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Twitter the Newspaper of Me
by Barry Wellman 02 Jul '09

02 Jul '09

Just tweeted this: For some of us, Twitter is becoming the oft-foreold "Newspaper of Me" -- that is if you follow the links. Twitter, of course, is what you make of it. Happy Canada Day! Barry Wellman _______________________________________________________________________ S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php _______________________________________________________________________

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Engaging Data Forum Call for Papers | Submissions Deadline July 13
by Marcus Foth 02 Jul '09

02 Jul '09

Dear all, The deadline for submissions to the Engaging Data: First International Forum on the Application and Management of Personal Electronic Information is July 13, 2009, 5:00 p.m. EDT (New York). Please visit http://senseable.mit.edu/engagingdata for further details on author guidelines for submissions. As a reference, our Call for Papers is below, in the attachment, and on our website. Please also distribute this reminder. Thanks! Best regards, Caitlin -------------------------------- Caitlin Zacharias Engaging Data Conference Coordinator SENSEable City Laboratory Massachusetts Institute of Technology Suite 10-400 77 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02139 USA T ++1-617-2537926 F ++1-617-2588081 W senseable.mit.edu/engagingdata E czachar(a)mit.edu Apologies if you receive multiple copies. Please distribute! * * * * * * * * * * * * * * CALL FOR PAPERS * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ENGAGING DATA First International Forum on the Application and Management of Personal Electronic Information Hosted by SENSEable City Lab, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Oct. 12-13, 2009 Massachusetts Institute of Technology Cambridge, MA USA http://senseable.mit.edu/engagingdata CALL FOR PAPERS Over the past decade, the development and use of digital networks has produced an increasing wealth of new data. Handheld electronics, locative media, telecommunications networks, and a wide assortment of tags and sensors are constantly collecting a rich stream of real-time information on various components of our lives and the environment we inhabit, including our movements, purchases, social interactions, Internet activities, and many more. These data afford a wide range of research opportunities in the social and natural sciences that will create a multitude of beneficial information and services. Affected areas range widely and include, among others, workplace efficiency, traffic management, tourism, marketing, logistics, e-commerce, entertainment, urban and architectural planning, disaster response, security, environmental sustainability, and social interaction. Advances in this field are progressing cautiously, however, as the public, commercial and social entities, and the government are only just beginning to understand this new condition of pervasive sensing and data mining as well as the associated framework required to manage it. Conflicting standards on privacy and fear of entering upon uncharted territories hinder companies, researchers, and others from engaging in activities that make responsible use of potentially sensitive data. Moreover, regulation has not kept pace with the changing digital infrastructure, and as a result different stakeholders currently face different restrictions on data usage. In short, we still lack a complete understanding of the societal value in this data and the influence on society by its use, and much still remains unexplored. It is becoming imperative to develop a new framework of standards and best practices for collecting, storing, analyzing, reporting, sharing, and protecting valuable electronic data created by new technologies and services. The Engaging Data: First International Forum on the Application and Management of Personal Electronic Information is the launching event of the Engaging Data Initiative, which will include a series of discussion panels and conferences at MIT. This initiative seeks to address the above issues by bringing together the main stakeholders from multiple disciplines, including social scientists, engineers, manufacturers, telecommunications service providers, Internet companies, credit companies and banks, privacy officers, lawyers, and watchdogs, and government officials. The goal of this forum is to explore the novel applications for electronic data and address the risks, concerns, and consumer opinions associated with the use of this data. In addition, it will include discussions on techniques and standards for both protecting and extracting value from this information from several points of view: what techniques and standards currently exist, and what are their strengths and limitations? What holistic approaches to protecting and extracting value from data would we take if we were given a blank slate? These issues and questions will be addressed through invited talks, paper presentations, and panel discussions. The forum will serve as a platform to exchange ideas, discuss the latest developments in this field, address significant issues, and create visions for the future. The forum is seeking original contributions in the form of both position papers and technical papers. Of particular interest are papers that open new paths for research, express a creative vision for the future, and contribute to a lively debate. TOPICS Papers are solicited that propose principles and approaches to building a viable social ecosystem for using information mined from human interactions with digital networks. Each paper must touch on the technical, security, social, legal/political, and financial aspects of the issue, although it is expected that papers will concentrate more on some aspects than on others. Topics of interest within these aspects include, but are not limited to, the following: --Technical-- Uses and concerns associated with data collection and mining: 1. Information mined by an endpoint party to a communication, including: -Types of information mined from consumer devices by endpoint parties (e.g. VoIP routers and radio handsets) -Accuracy and use of location analyses based on IP addresses, Internet traceroutes, etc. -Sharing of mined data with third parties -Methodologies to analyze and visualize this data 2. Collection, storage, and use of information gathered from wireless networks, including: -Location-based tracking and other forms of mobile sensing -Mobile phones, cordless phones, walkie-talkies, wireless microphones -Femtocells -RFID systems -Wi-Fi Networks -Implications for "white spaces" signal-sensing devices -Increased personalization of communications (i.e. device is commonly unique to a particular individual) -Sharing of data with third parties 3. Collection of information on traffic flow patterns in fixed networks, including: -How uses and concerns vary based on whether flows are segregated by endpoint, time-of-day, bandwidth usage level, application type, etc. -Optical and non-optical networks -Broadband networks -Personal area networks (PAN), Local-area networks (LAN), Wide-area networks (WAN), etc. 4. Information collection inside the network -Packet inspection, e.g. collection of IP addresses, HTTP cookies, etc. -Significance of IPv6 in providing static IP addresses that may be specific to particular devices and/or their locations 5. Soundness of data -Veracity, completeness, etc. of data collected from multiple perspectives, e.g. multiple sensors and/or points inside the network -Algorithms and other tools to deal with incomplete, contradictory, and incorrect data 6. Data protection -Effectiveness and adequacy of encryption, anonymization, aggregation, hashing algorithms, and level of accuracy of information at ensuring customer privacy -Metadata standards and preservation formats --Financial-- 1. Business and incentive models/structures --Security-- Social issues associated with data collection and mining: 1. Consumers and Privacy -Privacy concerns and countervailing interests concerning the authentication of electronic identities and transactions -Consumer awareness, e.g. how common it is for people to read privacy policies -Consumer access to, control of, and awareness of information collected about them -Ethical considerations and implications of data mining for both individuals and society -Social norms and expectations of privacy Legal and political issues associated with data collection and mining: 1. Standards for protecting and extracting value from data -Strengths and limitations of existing standards -"Blank slate," holistic approaches to protecting and extracting value from data -Applicability of set standards, e.g. EC Data Protection Directive, to the US, developed vs. developing countries, globally 2. E-government services -Appropriateness of permitting private entities preferential rights of access or redistribution of such data -Conformity with citizen expectations and assurances of the privacy of such data 3. Legal and regulatory concerns -Requirements, if any, for prior review and approval of proposed collection and use of data (IRB, etc.) -Acceptable methods of obtaining consent for the use of various types of information -Requirements of consent from parties related to the information, e.g. from only one party related to the information or from all parties related to the information -Responsibilities to disclose mining of information (who must disclose such activities and to whom must disclosure be made, e.g. direct customer of service, correspondents of direct customer, etc.) -Role of regulation in the exposure of information collected on network activities 4. Risk and Mitigation -Evaluation and mitigation of risks of research, government, and commercial activities involving data collection and mining -Methods of risk avoidance AUTHOR GUIDELINES Position papers must be 4-6 pages in length, technical papers 6-8 pages in length. Papers must be written in English and follow the standard IEEE format (two-column, single-spaced, 10-point font, on US Letter size paper). Please submit papers in PDF format. Templates can be found under: http://www.ieee.org/web/publications/pubservices/confpub/AuthorTools/confer… Each submitted paper will be peer-reviewed in a double-blind fashion. Please remove any mention of author names and affiliations in the entire submission, and if referencing previous work of the authors, use the third person. Papers will be evaluated according to originality, relevance, technical soundness, significance, and clarity. At least one author must register for the conference to have the paper published in the proceedings. The most exceptional papers in each category will be presented at the conference and published in the conference proceedings. All papers will be handled electronically and should be submitted online via EDAS. Please visit senseable.mit.edu/engagingdata for further details. IMPORTANT DATES Deadline for submission of full papers: July 13, 2009 Notification of acceptance: August 10, 2009 Camera-ready papers due: August 31, 2009 Early registration: August 31, 2009 Conference dates: October 12-13, 2009 GENERAL CHAIRS AND PROGRAM COMMITTEE General Chairs Carlo Ratti, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Assaf Biderman, Massachusetts Institute of Technology Technical Contributions Co-Chairs Alex (Sandy) Pentland, Massachusetts Institute of Technology David Lazer, Harvard University Program Committee Ben Adida, Harvard University Albert-László Barabási, Northeastern University Dirk Brockmann, Northwestern University John Clippinger, Harvard University Alissa Cooper, Center for Democracy and Technology Simon Davies, Privacy International Laura DeNardis, Yale University William Dutton, University of Oxford Deborah Estrin, UCLA Marcus Foth, Queensland University of Technology Dean Gallant, Harvard University Myron Gutmann, University of Michigan Gary King, Harvard University John Krumm, Microsoft Research William Lehr, MIT Marc Rotenberg, EPIC Karen Sollins, MIT Rebecca Wright, Rutgers University Jonathan Zittrain, Harvard University For questions regarding paper submissions, please contact Caitlin Zacharias: czachar(a)mit.edu. SENSEable City Laboratory Massachusetts Institute of Technology Suite 10-400 77 Massachusetts Avenue Cambridge, MA 02139 USA T ++1-617-2537926 F ++1-617-2588081 W senseable.mit.edu/engagingdata E senseable-data(a)mit.edu -- Dr Marcus Foth Senior Research Fellow Institute for Creative Industries and Innovation Queensland University of Technology (CRICOS No. 00213J) Victoria Park Rd, Brisbane QLD 4059, Australia Phone +61 7 313 x88772 - Fax x88238 - Office K506, KG m.foth(a)qut.edu.au - http://www.urbaninformatics.net/

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Blogs, listservs and ethics.
by Alecea Standlee 02 Jul '09

02 Jul '09

Hey all,I am having a bit of a debate about the use of blogs and listserv's in academic work. If one is using a listserv as a information source the current ethical guidelines say to cite it as an electronic resource. However, if a researcher is studying a blog/listserv as a research site, ie online ethnographic participate observation, does the same policy apply or rather do issues of informed consent pop up? What do you all think? Any thoughts or recommendations for readings would be most helpful! Alecea Standlee Syracuse University Department of Sociology

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Trivial tweeting
by Bernie Hogan 02 Jul '09

02 Jul '09

Dear Aoir folk, I had a Morton's thai chicken sandwich for lunch. Delicious. Pretty trivial, eh? So why do people do it? I can understand retweeting 'important' or novel things: it is obviously a practice for garnering attention (see danah, Scott and Gilad's new DRAFT: http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2009/06/18/understanding_r.html ). But why do people tweet what appears to be trivial statements? In the process of norm formation on twitter, I have been privy to more than a few conversations where the most common complaint about twitter is that twitter is for people who want to show off everything they're doing and, "I don't care what they had for lunch"; they are being exhibitionistic (which is a veiled term for unwanted self-exposure). Any thoughts? Here's some ideas: 1. People do not know what constitutes 'interesting' and they are trying. (The spaghetti on the wall hypothesis - throw it all and see what sticks) 2. People genuinely believe they are promoting something. 3. People want to make themselves accessible - mundane twitters help signify a sense of "connected presence". Also, have you followed anyone who was a trivial twitter, but ultimately stopped tweeting everything? Have you been privy to a norm-reevaluation (i.e. someone complaining about a tweeter that led to a change in the tweeter's behavior?). Did you tweet everything and then give up because it led to more bad press than good press? Was there an audience feedback in there, for example, people stopped following me until I started posting 'serious' things, like discussions about twitter, then it picked up? Take care, BERNiE (@blurky) Bernie Hogan Research Fellow, Oxford Internet Institute University of Oxford

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Re: [Air-L] Trivial tweeting (Bernie Hogan) RT @williamcarloswilliams
by Margie Borschke 01 Jul '09

01 Jul '09

On Jul 1, 2009, at 9:28 AM, Bernie Hogan wrote: > > I had a Morton's thai chicken sandwich for lunch. Delicious. I have eaten the plums that were in the icebox

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some data on: in dis-praise of the Chronicle
by Matzat, U. 01 Jul '09

01 Jul '09

Well, I do not have up-to-date evidence, but what I have is data telling us a bit what researchers liked or disliked about the communication in emailing lists in the year 2000. See the pre-print on my old-fashioned website: Matzat, U. (in press). "Quality of Information in Academic Emailing Lists." in: Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology. Best wishes, Uwe > Message: 1 > Date: Tue, 30 Jun 2009 19:07:46 -0400 > From: Barry Wellman <wellman(a)chass.utoronto.ca> > Subject: [Air-L] in dis-praise of the Chronicle > To: aoir list <air-l(a)aoir.org>, "Denise N. Rall" <denrall(a)yahoo.com>, > Catherine Middleton <cmiddlet(a)ryerson.ca>, Peter Timusk > <ptimusk(a)sympatico.ca> > Message-ID: > <Pine.SGI.4.40.0906301901280.17230812-100000(a)origin.chass.utoronto.ca> > Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > > I was appalled by the Chronicle's article -- especially the headline -- on > the putative death of e-lists such as this one. > > First, they gave no systematic evidence, just some anecdotes. Although the > article was more nuanced than the headline: "on the one hand, on the other > hand." Yet, still anecdotes. > > Second, they ignored the organizational ecology research that has shown > that some organizations die and some get born all the time. > > Third, the posts by my fellow Canucks Catherine Middleton and Peter Timusk > clearly showed the difference between 140 character Tweets (which I do a > fair amount) and posts to this list (ibid). Both of their posts were too > nuanced to be short tweets. > > Fourth, as Marc Smith can show you, even the older Bulletin Boards are > still thriving. > > Indeed, my hunch is that each communication form adds on to the other, > rather than displacing it, which is why I never get much writing done > (today's excusive, anyway). > > Happy Canada Day to All (except Janet Napolitano), > > Barry Wellman > _______________________________________________________________________ > > S.D. Clark Professor of Sociology, FRSC NetLab Director > Department of Sociology 725 Spadina Avenue, Room 388 > University of Toronto Toronto Canada M5S 2J4 twitter:barrywellman > http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman fax:+1-416-978-3963 > Updating history: http://chass.utoronto.ca/oldnew/cybertimes.php > _______________________________________________________________________ > ======================================= Uwe Matzat Sociology School of Innovation Science Eindhoven University of Technology P.O. Box 513, 5600 MB Eindhoven The Netherlands --------------- phone: + 31 40 247-8392 email: u.matzat /"at"/ tm.tue.nl http://www.tue-tm-soc.nl/~matzat/ =======================================

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Global Media Course Query
by Ted Coopman 01 Jul '09

01 Jul '09

All, I have just picked up a online class in Global Media and was looking for textbook/journal article suggestions or syllabi for similar courses. Ideally, any materials would be fresh (last few years) although older foundational is good as well. It is an upper-division elective writing course and other than that I can do almost anything I want with it (both good and bad!). While I teach a variety of media/new media courses this is a new one for me. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Feel free to contact me off list <ted.coopman(a)gmail.com>. Thanks, -TED -- Ted M. Coopman Ph.D. Lecturer Department of Communication Studies Department of Television, Radio, Film, & Theatre San Jose State University

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[revised deadline] New MA programme in Digital Anthropology at UCL
by Lane DeNicola 01 Jul '09

01 Jul '09

New MA programme in Digital Anthropology at University College London Revised application deadline: 28 September 2009 http://www.ucl.ac.uk/anthropology/digital-anthropology/ Digital technologies have become ubiquitous. From Facebook, YouTube and Flickr to PowerPoint, Google Earth and Second Life. Museum displays migrate to the internet, family communication in the Diaspora is dominated by new media, artists work with digital films and images. Anthropology and ethnographic research is fundamental to understanding the local consequences of these innovations, and to create theories that help us acknowledge, understand and engage with them. Today's students need to become proficient with digital technologies as research and communication tools. Through combining technical skills with appreciation of social effects, students will be trained for further research and involvement in this emergent world. This MA brings together three key components in the study of digital culture: 1. Skills training in digital technologies, including our own Digital Lab, from internet and digital film editing to e-curation and digital ethnography. 2. Anthropological theories of virtualism, materiality/immateriality and digitisation. 3. Understanding the consequences of digital culture through the ethnographic study of its social and regional impact. Bursaries There is a £5,000 annual bursary specifically for this and the MA in Material and Visual Culture, as well as 3 x £1,000 bursaries for all anthropology MA programmes. All those who have submitted an application by 30 June 2009 will automatically be considered and no additional application form is necessary. The Dept. of Anthropology at UCL is the world's leading centre for the study of Material and Visual Culture. We publish The Journal of Material Culture and several relevant book series. We have nine specialist staff in material and visual culture. We currently supervise nearly fifty PhD students specifically in this field, including many with topics in Digital Anthropology. The programme is suitable both for those with a prior degree in anthropology but also for those with degrees in neighbouring disciplines who wish to be trained in anthropological and related approaches to digital culture. There is scope for those with specialist interests to work closely with designers, curators, communication specialists as well as our own digital studio. In addition to its importance for careers such as media, design and museums, digital technology is also integral to development, theoretical and applied anthropology. For further information about this course contact d.miller(a)ucl.ac.uk For making an application, note that the UCL bureaucracy may take a while to catch up with what is a new course, so in order to ensure your application is received we recommend that you download the application form from: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-students/graduate-study/application-admiss… And send this directly to: Prof. Daniel Miller Department of Anthropology University College London 14 Taviton Street London WC1H OBW University College London has over 3,500 research staff and 17,000 students, ranking among the top three multi-faculty research and teaching universities in the UK. Located in the heart of Bloomsbury among the unique research resources of central London, which include excellent museum facilities as well as a dense network of specialist research and higher education institutions, the College provides an outstanding research base. The Department of Anthropology combines social and biological anthropology and material culture. Members of the Department carry out research in 49 countries, edit four international journals and run five research seminar series and specialist postgraduate research groups. There are over 140 postgraduate students funded by AHRC, ESRC, NERC, MRC, London University, British Academy, Institute of Zoology, Natural History Museum, Overseas Research Studentships, staff research programme awards, and various national governmental and international awards. UCL is thus one of the largest centres in the world for the training of PhD students in Anthropology. The Department encourages pure and theoretical research as well as providing strong links with applied and development projects. As well as holding top research standing, the Department has been rated excellent in successive teaching quality audits. There are 7 taught Masters courses and several undergraduate degrees (BSc Anthropology, BSc in Human Sciences, and Intercalated BScs in Medical Anthropology). The Department maintains a student-centred approach to teaching, with a full tutorial system for its 300-strong undergraduate population. The Material Culture section of the Department contains six members of staff and may be considered a world centre for such studies. Amongst other activities members of this group edit the Journal of Material Culture, the journal Home Cultures, and several book series and recently developed the weblog at materialworldblog.com. -- Lane DeNicola Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow College of Arts & Sciences Syracuse University http://www.nacresky.com/lad

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Re: [Air-L] Trivial tweeting
by Scott Golder (AoIR) 01 Jul '09

01 Jul '09

Right, but the question is, who gets listened to when it comes to norming, and who is listening? Suppose I make a normative statement ("Your apps really shouldn't be posting to Twitter") -- who listens to me? You could frame it in terms of networks; the people who I share reciprocal follower relations with (my strongest ties) are probably the most likely to agree. And to the extent that we have common alters who share that opinion, locally-dense parts of the network are likely to coincide with different norms. Note the huge homophily/influence problem here, as elsewhere. But I also think that thinking of networks can be counterproductive when what we want to think about is groups. Even though Twitter doesn't have group boundaries built into the technology, I still think that groups exist, and we'd do well to acknowledge that. The problem is that all the groups are streamed together, and when groups have contradictory norms about what is ok to post, participants are faced with an impossible decision. This can be interesting analytically because as a researcher you can observe how people prioritize their groups, but as the participant, it can be a struggle. The recent Facebook trend of taking surveys ("Which X are you") -- which happily seems to have died down -- is another good example. Groups who use Facebook for purely recreational reasons might be more comfortable with this (taking surveys is a key part of what FB is _for_) and people who use it as a less formal version of Linked In might be less comfortable with it. It's tempting to look at Twitter and see nodes! edges! It's a network! But I like the idea of stepping back and seeing it as an overlapping of groups that are still bounded, but by glass walls. Scott PS. My first post didn't make it (sent from scott@redlog instead of aoir@redlog) Here it is: I would add #4, play. Recently, I have personally enjoyed #internetbeatles and #robotpickuplines, for example. It's frivolous and fun, but frivolity and fun are important parts of life too, right? Rather than worrying about people who tweet mundane things, the more pernicious threat is applications that use Twitter for broadcasting users' in-app status updates, such as their current level in the spy game. I have complained this in the past, and I only see it getting worse as more and more apps (especially mobile ones) realize they can free ride on Twitter as a channel for notifications. This suggests to me that Twitter apps are going to have to become more like email clients. I want better filters for users, topics (#hashtags), better threading, and archiving. It would be interesting if, in addition to email, newsgroups and RSS feeds, email clients started making Twitter an option. Thunderbird's open source - anyone want to collaborate on building Twitter support into it? PS. peanut butter sandwich, chocolate milk and a double espresso.

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Re: [Air-L] Trivial tweeting
by Bernie Hogan 01 Jul '09

01 Jul '09

Hi Scott (and AoIRers), I don't think 'worry' is the right word. I'm interested in the process of norming these spaces. You are norming twitter right now by suggesting that a certain kind of activity (in-app notifications) is not good for the space. I tend to agree, and also think it is a trivial use of the space. Of course, the "simple" answer is 'don't follow!', but that's often a suboptimal option. Often, I -want- to hear about someone, but I would prefer a higher signal-to-noise ratio. Some people explicitly ask for a higher signal to noise ratio, others complain to a third party ("gawd, she tweets SO much") and others just unfollow. I cannot say which is the right course, but I know that they all happen, and that they are all a part of the collective dynamics of defining and communicating an appropriate use of this medium. I recall a similar form of norming taking place on facebook, but there the issue was "drunk pictures" rather than "what I had for lunch". (OMG, I can't believe he put that picture, up!" or "what will my employer [parent, spouse, kids] think", etc...). In both cases, neither is to be taken literally, but as a metaphor for the kinds of unwanted activities or concerns endemic to that space. Sidenote - what do you (the royal AoIR you) think will be the common complaint about Google Wave, cause we all know one is bound to emerge? Take care, BERNiE

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