Sensorica at the Canadian Science Policy Center 2017

Open album

Tibi, Maria and Fabio presented Open Science Practices at the CSPC2017.

Our Panel description

Canada hosts some of the most ambitious pilot projects in open science and open innovation. The problem is that all these initiatives are poorly known and understood, especially those that did not emerge within traditional institutions, which are in fact the most disruptive ones. In this Case Study panel we discuss a few special open science projects that have originated within open innovation networks, and have been conducted in collaboration with forward-looking academic labs. The panelists will present the methodologies, the infrastructure for collaboration and the governance that have been employed, the resulting benefits, and will analyse some of the problems encountered. These cases constitute a great example of how academia can interface with open networks and communities. 

Online communities and networks have become environments buzzing with scientific and technological activities. It is nowadays normal for a graduate student to work in a lab by day and contribute to online communities by night, or spend their evenings in open innovation spaces such as fablabs, makerspaces, and hackerspaces. It is also not a secret any more that students turn to their online peers for technical questions and advice, rather than to their lab colleagues and professors. The most prolific students are those who maintain complex relationships outside of the immediate academic circle. The boundaries of academia are becoming very fuzzy, but there is very little effort to formalize these exchanges between academic labs and online communities/networks, and open innovation spaces. 

The cases that will be presented and discussed during this panel will show how interfaces between academia and open innovation communities/networks accelerate scientific discovery and technological transfer. By presenting and discussing these cases we hope to stimulate other labs to experiment with relations with open innovation networks. At a higher level, we also hope to influence Universities to put in place pilot programs to begin formalizing these kind of relations. SENSORICA affiliates can work with different academic players to transfer their knowledge and know how.

The panel on Open Science was split into two sections, The Scientific and Economic benefits of Open Science and Open Science and Innovation (our section).

During the first part of the session, Guy Rouleau (Chair of the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, McGill University) spoke about MNI and their bold action to move to open science. The open science concept in the first part was presented as a more open collaboration between academia and the private sector, where no patents were pursued. This is the institutional view of open science, a more top down approach, supposing that scientific development comes from academia and the private sector puts new scientific knowledge into practice. A representative of the multinational pharmaceutical Merck was part of this first panel, testifying why large companies are interested in open science and open innovation. In essence, for rare medical conditions that don't represent a large market, Merck is happy to work in an open way to reduce the costs of treatment development, while hoping to monetize the solution.

During our part, we extended the definition of open science beyond open publication and the creation of commons and of open source technologies. These concepts are captured in a presentation that we made for MNI in 2016. We also approached the question from a practical perspective, presenting Breathing Games and some of the SENSORICA's past projects. But most importantly, we established the existence and the importance of open networks (the crowd/people) as new socioeconomic agents with a very important role in science and innovation, proposing private-public-people partnerships. We introduced the button up view, advocating for a better interface between the crowd (open networks) and the public and private sectors.

See more on this event.
See more on SENSORICA's Open Science activities.

Matrioshka and mobility at eco2Fest 2017

Name of the event: ''Matrioshka hub de mobilite''LEAD: Pamela, with Tibi (facilittor)In collaboration with OuiShare Montreal and Matrioshka DATE: 12 to 13 August, from 9:30am to 5:30pm PLACE: Vieux Port de Montreal, see on Facebook.

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This event is part of Pamela's Internship program with SENSORICA and Matrioshka.

L’activité a eu pour but de faciliter la création dans un mode d’apprentissage actif. Nous avons mis en place une expérience de création à partir d’une approche Ecodesign reliée à la mobilité. Le but de l’activité a été d’ecoconcevoir de nouveaux usages et fonctionnalités du mobilier urbain Matrioshka, dans différentes scénarios de mobilité à Montréal. Nous avons utilisé des concepts reliés à l’écologie du paysage, aux technologies durables et à la mobilité en réseau en utilisant la Matrioshka. Des citoyennes et quelques expertes en mobilité ont participé à l'activité. 

Open event description doc

Matrioshka project

Pictures and videos

Open in new tab

Documents used in this event

Open in new tab

Canadian Science Policy Center 2017

 

Tibi, Maria and Fabio presented Open Science Practices at the CSPC2017.

• For our panel - also see official takeaway and official takeaway document
• In general  

 

Our Panel description

Canada hosts some of the most ambitious pilot projects in open science and open innovation. The problem is that all these initiatives are poorly known and understood, especially those that did not emerge within traditional institutions, which are in fact the most disruptive ones. In this Case Study panel we discuss a few special open science projects that have originated within open innovation networks, and have been conducted in collaboration with forward-looking academic labs. The panelists will present the methodologies, the infrastructure for collaboration and the governance that have been employed, the resulting benefits, and will analyze some of the problems encountered. These cases constitute a great example of how academia can interface with open networks and communities.

Online communities and networks have become environments buzzing with scientific and technological activities. It is nowadays normal for a graduate student to work in a lab by day and contribute to online communities by night, or spend their evenings in open innovation spaces such as fablabs, makerspaces, and hackerspaces. It is also not a secret any more that students turn to their online peers for technical questions and advice, rather than to their lab colleagues and professors. The most prolific students are those who maintain complex relationships outside of the immediate academic circle. The boundaries of academia are becoming very fuzzy, but there is very little effort to formalize these exchanges between academic labs and online communities/networks, and open innovation spaces.

The cases that will be presented and discussed during this panel will show how interfaces between academia and open innovation communities/networks accelerate scientific discovery and technological transfer.

By presenting and discussing these cases we hope to stimulate other labs to experiment with relations with open innovation networks. At a higher level, we also hope to influence Universities to put in place pilot programs to begin formalizing these kind of relations. Sensorica affiliates can work with different academic players to transfer their knowledge and know how. 

Open presentation

 

Notes

The panel on Open Science was split into two sections, The Scientific and Economic benefits of Open Science and Open Science and Innovation (our section).

During the first part of the session, Guy Rouleau (Chair of the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery, McGill University) spoke about MNI and their bold action to move to open science. The open science concept in the first part was presented as a more open collaboration between academia and the private sector, where no patents were pursued. This is the institutional view of open science, a more top down approach, supposing that scientific development comes from academia and the private sector puts new scientific knowledge into practice. A representative of the multinational pharmaceutical Merck was part of this first panel, testifying why large companies are interested in open science and open innovation. In essence, for rare medical conditions that don't represent a large market, Merck is happy to work in an open way to reduce the costs of treatment development, while hoping to monetize the solution.

During our part, we extended the definition of open science beyond open publication and the creation of commons and of open source technologies. These concepts are captured in a presentation that we made for MNI in 2016. We also approached the question from a practical perspective, presenting Breathing Games and some of the SENSORICA's past projects. But most importantly, we established the existence and the importance of open networks (the crowd/people) as new socioeconomic agents with a very important role in science and innovation, proposing private-public-people partnerships. We introduced the button up view, advocating for a better interface between the crowd (open networks) and the public and private sectors.

 

Our media

Photo album

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Open innovation processes coupled with education for young kids

"Matrioshka a strange beast'', Lead: Pamela, with Tibi (facilittor)

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This event is part of Pamela's Internship program with Sensorica and Matrioshka.

The purpose of the activity is to facilitate co-creation in an active learning mode. This is an experience of collective creation of new concepts, based on an Ecodesign approach, as well as learning at the ecological, technological and sustainable levels using the Matrioshka street furniture. Matrioshka is considered a species in the ecosystem. 

Matrioshka project

Open full description of the event

Presentations used in this event

Open Matrioshka- un espèce dans l'ecosy

Open Guides Activité 1- Matrioshka GSF

Pictures: Open in new tab 

Full documentation: Open in new tab

GOSH 2017

 

 

Sensorica was invited to participate in the Gathering of Open Science Hardware (#GOSH2017), which took place between March 22-25th at the Anacleto Angelini Innovation Centre, Pontificia Universidad Católica, in Santiago, Chile. The event was funded by the Sloan Foundation, with funds dispersed through Public Lab. A total of 90 people (representing both individual work and organizations) attended the event from over 30 countries. This year, Maria Frangos represented Sensorica at the event (see Poster). She received air and ground travel funding of up to $900 USD. Maria absorbed the costs of her accommodations ($126 CAD), and some meals and transportation to and from the conference for a total of $200 CAD. Abran offered to pay for the printing costs of the poster, which cost $37 CAD.

Open event page

Objectives

The goal of GOSH 2017 was to co-create a roadmap for making Open Science Hardware ubiquitous by 2025 by "expanding the reach [...] within academic research, citizen science and education."

Another goal of the workshop was to represent a diversity of voices involved in OSH initiatives. Participants from Asia, Africa, South America, Europe and North America attended GOSH 2017, half of whom were women. Achieving gender parity, as well as representing queer and trans voices, were important aspects in ensuring that GOSH 2017 remained open and equitable:

"We strive to make open science hardware open to everybody, regardless of scholarly or professional background, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, ability, physical appearance, body size, race, age, economic background, country of origin or employment, religion, and other differences. Because we come from different backgrounds, it is important to be intentional about providing respectful, equitable spaces — both online and in person — for our community to come together and engage in constructive, respectful discourse. As our manifesto states: GOSH is used for peaceful purposes and causes no harm."

Events

In addition to participating in creating the roadmap, Maria led a design skills sharing session as well as collaborated with other participants in planning the 'unconference' sessions, one of which focused on business models (notes from the session will be available online soon).

Sensorica also participated in a public exhibition on opening day. In addition to creating a poster and flyers highlighting our contribution to Open Science as an OVN, Maria demonstrated the Breathing Games flow meter prototype Povilas, Andre, Fabio and Patrice worked on and displayed a slideshow of other Sensorica open science projects.

Approximately 200 people attended the public exhibition, including a school group, univeristy students, professors and GOSH participants. A steady stream of people came by our table, most of whom were interested in the tangible device on display, the flow meter. A number of people were also interested in the OVN model and asked questions about Sensorica's approach. Several took a flyer.

In terms of individual specialisation, the design skills sharing workshop led by Maria covered the following topics: how designing for connected devices differs from designing for software, creating user stories, designing for empathy, how to create a user flow, and how to create a low-fidelity clickable prototype. More than 10 people attended, none of whom had any design experience. A few were hardware engineers, while others were working in biology, performance art and other disciplines. The feedback Maria received was great and so was what they produced. Workshop participants were able to quickly grasp the design process by applying it to their own ideas, projects and hardware. You can access the design skills presentation here.

Overall, the people at GOSH were happy to meet yet another Sensorica affiliate, having already met Tibi and Bruce online. There were many participants at the conference, which provided an opportunity to meet a number of people and share our projects and ideas. Now that these connections have been made, follow-up and participation in the GOSH forum and site are critical if we hope to build on these.

 

Outside interest and leads

An engineering professor, Paulina Barria, who I spoke to at the public exhibition was interested in our work. Paulina is part of a a project called bikelite - an IoT bike project with the goal of improving safety for urban cyclists. The project is composed of a free mobile app that indicates the safest city routes, a light guidance device on the handlebar that advises cyclists of road hazards, and LED lights that generate images in the wheels. I contacted her last week via LinkedIn but will follow up again this week. The app is already designed but they need to work on the lighting system. This is a long-term project with many components.

 

Next steps for OVN at GOSH

There are some unique opportunities for advancing the role of Open Value Networks (OVN) for Open Science Hardware. Firstly, Maria will work with Greg Austic, founder of Photosync, to help structure the documentation on the GOSH website. Part of the site will be a "how to" section, which will help guide those who have decided to embark on an open science hardware through a series of podcasts. At least one of these will focus on the OVN model. Maria will interview people from Sensorica (and other projects) about their experience launching OSH projects using the OVN model.

This could tie in nicely with Abran's idea of presenting "OVN's as a viable means to organizing and delivering community based healthcare initiatives," as well as Breathing Games, an open source science initiative.

Please post comments or questions in this forum. We need to continue this work within our own network, while seeking to bridge connections with other organizations and open source projects.

 

For more, see Poster, Pictures and Documents.

SENSORICA at #GOSH2017

SENSORICA was invited to participate in the Gathering of Open Science Hardware (#GOSH2017), which took place between March 22-25th 2017 at the Anacleto Angelini Innovation Centre, Pontificia Universidad Católica, in Santiago, Chile. The event was funded by the Sloan Foundation, with funds dispersed through Public Lab. A total of 90 people (representing both individual work and organisations) attended the event from over 30 countries. This year, Maria Frangos represented SENSORICA at the event.

Objectives

The goal of GOSH 2017 was to co-create a roadmap for making Open Science Hardware ubiquitous by 2025 by "expanding the reach [...] within academic research, citizen science and education." 

Another goal of the workshop was to represent a diversity of voices involved in OSH initiatives. Participants from Asia, Africa, South America, Europe and North America attended GOSH 2017, half of whom were women. Achieving gender parity, as well as representing queer and trans voices, were important aspects in ensuring that GOSH 2017 remained open and equitable:

"We strive to make open science hardware open to everybody, regardless of scholarly or professional background, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, ability, physical appearance, body size, race, age, economic background, country of origin or employment, religion, and other differences. Because we come from different backgrounds, it is important to be intentional about providing respectful, equitable spaces — both online and in person — for our community to come together and engage in constructive, respectful discourse. As our manifesto states: GOSH is used for peaceful purposes and causes no harm."

Events

In addition to participating in creating the roadmap, Maria led a design skills sharing session as well as collaborated with other participants in planning the 'unconference' sessions, one of which focused on business models (notes from the session will be available online soon).

SENSORICA also participated in a public exhibition on opening day. In addition to creating a poster and flyers highlighting our contribution to Open Science as an OVN, Maria demonstrated the Breathing Games flow meter prototype. 

Approximately 200 people attended the public exhibition, including a school group, university students, professors and GOSH participants. 

In terms of individual specialization, the design skills sharing workshop led by Maria covered the following topics: how designing for connected devices differs from designing for software, creating user stories, designing for empathy, how to create a user flow, and how to create a low-fidelity clickable prototype. More than 10 people attended, none of whom had any design experience. A few were hardware engineers, while others were working in biology, performance art and other disciplines. The feedback Maria received was great and so was what they produced. Workshop participants were able to quickly grasp the design process by applying it to their own ideas, projects and hardware. You can access the design skills presentation here. 

See more on this event HERE. 

Sensorica at Open Design Conference in Hong Kong

 

Maria Frangos M.S. Design and Sensorica affiliate, presented at Open Design of E-very-thing, part of the Cumulus series of design conferences, which was held at the Hong Kong Institute of Design in late November 2016. Our short paper was submitted to the track Open Design for Engagement:

"The novelty, diversity and complexity of current social challenges and the contexts in which they are situated demands similar diversity of interventions to address them. Multiple and diverse proposals are most readily generated via the involvement of many different people, with many different perspectives and resources, contributing to the process of innovation. These are the tenets of “open innovation” – that by “opening up” the innovation process – the process of coming up with, implementing and exploiting new ideas – we can increase the diversity of, and capacity for, innovation within a (eco)system. To “open up” the innovation process to a diversity of actors – to democratise design innovation – a diversity of people must encounter the design process such that they can engage with and contribute to it. This track aims to explore these early stages within the collaborative innovation journey. Enquiring into the strategies that are applied to support the assembly and formation of publics, from which design coalitions may precipitate. We ask “What are the methods, tools and approaches that favour encounter and foster engagement – and ultimately participation - in ‘open’ processes of collaborative enquiry, visioning and production?” From living labs to design performances - we are interested in the platforms and practices that “stage” these encounters and engagements. We also welcome the sharing of examples, as well as reflections and theories as to what works in what contexts - how, why and for whom."

Short report

Paul Bardini, PhD student from Brisbane, Australia also presented work on open source hardware, along with Maria. Aside from them, most attendees were not versed with open source methodologies. The term open or openness was interpreted more as a general approach to inclusion, rather than a methodological approach. The other presenters showed work spanning from fashion design and making to urban typography and heritage, with a unifying focus on engagement.

Our paper will be published this spring, see below. 

Larger context

Sensorica has been prototyping relations with academic labs for the past 6 years. The body of these relations form an interface between the crowd and academia. In our opinion, Open Science is a set of practices that reach beyond institutional borders, hence the need of these interfaces.

The PV characterization project presented at this conference is the most recent iteration of this sort of interface. Past iterations have been built around ENGAGE grants with McGill, Ecole Polytechnique, Montreal Heart Institute.

Sensorica is the only open (innovation) network we know that has gone so far into prototyping interfaces with traditional institutions, academic, private and governmental - see this document for more. This is still a work in progress. At every iteration we have learned something new and adjusted our OVN model. This 6 years long process has provided Sensorica with a valuable insight into the meshing between what we call the new economy and the traditional economy, in a period of transition.

Traditional institutions that are embarking on a path of institutional change need, in our opinion, to start by building bridges with the new type of organizations (connect to the crowd through interfaces like Sensorica), and through these bridges get infused of new structural elements, methodologies, tools, etc. in order to inform and fuel their own transformation. 

 

Published paper