What are the ethical and social responsibilities of scientists

Presented as part of the session titled "Sharing scientific data: who benefits?" at ESOF (The Euroscience Open Forum) 2008.Session abstract: Digital datasets—text-based, numeric, audio, video or image-based—form the output of all scientific disciplines. How are these data being made available for sharing? What quality control mechanisms are in place? What kinds of naming conventions, tags, and metadata are in use and how effective are they at helping to manage open data? Who is storing, archiving and curating open data and at which levels? And how is the production and sharing of open data assessed: what processes are in place for crediting scientists for making their raw data openly accessible for sharing and use? How much can and should data publication replace traditional forms of publication of research findings?