# Science Cafes, Science Shops and the Lockdown Experience in Florence and Rome+
## 2 Science Cafes  
In science communication, many of the methods provide for a passive presence of the public, with a \"one way\" mechanism in which the emitter is the expert and the recipient is the people: the information flow from experts to participants.  
A conference, for instance, is normally organized in a lecture hall of a university or an institutional place, with the expert being in the \"chair\" and the public in the parterre. In a sense, it is as if the conference took place in the expert's house and the participants were guests.  
As a result, the flow of information and interactions are almost always one-way, with a few questions from the audience, confined at the end of the intervention. Participation is therefore very selective and is unlikely to involve a generic public. From the point of view of the interaction, the conference is still better than other forms of dissemination such as articles, television, and radio broadcasts, but it reaches a smaller audience.  
In 1992, [PERSON], a former BBC Director, launched in Leeds the idea of a science cafe, anticipating the revolution in science communication from the \"Public Understanding of Science\" to the \"Public Engagement of Science and Technology\" [16]. A science cafe is a conference turned upside down [17; 18; 19]. The advent of the Internet has also allowed using tools such as podcasts to distribute the recording of events and even streaming, introduced mainly from the science cafe in Florence, to be able to reach people who for geographical or health reasons cannot reach the venue of the event but want to participate at distance [20].  
One of the most important aspects of this methodology is related to its cognitive implications. From one side, there is the need to actively involve the public in the transmission of information, avoiding the passive TV effect. Simultaneously, one wants to avoid participants taking a premature position on hot topics, since in this case there is the risk of polarizing the audience that is no longer effectively communicating. The science cafe method is based on avoiding the participation of counter-posed experts, and to let public pose questions at any time, but possibly avoiding expressing their opinion until the end. Many of these aspects survive also when using virtual interactions.  
In Florence, Italy, the organization of these events is carried out by the cultural association \"Caffe-Scienza\" (of which two of the authors are members), formed mostly by academic and CNR researchers, but also many \"ordinary\" people. Starting from 2004, this association is organizing the traditional science cafes (caffe-scienza) and other initiatives, almost one event per week. The public is mainly composed of middle-age, highly educated people.  
Up to now, the Caffe-Scienza association has organized more than 300 events, with several variations: in markets, in libraries, streamed on YouTube, with online participation of experts, using movies (Cine-Scienza), and so on (Figure 1). The association also experimented with radio support (nine years) and animated the Italian Network of Science Cafes. The themes are varied, covering science and technological topics. Science cafes have also been used as an instrument for evaluating and discussing the results of European projects, as well as to co-design new ones.  
In Rome, the science cafe activity is carried out by the non-profit association \"FormaScienza\" (of which one of the authors is a member), formed by academic researchers, teachers, and artists, but also \"ordinary\" people. This association organizes, from 2005, the science cafes and other initiatives such as the junior science cafes (with high school students), science education research, teachers and student trainings, science labs, science theatre events, and science festival. In this case as well, the public is mainly composed of middle-age, highly educated people, with a strong component of high-school students, motivated by their teachers.