The membership was polled to decide whether a membership directory should be made available, and was in favour of it. This is good news since a Membership Directory will help for networking, to find your most valued members of our Society.
The INDEEP Experts List paved the way and did a great job at collecting expertise and valuable professional information for over 300 deep-sea scientists. However, it is discontinued and needs update. In coordinating with INDEEP instigators, we collected all answers and used AI to summarize them with terms and categories that are as inclusive as possible, yet tapping into controlled vocabularies that is insightful enough to easily pinpoint relevant expertises, activate networking, and find key research hubs or niches.
Upon registration, the Society collects two types of information: via its membership management system
Personal information: this is the “Contact” data: phone number, email address, gender, ethnicity, accessibility, etc. This info can only be shared publicly if specified by the member and is private by default.
Professional information: this is the “Member” data: expertise, knowledge, sampling resources, research interests, analytic skills etc. We are currently revising the questionnaire based on the INDEEP recollection. It is also kept private by default.
In fact, no directory is yet active: we are currently working at making it useful and easy.
Currently, all answers to the two types of information are mixed. None is accessible publicly or to other members. We are planning an internal data migration to separate them. It will be operational for future registrations and a notification will provide detailed explanations:
New members will fill the necessary “Contact” info and will then receive an invitation to fill their “Member” info, which will be most useful for professional networking.
Already-registered members will receive the invitation to revise their “Member” info.
Indeed, each member remains in full control of its information and may decide whether or not to display each individual data to the Membership Directory. Only DSBSoc members will be able to access the members directory.
This takes some effort and coordination – thanks for the patience!
