Re:inventing information science in the networked society

The International Symposium on Information Science (ISI) is a biannual gathering of scholars, researchers and students of information science in Europe and beyond who share a common interest in critical information issues in contemporary society. The conference series originated in the German-language information science community and has become more and more international in recent years. This time, the 14th International Symposium on Information Science (ISI 2015) takes place in Zadar, Croatia, from May 19 to May 21, 2015 and is jointly organized by the Department of Information Sciences at the University of Zadar and the German Academic Association for Information Science (Hochschulverband Informationswissenschaft e. V.), in association with the Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS& T). ISI 2015 happens at a time of ongoing changes in our networked society. Recent internet developments have made it possible to access ever rising amounts of data and efficient analysis tools empower users to identify patterns which extend human minds (big data). Easy-to-use web services also allow users to be producers of information, a development which is subsumed under the term of “social web”. Furthermore, science makes extensive use of collaboration, information sharing and information distribution all of which are available through network technologies. These changes have a considerable effect on both information science and practice and will be discussed at ISI 2015.