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web science, or AoIR by any other name
by Amy S. Bruckman 07 May '07

07 May '07

> Do folks here see "Web Science" becoming a part of AoIR? We're starting a Web Science initiative in the College of Computing at Georgia Tech. We interpret the term broadly to mean "the interdisciplinary study of the Web." (Not just semantic web stuff.) Compared to the kinds of things the AoIR community usually addresses, I would say we're a bit broader because we include more core computer science. Part of our reason for calling it "web science" instead of "Internet research" is to appeal to the folks coming from the hard side of computer science. One of our goals is to increase communication across disciplines. For example, we had a great conversation at a faculty meeting yesterday about the "interestingness" algorithm on flickr, and how this might reflect a new view of algorithms that draws together our social computing and theoretical computer science faculty in a new way. And if we can draw in our economics, public policy, "new media", etc. folks too... then this starts to look interesting! So basically I see "Internet research" and "web science" becoming synonyms in the long run. YMMV :-) -- Amy Amy Bruckman Associate Professor College of Computing Georgia Institute of Technology Atlanta, GA 30332-0760 Tel: 404-894-9222 Fax: 404-894-3146 Email: asb(a)cc.gatech.edu Web: http://www.cc.gatech.edu/~asb/

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New Research Positions at the OII
by William Dutton 07 May '07

07 May '07

I would like to bring two new positions at the OII to the attention of members of the AoIR. See: <http://www.oii.ox.ac.uk/people/ newpositions.cfm> William Dutton william.dutton(a)oii.ox.ac.uk http://people.oii.ox.ac.uk/dutton/

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On-line focus groups
by Semenov Alexander 07 May '07

07 May '07

Hello, all! After a rough search in aoir-archieves without results I'm asking directly: Does anyone know any papers on on-line focus groups? Anything will go - methodology, examples of usage, results of such surveys, areas of application, restrictions, platform and software descriptions and so on. Thanks in advance! Best wishes, Alexander Semenov.

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Re: [Air-l] Grants
by Kluver, Randy 07 May '07

07 May '07

I don't think you can make that kind of conclusion based on one limited point of data. I too receive Grants.gov postings, but the messages to me are filtered according to the criteria that I have specified when I signed up. Sometimes I get one or two a week, sometimes not. Federal agencies operate on cycles, and there are some periods of time that are just busier than others. For a better sense on the state of federal funding, you could consult the NSF statistics: http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/nsf07303/pdf/nsf07303.pdf. According to this, in 2005-2006, funding for all categories increased by 3% than the previous year, and in 2006-2007, it increased by 1.2%. The proposed amount for this year is over 136 billion dollars. Of course, some money is shifted from one category to another. The biggest hits were in Agriculture and transportation, the biggest growth category was regional and community development, with an increase of 22% in 05-06 and 23% in 06-07. That actually seems to me that it would be one category of federal funding relevant to this particular community. Thus, I think both of your conclusions are wrong; federal funding has not disappeared, and funding that affects this community is certainly not non-existent. I don't have any data on private sources of funding. Randy Kluver, Ph.D. Director, Institute for Pacific Asia Texas A&M University 204 Coke 3371 TAMU College Station, TX 77843-3371 Phone: (979) 845-3099 Fax: (979) 845-3085 http://international.tamu.edu/ipa/ 1. Grants (James Whyte) Date: Sun, 6 May 2007 09:09:55 -0700 (PDT) From: James Whyte <whyte.james(a)yahoo.com> Subject: [Air-l] Grants To: air-l(a)listserv.aoir.org Message-ID: <940509.64390.qm(a)web59010.mail.re1.yahoo.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 I have, for several years, received the announcements of federal grants from http://grants.gov . When I first atarted in 2004 those announcements appeared in my inbox every day and sometimes twice a day. Today I received a posting that contained one announcement. This was the first posting in over a week. My point is that in 2 years the funding for research has almost disappeared. New funding that effects this community seems to have become non-existant. Is this true in the private sector? I have not found any single source that reports this sector. James

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Internet & Politics: book launch event in London, 14 May
by Jankowski 07 May '07

07 May '07

All: Those of you in the London area may be interested in attending the panel described below, related to recent Internet and politics publications, particularly The Internet and National Elections: A Comparative Study of Web Campaigning (Routledge: May 2007; editors: Randy Kluver, Nicholas Jankowski, Kirsten Foot, Steven Schneider). Details on the book are available at: http://international.tamu.edu/ipotest/book/index.asp Those of you unable to attend the live event may be interested in the webcast; see the site of the Stanhope Centre for Communication Policy Research: <http://www.stanhopecentre.org/2007/>http://www.stanhopecentre.org/2007/ Nick Jankowski THE INTERNET & POLITICS: ASSESSING THE CLAIMS AND REVIEWING THE EVIDENCE Panel Discussion Monday, May 14, 2007, 5.30 7.30 p.m. City University Northampton Square, London EC1V 0HB Convocation Suite Travel instructions: <http://www.city.ac.uk/maps/northamptonsquare/index.html>http://www.city.ac.uk/maps/northamptonsquare/index.html Open to the Public One of the long-standing claims of the Internet is that politics is becoming an open playing field, allowing persons previously excluded from the political process to become engaged. This and related claims have concerned a legion of activists and scholars during the past decade, but only recently have empirically-grounded studies been conducted that examine and in some cases contest these ideas. As a contribution to this continuing debate, the Stanhope Centre for Communication Policy Research (<http://www.stanhopecentre.org/2007/>http://www.stanhopecentre.org/2007/) is organizing a panel involving scholars active in this area. The editors and authors of three recent or about-to-be published books will be taking part, together with staff members from the Department of Sociology at City University. The most immediate publication in this genre is entitled The Internet and National Elections: A Comparative Study of Web Campaigning, to be released by Routledge in May 2007. This volume provides a comparative analysis of the use of the Web in countries around the world during political campaigns. Drawing upon a common conceptual framework, the book examines how the Internet is employed by a variety of political actors. Details of this publication are available at: <http://international.tamu.edu/ipotest/book/index.asp>http://international.tamu.edu/ipotest/book/index.asp At the conclusion of the discussion a reception will be held celebrating publication of The Internet and National Elections. Scholars participating in the panel are: · Jean Chalaby, Professor, City University, author of American Cultural Primacy in a New Media Order: A European Perspective (Gazette, 2006) · Endre Dányi, Research student, University of Lancaster, author of chapter in The Internet and National Elections · Kirsten Foot, Associate Professor, University of Washington; co-editor of The Internet and National Elections and co-author of Web Campaigning (MIT Press, 2006) · Nicholas Jankowski, Visiting Fellow, Virtual Knowledge Studio, Amsterdam, co-editor of The Internet and National Elections · Randy Kluver, Director, Institute for Pacific Asia, Texas A&M University, co-editor of The Internet and National Elections · Wainer Lusoli, Assistant Professor, Chester University, author of Voice and E-Quality: The State of Electronic Democracy in Britain (Hampton Press, forthcoming) · Steven Schneider, Professor, State University New York, co-editor of The Internet and National Elections and co-author of Web Campaigning (MIT Press, 2006) · Frank Webster, Professor, City University, author of Theories of the Information Society (Routledge, 2002) The panel discussion will be webcast; details available at: <http://www.stanhopecentre.org/2007/>http://www.stanhopecentre.org/2007/ For further information, contact: Stanhope Centre for Communication Policy Research Northampton Square, City University, London Tel. +44 (0) 20 7040 4566

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Online Activism -- empirical research references?
by Paul DiPerna 07 May '07

07 May '07

Dear air-listers, Can anyone recommend references for research on online activism? particularly relating to social and political movements? I'll definitely be grateful for any suggestions on insightful case studies and even broader empirical research.. Thanks, Paul ------------- Paul DiPerna Blau Exchange http://www.blauexchange.org online ID: http://claimid.com/pdiperna

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Call for papers
by Suzana Sukovic 06 May '07

06 May '07

Call for Papers Workshop on new sociotechnical insights in interaction design (Sociotech-ID'07) (September 10-11, 2007) in Rio de Janeiro, Brasil <http://iit.tvu.ac.uk/sociotech-id07>http://iit.tvu.ac.uk/sociotech-id07 held in conjunction with the 11th IFIP TC 13 International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction Interact'2007 http://www.interact2007.org/ Suzana Sukovic PhD Candidate _________________________________________ Information & Knowledge Management Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences University of Technology, Sydney PO Box 123 Broadway NSW 2007, Australia www.hss.uts.edu.au/research/research_students/suzana_sukovic.html

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Second Life Research Ethics
by Åsa Rosenberg 06 May '07

06 May '07

Hello, I am a PhD student at the Department of Sociology at Göteborg university, Sweden. I am planning an empirical exploratory study on ethics in online research using Second Life as my case (several case studies in SL on other topics will follow). I would very much appreciate any help I can get with the following questions. 1) Has any research like mine been conducted? I am looking for studies that focus particularly on research ethics and Second Life, i.e. studies performed in SL where ethics are the main object of study. I am well aware of the multitude of publications in more general ethics in online research. 2) Is there an online bibliography of research in Second Life besides the Annotated Bibliography of Second Life Educational Online Resources at <http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~mpepper/slbib> http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~mpepper/slbib? I am looking for some place that collects all published research on Second Life. (Not sure if that is the purpose of the Annotated Bibilography). Apologies for any cross-postings and thanks in advance, Åsa Rosenberg (SL: Kid Kuhn) Åsa Rosenberg Department of Sociology, Göteborg University asa.rosenberg[at]sociology.gu.se <http://www.cyberkid.se/> http://www.cyberkid.se

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Grants
by James Whyte 06 May '07

06 May '07

I have, for several years, received the announcements of federal grants from http://grants.gov . When I first atarted in 2004 those announcements appeared in my inbox every day and sometimes twice a day. Today I received a posting that contained one announcement. This was the first posting in over a week. My point is that in 2 years the funding for research has almost disappeared. New funding that effects this community seems to have become non-existant. Is this true in the private sector? I have not found any single source that reports this sector. James --------------------------------- Ahhh...imagining that irresistible "new car" smell? Check outnew cars at Yahoo! Autos.

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Re: [Air-l] on journals ... | direction of internet research as a discipline
by Paul DiPerna 04 May '07

04 May '07

I see a lot of parallels between political science and the development of the internet research field. Though my perspective is slanted since my roots are in poli sci. Political Science, organized formally within APSA, has been around since the days of Woodrow Wilson (specifically 1903). Yet while I was in grad school, it struck me how much the field still struggles with self-identity. Students and even some professors would periodically raise questions asking what makes Political Science different from Sociology? In terms of theory, some would say the former is a natural extension of the latter... generating middle-range theories and defined largely by the wealth and types of observable data and subject matter. Ellis mentioned this kind of disciplinary definition/parameter in her previous message (below). For those who like historical contexts, you might be interested in this presidential keynote speech given in 1904, at the first APSA conference: http://www.apsanet.org/imgtest/190405AddrGOODNOW.pdf APSA aside, I'm pretty sure the "political science" field (at least in the U.S.) has been around for almost 150 years.. and there are still some discipline identity issues. On a separate tangent, it will be interesting to see the progression of the Berners-Lee/ Web Science Research Initiative (http://www.webscience.org/) and how it grows with respect to the already established internet research field. Do folks here see "Web Science" becoming a part of AoIR? do you see WSRI as bringing added value to a larger field of internet research? or do you see this movement as reinventing the wheel? - Paul > -------- Original Message -------- > Subject: Re: [Air-l] on journals ... Ellis Godard wrote: I'm curious how many others think/believe/expect this. Disciplines can be defined by their subject matter, methods, or perspectives (typically some combination), but AOIR is diverse in all three of these regards - and intentionally (perhaps even increasingly) so. Even if those fascinated with "inter-/trans-"/boundary-crossing focus their career attention within AOIR, and those of us with disciplinary inclinations depart, to what extent can unbounded diversity provide a foundation for a home anything, much less a home discipline?

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