The Web Science Lab (WSL) at IIIT Bangalore is interested in understanding how the Internet, WWW and AI affects different facets of human life. The Internet, WWW and now AI have brought about massive changes on human life in just about all facets– be it in business, administration, social well-being, personal relationships, education, etc. While these technologies continue to evolve at a rapid pace, there is relatively little attention given to how we as humans are transforming in this new world.
The idea of Web Science was formally coined by the establishment of the Web Science Trust Network (WSTNet) in 2006, comprising of multiple research labs around the world. WSL at IIITB is a part of the global WSTNet.
The book “The Power Law of Information: Life in a Connected World” written in 2006 by Srinath Srinivasa provides some of the underlying questions that started this lab. This book was written before the emergence of social media, mobile apps, cryptocurrency, etc. and has some arguments speculating the emergence of these structures.
As part of our Digital Empowerment initiatives, WSL has also partnered with Gooru Learning Inc., which is California-based company (that has its genesis in Google Inc) focusing on how WWW and AI can aid in social empowerment through education. WSL is part of Navigated Learning Collaborative under Gooru.
The Centre of Excellence in Big Data Engineering was incubated by WSL.
WSL was earlier called the Open Systems Lab (OSL) which began operations in 2002.
WSL Research Sites
Karnataka Data Lake: Policy Research Using Big Data Analytics
