The international IASSIST (International Association for Social Science Information Service and Technology) conference was supposed to be held in Gothenburg in 2020, but was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the plans for the conference were changed. The conference is now divided into two separate events during 2021: a global virtual conference in May, and a regional in-person meeting in Gothenburg in September.
The IASSIST conference focuses on data-related questions in the social sciences and open science. The conference is an annual event, arranged in different locations around the world, and usually attracts hundreds of participants. Gothenburg had been selected to host the 2020 conference, but like many other events, it had to be cancelled. There will instead be two separate IASSIST events in 2021, which will make it possible for more people to attend, in spite of restrictions and travel bans.
The virtual conference is held on 17–20 May, and it is open for participants from all over the world. Some of the themes that will be discussed are research data support, and the role of libraries in supporting data dissemination, protection of personal data and public data, data visualisation, practices for data management, and training and education efforts. To compensate for different time zones, all presentations during the virtual conference will be recorded and accessible after the live sessions.
On 14–16 September, there will be an in-person meeting in Gothenburg, pending public health restrictions. This will be a joint event between IASSIST and the research infrastructure CESSDA (Consortium of European Social Science Data Archives), hosted by SND. Keep an eye out for updates on the website, where information about the meeting may change, depending on how the current situation develops.