Welcome to the Ethical Web Science Workshop

Call for Papers

We invite submissions addressing ethical challenges in Web Science. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Explainability and Accountability
• Data Provenance and Consent
• Algorithmic Amplification and Harm
• Web Fragmentation and Inclusivity
• Responsibility in Web Research
• Redefining Digital Commons

Submission Deadline: April 30, 2025, 11:59pm AoE

Submit your papers through EasyChair: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=ews25

Format & Length: All paper submissions should adopt the current ACM SIG Conference proceedings template (acmart.cls available here). Please submit papers as PDF files using the ACM template, either in Microsoft Word format (available here under “Word Authors”) or with the ACM LaTeX template on the Overleaf platform, available here. In particular, please ensure you are using the two-column version of the appropriate template. Submission must be as a single PDF file: 4 (four) pages maximum in length, including references.

Publication: All accepted papers will be published in the ACM Web Science Conference Companion Proceedings, unless authors explicitly choose to opt out of publication.

For any inquiries, please contact us at ews25@easychair.org.

About the Workshop

Motivation

The Ethical Web Science Workshop at WebSci’25 aims to address the ethical challenges that arise from the rapidly evolving relationship between the Web and AI. With increasing reliance on Web-sourced data, issues of fairness, transparency, and consent have become central to technological innovation.

Objectives

• Interdisciplinary Dialogue: Bring together researchers, practitioners, ethicists, and policymakers.
• Framework Development: Create tools and guidelines for ethical compliance in Web-based research.
• Guidelines for Best Practices: Discuss standards for ethical data sourcing and usage.
• Collaborative Outcomes: Foster discussions that may lead to a manifesto for Ethical Web Science.

Agenda

The half-day workshop will feature 4-6 paper presentations (15 minutes each), two invited talks (30 minutes each), and a 45-minute panel discussion.

Topics

• Explainability of Web Data Quality
• Accountability of Web Content
• Data Provenance and Consent
• Copyright and Digital Commons
• Mitigating Algorithmic Amplification of Harm
• Ensuring Inclusivity in a Fragmented Web

Organizers

Program Committee

Tanya Singh (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, USA)

K. Krasnow Waterman (LawTechIntersect LLC, USA)

Gautam Kishore Shahi (University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany)

Venue

The Ethical Web Science Workshop will be held as part of the WebSci’25 conference. For more details regarding the venue and logistical arrangements, please refer to the main WebSci’25 website.