The application of e-science, the use of information and communications technologies (ICT) to support scientific work, increases the scale, access and diversity of information and collaborations and enables research on complex and interdisciplinary questions. However, smart technologies alone do not make e-science a success. Insights on the user and usage and the understanding of the societal and organizational dimensions contribute to the design, user uptake and sustainable use of the infrastructure. Hence, social science has a significant contribution to make to the development and implementation of e-science facilities. The position we would like to bring forward to this meeting is based on our experience in the e-infrastructure project, called ViBRANT (http://vbrant.eu). Below we highlight why and how, according to us, social science contributes to ViBRANT, under what conditions and what issues still need attention
