Summary of the 2003 Instantiation
at the WSIS
The Swiss Agency for Development and
Cooperation and the Global Knowledge Partnership organized in Palexpo,
during the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS), an exhibition and a
series of events collectively called the ICT for Development platform
(ICT4D). In this context, they approached CERN in May 2003, offering free
floor space to show CERN and more generally scientific projects and
achievements which contribute to the information society. CERN accepted the
offer and developed a concept called the Science and Information Society
Forum (SIS-forum), also known as the Science Tree.
Neither totally an exhibition nor
totally a conference, the SIS-forum capitalized on the conference concept,
by inviting projects through a peer-review process, as well as on the
principle of exhibitions, where presenters were available during
timeslots to respond to visitor questions.
As a result of a call for content
issued in July, forty-two projects from thirty two organizations world-wide
were invited, all focusing on science's leading role in driving the
development of the information society. They were organized into 5 themes:
Education and Culture;
Health;
Development,
Environment, Risks;
Fundamental Sciences
and Enabling Technologies; CERN in the Information Society.
Presentations and demonstrations of projects were done exclusively in
digital format, using a computer infrastructure set up by CERN, formed of 12
computers and 14 screens. The stand represented metaphorically a tree,
formed of a trunk -central pillar where CERN achievements were shown- and
branches –thematic pillars to host presentations on the 4 other themes. One
tangible outcome of the project was the digitization of hours of existing
analog CERN films to create a digital programme now available for further
use.
The key messages explicitly conveyed
were: “Science is collaborative and transcends borders”, “Scientific
communities can be the vector for IS deployment is developing regions”; CERN
is playing a central role in the development of the information society”.
In total 32 people from 4 divisions
(ETT, IT, HR, PE) as well as 4 persons from outside CERN contributed to the
project.
The SIS-forum was designated by the
local press as one of the four best stands of the exhibition. It attracted
interest from the press and media, leading to numerous articles and
interviews including from the BBC, the national Portuguese and Irish
televisions. The inauguration in the presence of Mr. Kofi Annan was a major
media event. The stand also received visits from numerous VIPs including the
Presidents of Romania, Estonia, the Federal Counselor Calmy-Rey and
Leuenberg. More than 700 visitors where photographed next to the World's
first web server, and their picture to be displayed on the SIS-forum web
site. The web site (cern.ch/sis-forum) has received more than half a million
visits at the time of this being written.
The major difficulty lied in the
extremely short delay, due to the late proposal by the Swiss government. The
project was organized and developed is such a way that its entire machinery
(structure, people) can be re-activated for further instantiations of the
SIS-forum. The physical stand has been acquired by CERN and can be
remounted. Two outside organizations expressed interest for hosting the
SIS-forum –scientific content and its physical tree- at the occasion of
major conferences. The CERN Globe of Innovation is also considering hosting
it at the occasion of the 50th Anniversary.
The SIS-forum was complemented by an
on-line stand, where live demonstrations took place, in particular over a
fast connection to North America. |