Apologies for cross postings INVITATION What is the use of Web archiving for research? - a discussion from the point of view of the social scientist and humanities scholar 26 September 2006 - at 13.30 o´clock - at the Virtual Knowledge Studio, Cruquiusweg 31, Amsterdam. For directions see www.virtualknowledgestudio.nl Increasingly, social scientists and scholars in the humanities are exploring the use of the Web in their research as a source of data or research objects. Usually, these studies are incorporating "the live Web" because there is no practical alternative. As a result, scholars have to cope with the instability of the Web, with ambiguous instances of data sources and Web objects, and with the disappearance of Web phenomena. This creates strong limitations to the interpretative and explanatory power of Web studies. This meeting aims to explore a new way of collecting and analyzing the Web: the use of Web archives in social science and humanities research. Web archiving has already been initiated by a number of national libraries, amongst others the Australian, French, American, British and Dutch national libraries. They were stimulated by the invention of the Internet Archive in the US. These initiatives can be mobilized to create new research possibilities provided they are enriched and confronted with the perspectives of the research communities in the humanities and social sciences. The meeting will explore the potential of Web archiving to enhance existing research projects. Prof. Steve Schneider (Web Archivist, State University of New York) will give a keynote entitled "Scholarly Web Archiving: Processes, Challenges, Techniques & Tools" (for the abstract, see below). The second part of the meeting will be an exploration of the type of research questions that may profit from some form of Web archiving. We will also discuss the limitations and conceptual puzzles posed by Web archiving as a prospective tool for research. We would like to invite you to participate in this discussion. We have reserved room in the programme for responses and additional presentations on the topic of Web archiving. If you would like to give a presentation or prepared contribution, please contact Paul Wouters at paul.wouters@vks.knaw.nl. RSVP: please let us know if you will participate in this event (paul.wouters@vks.knaw.nl). You will receive a detailed programme of the meeting a week in advance. Abstract keynote Steve Schneider: This presentation will introduce the "VKS Web Archiving Knowledge Base," a presentation of current knowledge and understanding concerning scholarly Web archiving. The knowledge base, built on a wiki-like platform, is itself an exercise in scholarly Web archiving, and demonstrates in a reflexive mode the processes associated with Web archiving, and the challenges Web archiving poses to scholars in the humanities and social sciences. The knowledge base also identifies techniques and tools that can be deployed to complete each of the processes, reviews recent Web archiving projects, and outlines potential projects and collaborative opportunities with the Virtual Knowledge Studio. -- Paul Wouters Virtual Knowledge Studio for the Humanities and Social Sciences Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Cruquiusweg 31 1019 AT Amsterdam, NL T: +3120 8500463 F: +3120 8500271 www.virtualknowledgestudio.nl