Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - HubIT (The HUB for boosting the Responsibility and inclusiveness of ICT enabled Research and Innovation through constructive interactions with SSH research)

Teaser

HubIT is a Horizon 2020 project bringing together ICT and social sciences and humanities (SSH) communities to promote the approach that when conducting research and innovation, the values, needs and expectations of society should be considered. To achieve this, the project...

Summary

HubIT is a Horizon 2020 project bringing together ICT and social sciences and humanities (SSH) communities to promote the approach that when conducting research and innovation, the values, needs and expectations of society should be considered. To achieve this, the project facilitates the principles of responsible research and innovation (RRI). It means that societal actors should work together to make the ICT research and innovation process human-centered and driven from societal needs. In the digital era where the impact of ICT related developments in product and service design is mostly not known in advance, taking a pro-active responsible approach is of the utmost importance.

Thus, the role of the HubIT project is to: provide to ICT and SSH stakeholders from Horizon 2020 projects and beyond a space to meet face-to-face and virtually; inspire them to work together; provide a set of practical tools to get started; guide them to Horizon 2020 new funding opportunities; and give insights to policy makers regarding the grassroot level challenges to be overcome to enable ICT-SSH collaboration to take place. To have a wide outreach the HubIT, running from 2017-2020, consists of 14 organizations from 10 countries: Estonia (coordinator), Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Lithuania, Portugal, Slovakia and United Kingdom.

The long-term strategic objective of HubIT is to contribute to the high quality and impact of European research and innovation and ensure that H2020 funded and further ICT related innovation is responsible, inclusive and aimed at reversing inequalities. The direct objective of HubIT is to build a Hub that activates and improves constructive and co-creative interactions between SSH and ICT disciplines in developing and implementing a shared vision of inclusive ICT research and innovation.

To make the project activities visible an interactive web-platform called the HubIT Metropolis has been launched (www.hubit-project.eu). It is an interactive platform that supports the ICT-SSH community to kick-off collaborations. It is a place to find information on Horizon 2020 projects and stakeholders who are interested in making Information and Communication Technologies innovations closer to social challenges and needs.

There is a social meeting point called Get Connected Airport within the Metropolis to meet like-minded people and look for collaboration opportunities. Users can explore the meaning of RRI, learn about societal and ICT sector related challenges and how to address them, and review examples of good practices. In addition, 35 events will be organised throughout the project. The events are primarily aimed at building the ICT-SSH community and activities in the last year of the project aim to move ICT-SSH collaboration forward at a very practical level in bringing people together at hackathons, ICT maker labs and a Common Ground Camp.

Work performed

The HubIT project started in September 2017 and by February 2019 the project has completed 18 months of activities. During the first reporting period the core activities of the project were the elaboration of the Initial European Framework Model (WP2) based on the recommendations from the Advisory Board (M3) and Expert Group workshop (M7) and the management of the ICT-SSH community building and networking activities (WP3). These activities have been strongly supported by assessment (WP5) and dissemination and communication (WP6). The most important dissemination and communication activities to highlight here are the organisation of the first annual conference and the launch of the project online platform, the HubIT Metropolis.
The main outputs of the project up to M18 are:
• The HubIT Metropolis (online platform) containing the Initial Framework Model has reached 4,460 visits and 101 registered users.
• RRI dimensions have been proposed that emphasise social needs: public engagement, gender equality, science education, open access, ethics, governance and two additional horizontal dimensions, sustainability and social justice.
• External experts involved in the process: A pool of 25 Advisory Board members was established and experts engaged through the first AB workshop in M3. The first Expert Group workshop was organized in M7 with 30 external experts to receive feedback on the idea concept of the Framework Model.
• 5 events organised in 3 countries have involved 246 stakeholders (ICT, SSH, policy makers):
the events organized up to M18 were the 1st annual conference, 2 speed-dating sessions, workshop for the social sciences and humanities researchers „Bridging the gap between Social Sciences /Humanities and ICT“ and an international workshop “Ensuring new technologies embrace societal issues and concerns”.
• Events’ assessment where the results show that the participants assessed the events as “very useful”. Participants, both with SSH and ICT backgrounds, believe that SSH is very important for developing ICT solutions and they foresee a much higher future engagement of SSH and ICT.

Final results

During the first reporting period the core activities of project were the elaboration of the Initial European Framework Model and the management of the ICT-SSH community building and networking activities strongly supported by the assessment and dissemination and communication activities. The content of the Initial Framework Model presented at the HubIT Platform has been the basis for the events organised. The main conclusions are that the events were successful in terms of raising awareness and deepening the understanding of participants regarding the SSH-RRI approach, initiating future collaboration between SSH and ICT people. People were mostly attending to find cooperation opportunities, new ideas and partners.

By the end of the project in total 33 events will be organised to bring together the ICT and SSH community and boost practical and experimental collaboration, also the HubIT Metropolis and its content will be finalised.

• 3 speed-dating events (2 completed by M18)
• 10 national workshops (1 completed by M18)
• 3 international thematic workshops (1 completed by M18)
• 4 international policy workshops
• 1 SSH researchers´ workshop (completed by M18)
• 1 ICT industries workshop
• 3 annual conferences
• 3 hackathons
• 3 ICT maker labs
• 1 Common Ground Camp

Additionally to the above mentioned events an Expert Group workshop (M7) took place and 3 Advisory Board meetings will be organised (first of them was held during first reporting period).

The expected impacts:
• Improved level and efficacy of the interaction between SSH and ICT disciplines;
• Improved take-up of societal concerns in ICT-related research and innovation;
• Increased worldwide visibility and influence of a European community with a shared vision for inclusive ICT research and innovation;
• Engagement of stakeholders to the process and guiding the inclusive ICT innovation process after the lifetime of the project;
• Supporting the policy makers and ICT-SSH community with good practices.

Website & more info

More info: http://www.hubit-project.eu/.