- Air-L - lists.aoir.org

New on ICT Guides
by Craig Bellamy 18 Apr '08

18 Apr '08

Dear AOIR, ICT Guides is a service offered by the Centre for eResearch at King's College in London (CeRch). It seeks to promote the use of ICTs in research and learning through cataloging digital arts and humanities projects along with the tools and methods they employed. A number of new projects have been added to ICT Guides: Highlight: Henry III Fine Rolls Project " The Henry III Fine Rolls Project is a three year Resource Enhancement project, commencing in April 2005 and funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC). It aims to publish the Fine Rolls of Henry III from 1216 down to 1248 in English calendar format, in both print and electronic form. There is a fine roll for each of Henry III's fifty-six regnal years. Recording offers of money to the king for a multiplicity of concessions and favours, they are of the first importance for the study of political, governmental, legal, social, and economic history. The Fine Rolls of Henry III from 1216 down to 1248 are being published in both print and electronic form, including access to digital facsimiles of the rolls.The print version will be published by Boydell & Brewer. The electronic version appears on the project website and provides free access to all those interested in this resource. A second three year project also funded by the AHRC will complete publication down to the end of the reign in 1272. . " See: http://ahds.ac.uk/ictguides/projects/project.jsp?projectId=926 ** Suggestions for new projects most welcome. -- Dr Craig Bellamy Research Associate Centre for eResearch (CeRch) King's College, London http://ahds.ac.uk/ictguides/ ----- 26 - 29 Drury Lane 3rd Floor King's College London LONDON, WC2B 5RL Phone: 020 7848 1976 ______________________________________________________________________ This email has been scanned by the MessageLabs Email Security System. For more information please visit http://www.messagelabs.com/email ______________________________________________________________________

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Re: [Air-L] Limited/Designated Public Forums and E-Government
by Daren Carroll Brabham 18 Apr '08

18 Apr '08

For a free speech graduate seminar last semester I pondered what the free speech considerations would be in a government-sponsored crowdsourcing venture. It's related to the Public Forum concept in e-governance, but the paper is admittedly kind of thin on the case law support. Paper's titled "Crowdslapping the Government: First Amendment Protections for the Crowd in Government Crowdsourcing Ventures." It's under review at a conference right now. If you're interested in a copy, shoot me an email--happy to share. db --- Daren C. Brabham Graduate Teaching Fellow Department of Communication University of Utah 255 S. Central Campus Dr., Rm. 2400 Salt Lake City, UT 84112 phone: (801) 633-4796 daren.brabham(a)utah.edu www.darenbrabham.com <http://www.darenbrabham.com/>

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Use of @ as convention for blog/forum threading
by Alex Halavais 17 Apr '08

17 Apr '08

Hello, all, One of my students is looking at the diffusion of the "@" sign as a convention for threading conversations in blogs. She's done a preliminary scan of the literature, and hasn't found much that addresses this specifically. Any suggestions for work that addresses the question of the evolution of meta-discourse for conversation control in contexts (mailing lists, IRC, IM, forums, blog comments) that often do not have built-in threading? Thanks! Alex -- -- // // This email is // [X] assumed public and may be blogged / forwarded. // [ ] assumed to be private, please ask before redistributing. // // Alexander C. Halavais, cyberflâneur // http://alex.halavais.net //

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Book: Researching with Communities: Grounded perspectives on engaging communities in research
by Andy Williamson 17 Apr '08

17 Apr '08

*** apologies for cross-posting, please forward to your networks *** Researching with Communities: Grounded perspectives on engaging communities in research Edited by Andy Williamson and Ruth DeSouza Researching with communities presents a range of personal and grounded perspectives from academics, researchers and practitioners on undertaking research in ways that promote and privilege the voice of the community, is respectful of local or indigenous practices and is culturally safe. Most definitely not a 'tick list' for approaching community-inclusive research, this book provides grounded exemplars, guides and discussion about the experiences of doing research respectfully and inclusively. It does this by drawing on the perspectives of researchers and community practitioners and by providing a range of reflective chapters that explore what community-based research means in a range of settings and for a range of people. Like the communities in which they are grounded, undertaking research in this way is always a unique experience. This book is a valuable resource for researchers, evaluators, students, community practitioners and policy makers. The international authors cover disciplines from community ICT to health and refugee and asylum seekers to community development. For more information and to order your copy, please visit http://www.lulu.com/content/1550518. Andy Williamson email andy(a)andywilliamson.com website www.andywilliamson.com uk/europe +44 (0)20 8133 7412 us/canada +1 415 578 4504 asia/pacific +61 (0)3 9018 7165

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Beta Test a New Blog Scraping Tool
by Stuart Shulman 17 Apr '08

17 Apr '08

Folks, Some of you know I have a new penchant for tool-building. Well, the latest creation of the QDAP lab is a blog scraping tool. The tool is designed to allow you to set up accounts to automatically capture blog posts on one or several blogs and to archive the data in a plain text format "ready-to-be-coded" inside QDAP's Coding Analysis Toolkit. For anyone who ever wanted to study blogs, this is a big step forward. The emphasis here is on a user-friendly interface and a seamless system for capturing and coding blog data. Now, this is a brand new tool and probably a bit buggy. However, it works well enough that we invite you to set up an account and start capturing blog data. No doubt there are some of you interested in the blogs and Election 08. To create a new blog scraping account, please visit: https://surveyweb2.ucsur.pitt.edu/qblog/page_login.php To learn more about the Coding Analysis Toolkit, please visit: http://www.qdap.pitt.edu/cat.htm To learn about my lab, please visit: http://www.qdap.pitt.edu/ thanks, Stu

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Limited/Designated Public Forums and E-Government Sites
by Steven Clift 17 Apr '08

17 Apr '08

Has anyone out there dug into the topic of government designation (or web policy denials) in the U.S. or elsewhere if the legal concept existing that interactive spaces hosted on government website are a "public forum" of any form? By interactive I mean online space where the public can post comments and react to the comments of others. Steven Clift E-Democracy.Org

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CFP: Learning and Research in Second Life® Oct. 15 Copenhagen @ IR 9.0
by Jeremy Hunsinger 17 Apr '08

17 Apr '08

Call for Papers/Participation Please join us in a workshop on learning and research in Second Life(R) on October 16, 2008 in Copenhagen at Internet Research 9.0 (http://wiki.aoir.org/index.php?title=About_IR9.0 ) Paper Deadline June 15th. Second Life is a 3d virtual environment created by Linden Lab (R) which has captured the attention of researchers and teachers from around the world from a variety of disciplines. This workshop aims to improve the understanding of Second Life as a Learning and Research environment. It will bring 35 researchers together to collaborate, discuss and workshop diverse topics related to research and learning in Second Life. We will pursue a full-day schedule in which participants will discuss their work and interests on four different topics: learning in Second Life, integrated learning, the contributions of research to the community and ethical research methods. How can we better enable learning in this sphere? How can we better enable research? Our honored keynote will be Pathfinder Linden Researchers are requested to submit papers and short biography to slworkshop08(a)gmail.com , which will be selected and distributed amongst participants before the workshop. First invitations will be offered to those who provide full papers for consideration. These papers have two purposes: first is to provide a common platform for understanding our research and teaching and second submitted papers may be considered for publication in an edited volume being produced in relation to the workshop, or possibly in peer reviewed publication derived from the workshop (these are currently under discussion). Subsequent invitations will be made based upon research/teaching statement and biography with priority given to people submitting full papers. If you are interested in participating, please send an email containing your information to slworkshop08(a)gmail.com. Decisions will be made by August 1st, barring incident. There is a limit of 35 participants at the physical meeting; the event will be simulcast into Second Life which will be organized by Jason Nolan. We welcome professionals, faculty and graduate students to participate. This workshop is sponsored by Linden Lab, creators of Second Life, and is organized by Jeremy Hunsinger, Rochelle Mazar, Aleks Krotoski and Jason Nolan. Lunch, coffee breaks and the room is included in participation. (And you'll probably get a t-shirt!) *We are also seeking additional sponsors, please contact jhuns(a)vt.edu if you would like to sponsor this workshop.

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Muse: The National Internet2 K20 Initiative Online Social Network
by Gerry Mckiernan 16 Apr '08

16 Apr '08

Friends/ A Most Pleasant Wednesday PM Discovery [Thanks Jacob S.] Muse: The National Internet2 K20 Initiative Online Social Network ANN ARBOR, Mich. - April 15, 2008 The Internet2 K20 Initiative today announced that it has launched a brand new social networking site called Muse which seeks to significantly enhance collaboration, information-sharing and technology opportunities for the over 50,000 K-12 schools, community colleges, libraries and museums in 38 U.S.states that are now connected to the Internet2 backbone network. The site is also expected to provide a better bridge between the U.S. K20 community and its international counterparts worldwide. Within the short time since launching, the new site has already experienced significant uptake within the community. [snip] While the site continues to rapidly expand in use, Muse plans to introduce the ability for users to create topically-based communities, chat in real time about projects and interests, receive email "Museletters" tailored to those specific interests and provide RSS feeds to broadcast information on new users, projects and organizations as the site grows. In doing so, the site intends to provide the community the ability to develop stronger, more comprehensive collaboration groups and to promote the more rapid adoption of advanced networking applications among this unique set of Internet2 users. For additional details and links, please visit [ http://scitechnet.blogspot.com/2008/04/muse-national-internet2-k20-initiati… ] Regards, /Gerry Gerry McKiernan Associate Professor Science and Technology Librarian Iowa State University Library Ames IA 50011 gerrymck(a)iastate.edu There is Nothing More Powerful Than An Idea Whose Time Has Come Victor Hugo [ http://www.blogger.com/profile/09093368136660604490 ] Iowa: Where the Tall Corn Flows and the (North)West Wind Blows [ http://alternativeenergyblogs.blogspot.com/ ]

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CFP: In the Game: AoIR pre-conference workshop
by T.L. Taylor 16 Apr '08

16 Apr '08

In The Game: AoIR pre-conference workshop http://www.virtualknowledgestudio.nl/projects/in-the-game.php This event will be a pre-conference workshop at Internet Research 9.0: Rethinking Communities, Rethinking Place, to be held on 15 October 2008 in Copenhagen, Denmark. For information about the conference, please see the AoIR website (http://conferences.aoir.org/) It is co-organized by Anne Beaulieu (Virtual Knowledge Studio), Marinka Copier (Utrecht University), and T.L. Taylor (IT University of Copenhagen). Thematic background A core issue for ethnography is the ethnographer's relationship to her object of knowledge. Although the web as a context of research, and net-mediated sites in general, have been heralded as an opportunity for the ethnographer to become the invisible 'fly on the wall', our experience leads us to emphasise the contrary. The participant pole of the participant -observer continuum remains crucial, even in mediated settings. Indeed in some online contexts there is no research stance outside of that of engaged participant. The existence of relationships between the ethnographer and other participants is essential to ethnographies that want to maintain a focus on meaning and culture. The opportunities and challenges posed by pursuing ethnographies in mediated settings may be other than claims to having achieved objectivity, and may consist in a re-examination and re-valuation of particular attachments to the ethnographic tradition. This event seeks to explore the particular textures and implications of ethnographic relationships in mediated settings. The ethnographic relationship is understood inclusive here, as a complex and evolving relationship that changes over the course of fieldwork and through the various aspects of knowledge production and dissemination. To structure the discussion of such a complex issue, four themes have been identified and will frame the various sessions. These themes are detailed below. :: Contiguity :: What happens when the field and our scholarly activities are very close in time, space and media? What are the ways of leaving the field, if any? Is this still a useful, important, necessary move? What does such a loop of mutual observation and feedback between researcher and object imply? How does it differ from other forms of interaction or multiple roles of more traditional ethnographies? :: Accountability :: Does mediation increase the accountability of the researcher? How do the settings, with their porous/networked boundaries, differ or resemble other settings? How does accountability change over time, or in relation to different relationships? And when the researcher is a contributing member to the group, how is the notion of accountability enlarged beyond a research ethics definition to a participatory one. Because of the traces left by the researcher, is the accountability not actually greater than in face to face settings? What are the (necessary) boundaries of the researcher's responsibilities? When do we go too far? And how does time (often such a fast moving artifact online) intervene in the issues we have? How do ethnographic relationships change over time, time of the object studied vs. research and publication time. :: Affectivity and embodiment :: Despite the rhetoric that sometimes surrounds mediated environments, how as researchers are we still always engaged with affective embodied practice, both that of ourselves but those in the communities we study? How can these be important resources for our work, and what special challenges might they pose. In the context of games and virtual environments for example, the avatar issue is always at work, but there remains the way as researchers we still find our corporeal bodies enrolled in our work - our anxiety at a raid, the neck problems from all the computer use, the way our understanding of our sites is itself mediated through our embodied experience. Closely tied to this are the ways affectivity works within the domain of ethnography - the unguardedness of play, the frustration, the pleasure or frustration within the fieldsite. :: Scholarly practices :: How do relationships to the object shape what counts as research? For example, what is the role of the cultural status of the 'object' in making something legitimate scholarly enquiry? What is at stake when doing ethnographies of activities that are sometimes considered to be antithetical to 'research' - for example, gaming or playing, researching intimate activities, youth culture (where the accusation that one is just "hanging out" rather doing serious work may always loom). How do we articulate the relation between expertise and practice? Is ethnography being brought too close to home? Which new skills are needed? How is our practice of research interwoven, often in complex and unanticipated ways, with the socio-technical objects and agents in the field. Participants and structure The workshop is aimed at researchers who have already pursued fieldwork in mediated environments. They are invited to submit a paper proposal (1500 words) before 9 May 2008 to Marinka Copier (marinka.copier(a)let.uu.nl) The proposal should present elements of prior ethnographic material and a reflection on that work from the perspective of one of the proposed workshop themes: continuity, accountability, affectivity & embodiment, and scholarly practices. The goal of this process is to bring together practicing ethnographers for an in-depth discussion of some key issues within the domain, simultaneously grounded in concrete projects. The workshop will have a maximum of 15 participants to enable in-depth discussion, and respondents will be assigned for each paper. Submissions will be selected on the basis of peer-review, which will be coordinated by the organisers of the workshop. Final papers (5000-6000 words) will be due at the beginning of September and will be distributed in advance to all workshop participants. Important dates Deadline for submissions: 9 May (mail to marinka.copier(a)let.uu.nl) Announcement of paper acceptance: 30 May Deadline for full papers (5000-6000 words): 1 September Pre-conference workshop: 15 October -- __________________________________________________ Please use tltaylor(a)itu.dk (not my GMail account) for correspondence. T.L. Taylor, Associate Professor and Head of Media Technology and Games Study Line Center for Computer Games Research IT University of Copenhagen Rued Langgaards Vej 7, 2300 Copenhagen, Denmark +45 7218 5035 (tele) / +45 7218 5001 (fax) tltaylor(a)itu.dk / http://www.itu.dk/~tltaylor/

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'Christian Mission to a Virtual World' Paper
by Mark Brown 16 Apr '08

16 Apr '08

The Anglican Church is actively exploring how to offer church within the virtual environment. There is a major meeting happening in the UK in May to discuss the church within the virtual space. I have written a background paper for the meeting that may be of interest; it is entitled, 'Christian Mission to a Virtual World' To download it go to: http://brownblog.info/?p=381 Regards, Revd Mark Brown _________________________________________________________________ It's simple! Sell your car for just $30 at CarPoint.com.au http://a.ninemsn.com.au/b.aspx?URL=http%3A%2F%2Fsecure%2Dau%2Eimrworldwide%…

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