ABSTRACT
Partly as a result of fi nancial inducement (research funds) but also for sound methodological and substantive reasons, social scientists in the U.K. and elsewhere are beginning to engage with the wider program of ‘e-science’. This program is motivated by a multiplicity of factors including the requirement for urgent action to manage the increasingly large quantities of data produced by digital technologies and digitally enabled science. Whilst this ‘deluge’, ‘wave’ and ‘knowledge overload’ may provide novel opportunities for data analysis (Hey & Trefethen, 2003) it brings with it concerns over data mis-use and disclosure. In addition funding bodies are naturally keen to ensure re-use of the results of their investments in data to avoid resources remaining within the disciplines that originally collected them and to achieve a maximum return on their investments (Elias, 2006). Finally there is a stated imperative for groups of social scientists to collaborate on interdisciplinary projects to address large-scale research problems and potentially generate novel and innovative solutions or results (ESRC, 2005).
