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Call for Participation IWIPS2010- Programme Now Available
by Jose Abdelnour-Nocera 11 May '10

11 May '10

The 9th International Workshop on Internationalisation of Products and Systems www.iwips2010.org<http://www.iwips2010.org> (London, England, 7 – 10 July 2010) announces its programme for this year’s conference and invites the professional and academic communities to participate and contribute to discussions on the topics of localization and globalization. The objective of the 2010 theme is to focus on the impact of international design teams on the design, evaluation, and development of products and systems. Confirmed Keynote Presentations from Liam Bannon, PhD Professor at University of Limerick, Senior Researcher at Lero, The Irish Software Engineering Research Centre Investigating Culture(s): Local & Global Perspectives Charles Ess, PhD Guest Professor, Department of Information- and Media Studies, Aarhus University (Aarhus, Denmark – 2009-2012) Designing the Self? Notes on Communication, Technology, and Self/Identity Glyn Meek Information Technology Consultant; and Owner Software on Sailboats Organizational “Make-Up” - The Impact of Blending People, Places, and Technology Kath Straub, PhD Usability.org; formerly Chief Scientist / Executive Director at Human Factors International The Psychology of Persuasion: Principles without Borders The various session formats will enable all delegates to bring their experience and voice their views on the different conference topics. You can still contribute to the programme by - Submitting a poster paper. Deadline 15th of May - Proposing a breakout and/or panel session to the conference chairs before 1st of June. Detailed programme can be found in http://www.iwips2010.org/program_events.html Early Registration finishes on the 15th of May! Advance Registration (thru 15 MAY 2010) £250 / €283 / $413 Late Registration (after 15 MAY 2010 or later) £275 / €311 / $454 Register online: http://www.iwips2010.org/registration.html Sponsorship Opportunities still available from as little as £125! More info here http://www.iwips2010.org/sponsors.html Any further queries please contact the Conference Co-Chair, Jose Abdelnour Nocera at jose.abdelnour-nocera(a)tvu.ac.uk<mailto:jose.abdelnour-nocera@tvu.ac.uk>

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Re: [Air-L] Inside, Outside, Upside, Down - Privacy and Public presence in the Internet age
by Paul Frosh 11 May '10

11 May '10

Responding to Carmel and Seda, it might be helpful to think through publicness in two time-honoured and occasionally contradictory ways: first, as visibility (see John Thompson's work on this, among others) - being in public involves being seen in a shared space common to (and open to) all. Obviously new technologies mean that increasing areas of what were once considered domestic life are made visible to unknown others, for better and for worse (that is why privacy is invaded) - although 'old' technologies (photography, voice recording, television) did a pretty good job of expanding publicness. Thinking about Carmel's example of the wifi street party this idea of publicness obviously applies: the street is a paradigmatic example of shared public space. The other sense of publicness is discursive: a group united by shared discourse (Habermas, Warner). In the modern era this was usually but not exclusively a physically dispersed group brought together through shared texts and media, and frequently synchronized consumption of those texts (reading the daily newspaper) - irrespective of whether those texts were consumed in (visible) public places or in private spaces: in fact, broadcasting media pulled private 'domestic' consumption firmly into the discursive public sphere. Carmel's example equally applies here: everyone listened to the same music, at the same time - and the music was 'broadcast' to them by wifi. The paradox in Carmel's wifi street party is between these two forms of publicness - visible and discursive - and in the conspicuous, comic redundancy of co-presence to the act of public media consumption. It is as though one were suddenly presented with a material image of the dispersed media public, transformed into a publicly visible crowd, put on view to one another, while still privately consuming their shared texts. Don't know if this rambling helps! Paul Paul Frosh, msfrosh(a)mscc.huji.ac.

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Dialogue about defining virtual worlds
by CarrieLynn D. Reinhard 11 May '10

11 May '10

Hello fellow researchers and practitioners, As part of the Virtual Worlds Research Group at Roskilde University, I am exploring how users make sense of virtual worlds -- and by users I am including us, the researchers and practitioners who engage with virtual worlds in their professional careers. To that end, I have begun a dialogue to explore how we make sense of virtual worlds through how we define them. This is a dialogue that has both online and offline components. The offline component will take place at a workshop our project is conducting. However, you can participate in the online components which bookend this workshop. Starting now, the first round of this dialogue is open for participation. If you are interested, go to http://worlds.ruc.dk/workshop/dialogue-round-1. Please feel free to email me with any questions you may have. CarrieLynn D. Reinhard, PhD Virtual Worlds Research Group http://worlds.ruc.dk/

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Reminder: Call for Papers, "New Groups and New Methods? The Ethnography and Qualitative Research of Online Groups"
by Maurizio 10 May '10

10 May '10

Apologies for Cross-Posting ERQ Call for Papers: New Groups and New Methods? The Ethnography and Qualitative Research of Online Groups Special Issue (volume 4, number 2, 2011) of “Etnografia e Ricerca Qualitativa” (Ethnography and Qualitative Research) Edited By: Stefano De Paoli & Maurizio Teli Abstract due: 15 May 2010 (500 words) Online groups, also called "virtual worlds", "virtual communities", or “digital collectives”, are those social groups whose members’ interactions are mediated primarily by the Internet. Participation in these groups has a variety of purposes and takes place via a variety of technological platforms. These include, for instance, platforms for social networking (such as Facebook, Second Life and social networks in general), platforms that have a productive purpose for participants (such as projects for the development of Free and Open Source Software), or platforms whose goal is to provide entertainment or a pastime for users (for instance Multiplayer Online Games such as the Massive Multiplayer Online Games or Online Poker). Nowadays, the social relevance of this phenomenon has become quite clear in several areas. For example, social networks like Facebook or MySpace now count millions of users that interact online, with a variety of goals, practices and tools (Beer, 2008). The proliferation of socio-technical phenomena such as Wikipedia, Creative Commons and Free and Open Source Software has changed some of the traditional assumptions about organizational hierarchies and paid labour (Kelty, 2008). Or again, Online Games' virtual economies are tied to real economies, in ways that challenge traditional assumptions about property (Castronova, 2005). Social, cultural, economic, and technological dimensions are, therefore, closely intertwined in the phenomenon of Online Groups. In this special issue (volume 4, number 2, 2011) of “Etnografia e Ricerca Qualitativa” (Ethnography and Qualitative Research) we are looking for contributions with a strong empirical bias that can tackle this hybrid complexity and that specifically offer reflections and practical experiences for a discussion on the theoretical and methodological dimensions of the phenomenon. This involves reflecting on one or more of the following topics: Firstly, some reflections might focus on the theoretical dimension. Often the literature, in both the social sciences and economics, for example Benkler’s (2006) or von Hippel’s (2004) works, has associated the birth and proliferation of online groups with a process of democratization and the construction of a new democratic balance of power and knowledge. (Consider the case of Free and Open Source Software or the advent of Web 2.0 and User Generated Content.) However, this literature is often linked with individualistic approaches, the methodological dimension of which does not focus on the “fine grain” of social practices and on the power relationships these practices might imply. One of the goals of this special issue is therefore to stimulate a debate on how ethnographic or qualitative research in general can help to balance this optimistic view, in which "online" is seen as a place of pure democracy. Secondly, the research on online group interactions requires a discussion of and reflection on the assumptions of traditional qualitative and ethnographic research. Indeed, the researcher herself is required to take part in online interactions and to use the Internet to conduct the research. This consideration illustrates that there is an inherent reflexive element: the researcher studies a phenomenon that she is also contributing to identify. It is therefore important for researchers to reflect on the use in research of the same technologies and platforms used for online interactions. This includes, for instance, tools for collecting qualitative data, for analyzing data and also for the communication/dissemination of research results. Examples could be: the use of blogs or wikis as tools to keep and organize field notes or even to build a relationship with participants in the online groups themselves; the use of online resources (such as software tools) that can be used for data collection and analysis, for example extensions for the Firefox browser or web-based CAQDAS software; and the use of blogs, wikis and other platforms to disseminate research results, in this way contributing to the construction of online interactions. Finally, ethnographic and qualitative online research requires specific reflections on the ethical aspects of the research. For instance, the availability of archived material in a space that is neither public nor private, according to classical categories in the ethics of research, and whose authors are not always reachable, poses challenging problems. Indeed, often the user communications and interactions are public, in the sense that they are easily accessible by almost anyone through an Internet connection. This type of “sharing in a limited context” by users raises ethical questions for researchers, as the users' original purpose was not to provide “data” for researchers (Bakardjeva and Feenberg, 2001). Therefore, an approach that takes the situation into account should be used when discussing the status of public/private information in relation to Internet conversations and interactions (Teli, Pisanu, Hakken, 2007). In conclusion, we invite empirically grounded research papers that address one or more of the dimensions outlined above, but which may also expand them and include other aspects. Contributions might include (but are not restricted to): The ethnography and qualitative research of online groups: social networks, online games, Wikipedia, etc. The construction of groups: the role of the researcher and qualitative research Ethnographic and qualitative approaches to power and to online data Power and knowledge: digital archives, avatars Your experiences with using online technologies for the collection and analysis of qualitative data The ethics of qualitative research on online groups References Beer, D. (2008). Social network(ing) sites…revisiting the story so far: A response to danah boyd & Nicole Ellison, Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Volume 13 Issue 2, Pages 516 - 529 Benkler, Y. (2006). The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom, New Haven: Yale University Press von Hippel, E. (2004). Democratizing innovation, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press Kelty, C. (2008). Two Bits: The Cultural Significance of Free Software and the Internet, Durham, NC: Duke University Press Castronova, E. (2005). Synthetic Worlds-The Business and Culture of Online Games, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press Bakardjeva, M. and Feenberg, A. (2001). Involving the virtual subject. Ethics and Information Technology, 2, 233-240. Teli, M., Pisanu, F., and Hakken, D. (2007). The Internet as a Library-of-People: For a Cyberethnography of Online Groups [65 paragraphs]. Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung / Forum: Qualitative Social Research, 8 (3), Art. 33, http://www.qualitative-research.net/index.php/fqs/article/view/283/621 Important Dates: 15 May 2010: Abstract of maximum 500 words. We will accept any abstract we consider interesting for the aims of this special issue. The selection of the articles to be published will then be done on the basis of the Full Papers. Full Paper Submission: 15 September 2010 Review Results: 15 December 2010 Final Paper (maximum ten thousands words), camera-ready: 15 March 2011 Abstracts and Articles may be submitted in English or Italian. Articles must be submitted via email to the editors (see address below) in the Journal's approved house style. Please read the Guidelines for Submission first! They are at http://www.mulino.it/edizioni/riviste/etnografia/norme.pdf You can access information about the house style at http://www.mulino.it/edizioni/riviste/etnografia/norme.pdf Please note that submissions not in the house style will automatically be returned to authors for formatting. The journal is peer-reviewed and authors are expected to take reviewers' reports into consideration when finalizing their papers for publication. Queries: Stefano.depaoli [at] nuim [dot] ie and Maurizio [at] maurizioteli [dot] eu About the Journal: Etnografia e ricerca qualitativa (Ethnography and Qualitative Research) is a peer-review journal that hosts high-quality, original ethnographic and qualitative research, combining careful empirical observation with sound theoretical reflection. The journal has a wide and diverse audience, and the paper accepted and published are directed toward such an audience, not only toward the readers of the specific research field of the writers. The journal covers traditional areas of ethnographic inquiry, such as urban ethnography, deviance, work and occupational communities, immigration and ethnic relations, but also promotes the ethnographic analysis of scientific practices and knowledge, information and surveillance systems, religion, politics, the media, sport and the arts. ERQ is not committed to any specific theoretical approach, and is open to papers influenced by different theoretical traditions, provided they are based on accurate field research. It is published in Italian, but the web version is bilingual (Italian/English). Some articles are also published in French. ERQ is edited by Pier Paolo Giglioli, Alessandro Dal Lago, Giolo Fele and Marco Marzano. Some of the most well known Italian scholars involved in ethnography sit on the Editorial Board, which is complemented by a prestigious International Advisory Board. Journal Web Site: http://www.mulino.it/edizioni/riviste/scheda_rivista.php?issn=1973-3194 About the Editors of the Special Issue: Stefano De Paoli is a post-doctoral researcher at the National University of Ireland Maynooth, where he is conducting research on the Future of the Internet. Stefano has worked in Science and Technology Studies since 2004, focusing on an investigation of software licences. Recently, his research interest has been Massive Multiplayer Online Games, with a focus on cheating. More on Stefano at http://www.nuim.ie/nirsa/people/postdocs/stefano_de_paoli.shtml Maurizio Teli is a researcher at the Museo Tridentino di Scienze Naturali and collaborator at the University of Trento, Italy. He is conducting research on the relationships between online technologies and the construction of everyday societal facts. He has worked on Science, Technology and Society, as well as in Organization Studies and Internet Research, since 2004, mainly investigating the political reality constructed by software developers' practices. Recently, he has been working on the “My Ideal City” project (EU Grant Agreement n° 230554), questioning how three-dimensional virtual environments can be used in the dissemination of alternative realities. More on Maurizio at http://www.maurizioteli.eu

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Fwd: CFP: Transnational Times: Locality, Globality and Mobility in Technology Design and Use
by Christina Dunbar-Hester 10 May '10

10 May '10

---- CFP: Transnational Times: Locality, Globality and Mobility in Technology Design and Use A workshop at Ubicomp 2010 September 26, 2010 Copenhagen, Denmark Organizers: Irina Shklovski, Silvia Lindtner, Janet Vertesi, Paul Dourish We seek interdisciplinary scholars interested in exploring the role of ubiquitous computing, the use of information and communication technologies and the politics of technological design in transnational settings to participate in our workshop, TRANSNATIONAL TIMES, at Ubicomp 2010. Through this workshop we aim to expand our current scholarly vocabulary for the conceptualization of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in addressing the interplay of local and global user interaction. Current work in Ubiquitous computing is already considering the use of technologies in the developing world and marginalized users in the developed world. This workshop extends such an interest to examine interactions with ubiquitous technology in a transnational context. After all, technologies such as mobile phones, social networking applications and the internet writ large complicate the framing of use and culture as bounded by national or geographical borders, as such illuminating diverse user practices and identities. In this analytical frame we take inspiration from theorists of the global in anthropology, sociology, and HCI who focus on flows across boundaries, hybridity and transnationality. Examples of possible papers or research topics of interest include (but are not limited to): the use of pervasive technologies such as multiplayer gaming across borders, studies of the use of social network sites among diaspora communities, use of the internet and other ICTs in censorship state zones, the role of mobile technologies in reconfiguring the local and the global, technology in the context of international migration networks, ubiquitous computing and cross- cultural collaboration, and the role of technology in international politics. Papers that develop theoretical approaches, that examine or report on empirical work, or that design technological artifacts are welcome, and need not be limited to "developing world" sites of interest. We hope to attract submissions from scholars working in a range of fields across computational, social and humanistic studies, such as human computer interaction, anthropology, media studies, sociology, science and technology studies and social and cultural geography. The goal of the workshop is to assemble like minds and projects, to develop a language and toolset appropriate for the study of ubiquitous technologies in transnational spaces, and to engage a wider community of researchers working in this area. We also hope this workshop will interest technology designers and developers currently working in non- western contexts. Full papers may later be solicited for a potential edited volume. TO APPLY: Interested participants should submit a 2-4 page paper in Ubicomp Archival Format describing your current project and its contribution to the workshop topic and themes. As you prepare your paper we suggest you visit our website at < http://www.ics.uci.edu/~lindtner/transnationaltimes<http://www.ics.uci.edu/%7Elindtner/transnationaltimes> > for more information. Papers must be emailed to transnationaltimes(a)gmail.com by JUNE 15, 2010. Decisions will be announced by June 30. All accepted participants should plan to attend at least one full day of Ubicomp 2010 in addition to the workshop. Registration will be handled by Ubicomp 2010's central registration page via < http://www.ubicomp2010.org -- Christina Dunbar-Hester Postdoctoral Fellow Virtual Knowledge Studio for the Humanities & Social Sciences The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts & Sciences Amsterdam, The Netherlands http://virtualknowledgestudio.nl/

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Canadian Internet Use Survey 2009 Enquête canadienne sur l'utilisation d'Internet
by Peter Timusk 10 May '10

10 May '10

The Canadian Internet Use Survey 2009 released Internet use estimates today. I can help you contact the survey manager if you would like custom tables. http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/100510/dq100510a-eng.htm in French http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/100510/dq100510a-fra.htm Peter Timusk, B.Math statistics (2002), B.A. legal studies (2006) Carleton University Systems Science Graduate student, University of Ottawa. just trying to stay linear. Read by hundreds of lurkers every week. kiitos paljon, merci, thank you and muchas gracias for reading.

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Re: [Air-L] Inside, Outside, Upside, Down - Privacy and Public presence in the Internet age
by Seda Guerses 10 May '10

10 May '10

i think with the examples i have in mind, i am always thinking of orlikowski's idea of constitutive entanglement: looking not only at what technology leverages or only at the meaning people give to it, but to see how the two are constitutively entangled. for example manu luksch worked with people communicating in sign language and the fact that their conversation gets captured by cctv cameras and cctv workers. this is a loss of privacy that those communicating using sound will in most cases still be able to maintain. further, most telecommunication companies keep sms messages and use them for content and community analysis. hence, the communication may become more private with respect to the surroundings of those communicating, but by virtue of being text communication through a curious provider, sms are less private then a conversation using mobile phones (unless of course, the state of the art in voice recognition allows all conversations to be smoothly transcribed, searched, analyzed, etc.). Disclaimer: http://www.kuleuven.be/cwis/email_disclaimer.htm

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The role of Internet and ICT policies in the UK after the 2010 election: does it make a difference for the role of the Internet in British society if there will be a Labour-Lib Dem or a Conservative-Lib Dem government?
by Christian Fuchs 09 May '10

09 May '10

Source: NetPoliticsBlog, abridged, see http://fuchs.uti.at/367/ for full version Will there be changes in Internet and ICT politics and policies after the 2010 elections for the Westminster parliament? Will it in this context make a difference if there will be a Tory-LibDem government or a Labour-LibDem government? The election manifestos of the three parties give us an idea of what to expect in the near future for UK Internet politics. Liberal Democrats The Liberal Democrats do not have an agenda for the role they want to assign to ICTs and the Internet in Britain. In their “Liberal Democrat Manifesto 2010”, [...] One finds a few passages in the 109 pages of the document, where ICTs or the Internet are mentioned: The LibDems seem to consider social networking sites and web 2.0 primarily as problem, where users become victims of individual crimes. Therefore they want to tackle ”online bullying by backing quick-report buttons on social networking sites, enabling offensive postings to be speedily removed“ (p. 17). They do not discuss the problem of online commodification of users and the circumstance that the Internet is dominated by a commercial, advertising-oriented culture that results in data surveillance for economic purposes. Discussions about the online bullying report button ignore the positive aspects that web 2.0 has for the socialization and growing-up process of adolescents. [...] The message that the Liberal Democrat’s manifesto gives is that they have no clue about what role the Internet and ICTs should play in society. Having no ICT and Internet agenda is also an agenda, although not a particularly good one. So what about the Conservatives and the Labour Party? Can they make a difference in ICT and Internet politics? Conservatives & Labour [..…] Both the Conservatives and Labour want to advance the rollout of a super-fast Internet broadband infrastructure. [...] “We want Britain to become a European hub for hi-tech, digital and creative industries – but this can only happen if we have the right infrastructure in place. Establishing a super-fast broadband network throughout the UK could generate 600,000 additional jobs and add £18 billion to Britain’s GDP“ (Conservative Manifesto 2010, p. 24). [...] The Labour Party also wants to advance a high-speed Internet broadband infrastructure. It speaks of “Broadband Britain“: “Britain must be a world leader in the development of broadband. We are investing in the most ambitious plan of any industrialised country to ensure a digital Britain for all, extending access to every home and business. We will reach the long-term vision of superfast broadband for all [...]” (Labour Party Manifesto 2010, pp. 1:7f). Both the Conservatives and the Labour Party leave no doubt that they want to invest taxpayer’s money for creating a high-speed broadband infrastructure that is controlled by private companies and that can be accessed by people in the UK by paying fees to Internet service provider companies. This means that public investment is used not for creating a public infrastructure that is universally accessible, which means accessible for all without payment, but for privatizing the infrastructure so that is in the hands of companies and thereby de-facto becomes commodified and private property. If access to knowledge, knowledge production, and communication are universal conditions of human and societal flourishing, then Internet access – a central infrastructure for contemporary information, communication, and co-operation – should be treated as being part of the commons of society and should be made available without payment to all citizens. A commodified Internet infrastructure privileges high-income classes, stratifies Internet access, as a tendency excludes lower-income groups, and commodifies the access to knowledge and communication. The Conservatives do not think about Internet access solutions beyond the market, whereas the Labour Party suggests to “build on our network of UK Online centres and public libraries to spread free internet access points within the community, and develop new incentives for users to switch to online services“ (Labour Party Manifesto, p. 9:5). Free Internet access within libraries is a strange idea, it is like not being able to take home a book from the library, but having to read the full book in the library. The Internet is a highly flexible and mobile technology, containing access to certain places, such as libraries, is therefore an odd and backward-oriented policy suggestion. The only viable solution is to create freely available, non-commercial wireless Internet access points all over the country. What kind of Internet content and platform providers do the Tories and Labour favour? Both parties claim that they will advance economic growth by fostering entrepreneurship in the ICT industry and providing tax cuts and start-up subsidies for ICT and Internet companies. “A Conservative government will build a new model of economic growth, based on high tech and high value industries. This means harnessing and catalysing the next generation of technologies, and helping businesses to create highly paid new jobs in every part of the country. We will build a high tech 21st century infrastructure that is ﬁt for purpose, and we will lay the foundation for a British technology revolution” (Conservative Technology Manifesto 2010, p. 6). “As recommended by the Dyson Review, we will keep R&D tax credits but will simplify and refocus them on high tech companies, small businesses and new start-ups in order to stimulate a new wave of technology” (Conservative Technology Manifesto 2010, p. 7). Similar policies are envisioned by Labour: “Labour believes we should rebuild our economy in new ways: with more high-tech business, fairer rewards and responsibility from all, including at the top” (Labour Party Manifesto 2010, p. 0:4). “Within this, the Growth Capital Fund will focus on SMEs which need capital injections of between £2 and £10 million, while the Innovation Investment Fund will focus on the needs of high-tech ﬁrms” (Labour Party Manifesto 2010, p. 1:6). [...] Both the Tories and Labour cling to the 1990s Californian ideology (throwing public money at ICT companies and thereby hoping for economic prosperity and a new job wonder). The result of the Californian ideology was not long-time economic growth, stability, and a new job wonder, but the bursting of the Internet economy bubble in 2000 and as a result the new economy crisis. It is therefore surprising that the two largest British parties show continued faith in ICT and Internet corporatism and do not look for possibilities for public investment in alternative Internet and ICT models that try to go beyond crisis capitalism, finance capital, and try to see the Internet and ICTs as part of society’s commons. The Internet that both parties imagine is one that is dominated by monopoly capital, [...] So the Tories speak of the “ambition that the next generation of Googles, Microsofts and Facebooks are British companies“ (Conservative Technology Manifesto 2010, p. 2). There is not the slightest awareness in these documents of the many problems associated with Internet and ICT monopolies and the domination of the Internet by capitalist logic. Both the Tories and Labour consider ICTs and the Internet important for public administration and democracy. However, the ideas of both parties on digital democracy are conventional and do not go beyond eGovernment. [...] The Tories present themselves as the harbingers of direct democracy: ”Give citizens more power: People have been shut out of Westminster politics for too long. Having a single vote every four or five years is not good enough – we need to give people real control over how they are governed. So, with a Conservative government, any petition that secures 100,000 signatures will be eligible for formal debate in Parliament. The petition with the most signatures will enable members of the public to table a bill eligible to be voted on in Parliament. and we will introduce a new Public reading Stage for bills to give the public an opportunity to comment on proposed legislation online” (Conservative Manifesto 2010, p. 66). [...] The idea of the Conservatives is to let citizens suggest proposals that are discussed in parliament and to make use of the Internet to let citizens express their opinion on proposed legislation. This means that they want to foster political talking and interaction, but do not want to give citizens real power to influence and decide on legislation outside of general elections. The suggested reforms are not an expression of grassroots democracy and grassroots digital democracy, but rather of populist digital plebiscitarianism or what Carole Pateman in the 1970s called pseudo-participation: citizens are summoned to “participate” by communicating and voicing opinions in order to silence them and discourage real participatory politics, in which they can directly influence decisions and have a say in politics. Also Labour wants to strengthen democracy with the help of ICTs and the Internet, although their ideas remain more abstract: “Opening up government – central and local – in this way offers huge potential for Britain. We can use new technologies to give people a say on policy-making; enable citizens to carry out more of their dealings with government online; and save money for taxpayers as we switch services over to digital-only delivery” (Labour Party Manifesto 2010, p. 9:5). It remains unclear what exactly it means to “use new technologiesto give people a say on policy-making”. [...] Both the Tories and Labour understand digital democracy to mean that government provides more information to citizens with the help of ICTs and that citizens can communicate opinions to politicians, the government, and parliament with the help of the Internet. This understanding of digital democracy is narrow because it fully leaves out the importance of civil society and citizen-to-citizen political communication for a flourishing and dynamic democracy. The notion of democracy is confined to politics, there is no talk about economic democracy, work place democracy, and democracy in other spheres of society and the role that ICTs and the Internet could play for advancing participatory democracy in all realms of society. The understandings of digital democracy that can be found in the election manifestos of the Conservative Party and the Labour Party are one-dimensional, government-focused, and do not realize the actual potentials that the Internet can pose for democratic reforms that enable participatory democracy. [...] 66% of British Internet users aged 15-24 say that it is morally acceptable to download music for free and 70% say they do not feel guilty for downloading music for free (Youth and Media survey 2009, N=1026, Office of Communications: Communication Market Report 2009, 278). Refusing and opposing the interests of young people and other citizens, both the Conservatives and the Labour Party intend to continue the criminalization of file sharers in order to guarantee profit interests for the culture industry. No matter which party will be in power, a tightening of intellectual property right protection and of the repression against file sharers and thereby the interest of the majority of young people can be expected. The Labour Party has announced: “We will update the intellectual property framework that is crucial to the creative industries – and take further action to tackle online piracy” (Labour Party Manifesto 2010, p. 7:6). Similarly the Tories have said: “We will ensure that Britain has the most favourable intellectual framework in the world for innovators and high tech businesses. We recognise the need to tackle digital piracy and make it possible for people to buy and sell digital intellectual property online. However it is vital that any anti-piracy measures promote new business models rather than holding innovation back” (Conservative Technology Manifesto 2010, p. 7). Both parties miss an understanding of the question if free access to digital knowledge is a form of cultural democracy that strengthens capabilities, communication, the public sphere, and cultural dynamics. They put the corporate interests of the culture industry first and above the interests of cultural prosumers. Also alternative policy measures, such as the culture flat rate, are not discussed. The actual or potential criminalization of a large share of Internet users is simply accepted, not questioned. Also the problem of how cultural production can be remunerated in an age of file sharing without enhancing the dependency of these producers on large media companies and without criminalizing users is not discussed. Conclusion No matter if the resolution to the situation of a hung parliament in Great Britain will be a Conservative or a Labour government supported by the Liberal Democrats, one thing is for sure: there will not be any significant positive changes in the realm of Internet and ICT politics and policies. The Liberal Democrats have simply ignored this topic in their 2010 election manifesto, which shows that they consider Internet and ICTs as unimportant. In contrast, the Labour Party and the Conservatives compete for which of the two party can create a more neoliberal ICT policy framework. Both Labour and the Tories stand for the advancement of the commodification of the Internet and ICTs, the weakening and economization of the cultural commons of society, the criminalization of Internet users, opposition to the cultural interests of young Internet users, ignorance towards ICT-enhanced participatory democracy, civil society, and citizen-to-citizen political communication, and the focus on conventional and unoriginal eGovernment measures. In the UK, government will in the coming years pursue Internet politics with a backwards-oriented neo-neoliberal agenda. We can expect an extension and intensification of neoliberal Internet policies. [...]

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Re: [Air-L] Inside, Outside, Upside, Down - Privacy and Public
by Carmel L. Vaisman 08 May '10

08 May '10

Hi Seda. I see your point, yet, there is something about voice going silent. Today I attended a wifi street party: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDbc1RKHoCc Instead of playing music in public, they hand out earphones and everyone hears the same music but privately. If that is even considered private or just personal, since the music IS shared among a group of people but not really public...? These concepts sure need some shaking. Carmel Vaisman http://www.absolutecarmel.com Twitter @carmelva

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Material for Attention Currencies in Gaming Ecosytems
by Arun Menon 08 May '10

08 May '10

Hi, I am working on a paper examining attention currencies in gaming ecosystems, with a focus on attention as a mediating currency between real and virtual gaming currencies. I was looking through material by Goldhaber and Davenport and was wondering if there was any material examining these concepts and their application in gaming ecosystems particularly MMORPGs and perhaps even something on Goldfarming - already looked through Dibbell, Nakamura, Consalvo and Castronova in this regard. Are you aware of any work/research being done in this area around MMORPGs? or around gaming ecosystems that examine virtual economies in relation to the time, labor, production, and investment in MMORPGs? I was looking for a copy of "Online Game Interactivity Theory" by Markus F, its out of stock in India and would be too expensive to order. Does someone have an Ebook version of this book? I would really appreciate it if you could kindly mail me the same. Any other suggestions or advice would be very helpful Thanks in advance Best Arun Menon arun.kid86(a)gmail.com twitter : @arunuik

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