19. The Global Lake Ecological Observatory Network

This chapter explores a socio-technological (S-T) approach to information management within the Global Lake Ecological Observatory Network (GLEON). In S-T systems, information management, relevant organizational policies, and the supporting technologies are integral components of the network fabric. They derive from the needs of the community, articulated through representative governance, and they service the needs of the community by engaging data providers as partners in scientific endeavors. Through a brief history of GLEON, we recount the emergence of the S-T approach as part of GLEON’s philosophy as a learning organization. It is clear that there is still much to be learned about streamlining data curation and publishing, especially from an international network of observatories with diverse data and sensor networks. Grassroots networks such as GLEON often do not have the resources—human, financial, and infrastructure—required for persistent and highly efficient data curation and publishing. However, strategies that address directly the needs of the network community, such as providing credit to data providers, tracking the progress of projects that use the data, and sharing high-value synthesized data sets, quickly gain acceptance and garner commitment by the community. Today, S-T systems require ‘humans in the loop’ for data curation, which, in turn, results in constraints on scalability of these systems. One of the great challenges that lie ahead will be connecting GLEON S-T, which represents a diverse international community, with existing external data curation and archiving services.