highlighting over the last 576 01:02:27,690 --> 01:02:32,370 few days the need for tangible practical takeaways and outcomes that we can focus on. 577 01:02:32,370 --> 01:02:37,980 So if I could just briefly ask each of the panel members if there's anything that they'd 578 01:02:37,980 --> 01:02:43,110 like to contribute around something concrete that we could potentially do as a community, 579 01:02:43,110 --> 01:02:54,430 as a community to accelerate and increase the engagement between industry partners and social scientists in order that that values is not lost. 580 01:02:54,430 --> 01:02:57,270 Sorry, Jordan. The first quickly, 581 01:02:57,270 --> 01:03:10,970 I think you can communicate how the foundations like NSF can help fund initial start-up research collaborations between academic institutions. 582 01:03:10,970 --> 01:03:15,530 An industry, I mean, were set up to do that by the organisation to set up to do that. 583 01:03:15,530 --> 01:03:17,240 Your work. 584 01:03:17,240 --> 01:03:28,130 I have one concrete idea I would suggest with Tony to reach out to a because every every year they have social science, a day on Capitol Hill. 585 01:03:28,130 --> 01:03:33,890 So we needed to cope up here heavily and co-sponsor with Kosar on the Social Science 586 01:03:33,890 --> 01:03:39,020 Day on Capitol Hill to put industry engagement as a topic for the social scientists. 587 01:03:39,020 --> 01:03:40,880 Because that will, you know, 588 01:03:40,880 --> 01:03:49,820 eventually reach out to to be the broadly find the social science so all the trying national organisation relating to social science will be there. 589 01:03:49,820 --> 01:03:58,040 So fantastic. Thank you. And I would say that my experience at Facebook is when we do collaborations with the universities. 590 01:03:58,040 --> 01:04:04,520 Sometimes it's it's required to just throw out the rulebook because we're trying to do things in a way that's never been figured out before. 591 01:04:04,520 --> 01:04:09,020 We really want to share certain data. There's it's really difficult to share this data. 592 01:04:09,020 --> 01:04:12,290 So I think this probably isn't an actionable item, 593 01:04:12,290 --> 01:04:19,030 but I think universities need to be flexible with us and understand that we're trying to find a win win here. 594 01:04:19,030 --> 01:04:27,020 We're trying to respect our regulatory requirements and not get another $5 billion fine, but we really do want to do research with you. 595 01:04:27,020 --> 01:04:31,760 So please work with us and figure out if we could figure out a solution together. 596 01:04:31,760 --> 01:04:32,890 Fantastic. 597 01:04:32,890 --> 01:04:41,990 I'd say be proactive on looking for real world problems or societal challenges that external organisations are interested in learning more about or 598 01:04:41,990 --> 01:04:49,820 trying to come to terms with where you know you've got expertise across the university that will bring together different parts of the university, 599 01:04:49,820 --> 01:04:56,030 convene small informal groupings, get people together, provide some seed funding, 600 01:04:56,030 --> 01:05:02,600 do a little bit of nurturing and facilitating just building the building or putting people together in itself deliver. 601 01:05:02,600 --> 01:05:10,910 But but let things develop organically and allow those relationships to develop around some sense of common purpose or shared enterprise. 602 01:05:10,910 --> 01:05:16,680 Fantastic. Thank you. So if I can now thank all the speakers and I'll ask you to join me. 603 01:05:16,680 --> 01:05:19,722 Yeah.