While we are still enjoying the sunny, hot summer days, we are also preparing a couple of interesting autumn events surrounding topics such as free & open web search (our main topic), open data and AI, as well as fundamental rights in the context of open web search and data protection.
We invite you to join the conversation, so mark your calendar for the following events you won’t want to miss:

• #FWSD24 – FreeWebSearchDay is going into its second year with exciting interactive actions and events happening on 29 September and the surrounding days and week. More info and how you can partake and support this special day: https://freewebsearch.org/
• Economy Study – As part of FreeWebSearchDay, we are offering an online presentation in cooperation with Mücke Roth & Company and BMW Foundation Herbert Quandt on 30 September. The topic: A comprehensive study on the market potential of OpenWebSearch.eu in Europe. The study is part of our third-party community programme.
  Sign-up to the event: https://gstoo.de/OpenWebSearch
• #EBDVA – the European Big Data Value Forum takes place in Budapest, Hungary from 2-4 October this year. Our session “Web-data at your fingertips for Generative AI, Data Analytics and Search” is scheduled for 3 October at 15.30 CET: https://european-big-data-value-forum.eu/2024-edition/programme/
•  #ossym24 – The 6th international OpenSearchSymposium takes place from 9-11 October at Leibniz Supercomputing Centre near Munich. Speakers include Roberto Viola – Director General, Communications Networks, Content and Technology, European Commission , Dr. Martin Andree – Media Scientist and Bestselling Author and Richard Socher – CEO at you.com. Participation is free, with 100 on-site spots available. The hybrid event will also be streamed. All infos and sign up link: https://opensearchfoundation.org/en/events-osf/ossym24/
• EOSC Symposium – From 21-23 October the European Open Science Cloud Symposium sets the scene in Berlin, Germany. Join our Unconference session on „Findability in FAIR: Touchpoints between EOSC and Open Web Search“ on 22 October  from 17-18 CET: https://indico.cern.ch/event/1408259/timetable/?layout=room#20241021.detailed

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Until 28 February 2024, the information retrieval community is invited to hand in submissions of scientific papers and implementations of retrieval components for the first #wows24 workshop. Doctoral students, but also early-stage students such as Master’s and Bachelor’s students of computer science, information science, information retrieval and NLP are welcome to submit their scientific work and implementations.

Mentoring for the practical part of submitting (parts of) retrieval pipelines is offered by the organisation team to (early-stage) participants (e.g., bachelor/master students).

The International Workshop on Open Web Search #wows24 will take place in Glasgow on 28 March 2024 (co-located with ECIR 2024). It will provide a forum to discuss and develop ideas and concepts to open up the web search ecosystem.

Find more information about the workshop and how to participate on the website: https://opensearchfoundation.org/wows2024