January 19, 2003 Report of the a(o).i.r. executive committee Prepared by Steve Jones AoIR Executive Committee President: Steve Jones Vice-President: Nancy Baym Secretary: Ulla Bunz Treasurer: Benjamin Bates Open Seats: David Silver and Barry Wellman Appointed Seats: Matthew Allen and Leslie Shade Student Seat: Lisbeth Klastrup Publications Officers: Jeremy Hunsinger and Charlie Breindahl 2002 Conference Coordinator: Monica Murero 2002 Conference Program Chair: Klaus Bruhn Jensen 2003 Conference Chair: Liss Jeffrey 2003 Conference Program Co-Chairs: Matthew Allen and David Mitchell Ethics Working Group Chair: Charles Ess Elections Working Group Chair: Mia Consalvo Net Resources Working Group Chair: Charlie Breindahl 1. Introduction & General (Jones) Below is the monthly report from AoIR executive committee members. If you aren't reading this...well, you ought to be. I know it can get lengthy, and it can get detailed, but it's the single best way to know what AoIR is up to, and to find ways to get involved with it (in any number of ways from contacting the people who report to volunteering to work on something you see mentioned to making suggestions to...). 2. Executive Officers' Reports 2.1 President (Jones) 2.1.1 The call for papers for the 2003 AoIR conference in Toronto was published a short while ago. If you haven't had a chance to read it, it will be re-posted several times over. Planning for the conference has been under way for some time now, and it promises to be a great one. I hope you can join us, and I hope you can have some of your colleagues who may not have yet attended an AoIR conference join us, too. 2.2 Vice President (Baym) 2.2.1 I've been working on the annual book project with Jeremy and others, thinking about future conferences post-Toronto, and participating in discussion, though not as much as usual because my colleagues on air-exec generally beat me to what I would have said these days. 2.3 Secretary (Bunz) 2.3.1 Participated in the CfP and "joint conference or not" discussions. Other than that, pretty slow month compared to the one before. December 16, 2002 - January 13, 2003 This month on the executive list: . The exec committee finalized its recommendations for the call for papers, especially with regard to topics and keywords. The recommendations were shared with the conference/program organizers. The CfP was posted to air-l by President Steve Jones on January 6. . We were approached by the ACM Special Interest Group on Computers and Society about possibly organizing a joint-conference. This lead to animated discussion about the issue of joint conferences in general, and possible collaboration with this specific group. Overall, sentiment was positive about collaborating with this particular group, though the proposed timing (June 2004) is not ideal. Other possibilities (such as special topic or summer conferences in addition to the annual AoIR conference) were discussed. The general topic of "affiliation" was discussed too, and we agreed that we need clear guidelines that govern when and why we "affiliate" or "collaborate" with any interested organization. . Beta-testing of the conference submission website (thanks Jeremy!) . The executive committee has been debating the report of the election committee actively. 2.4 Treasurer (Bates) 2.4.1 Staying pretty current on memberships, accounts. 2.5 Open Seats (Silver, Wellman) 2.5.1 Silver: Nothing to report. 2.5.2 Wellman: Liaising between Exec Committee and the Toronto organizers of the 2003 conference (next October). 2.6 Appointed Seats (Allen, Shade) 2.6.1 Allen: In the past month I have concentrated on finalising aspects of the 2003 conference, as Program Chair, including assisting to finalise the call for papers (thanks to Liss and Steve and all), assisting to prepare the conference submission system (thanks to Jeremy for tech wizardry), and arranging the reviewing team. 2.6.2 Shade: Worked with Logie to figure out our contributions to AOIR conf book. 2.7 Student Seat (Klastrup) 2.7.1 Nothing much to report - have had to be AFK most of December/early January. The AIR-grad list is up and running and now have 50+ members! 2.8 Publications Officers (Hunsinger, Breindahl) 2.8.1 Hunsinger: the usual lot. I've been rewriting the submission system so it works the way it was requested. once that is finished, i plan on updating the listserve system, after that I probably have to start working on some sort of election system, as that is coming up soon too. 2.8.2 Breindahl: I have been overseeing postings and subscriptions on AIR-L and our other lists as usual. I have also done some minor editing and additions to our public web site and continue to update the book list. There has been no activity in the 'Net WG. 2.9 2003 Conference (Liss Jeffrey, Chair; Matthew Allen, David Mitchell, Program Co-Chairs) 2.9.1 Jeffrey (with her team: Katherine Parrish, Jason Nolan, Alex Kuskis, and steering committee chair Barry Wellman): - Call for papers has gone out, and is up on Toronto 2003 web site <www.ecommons.net/aoir web> . French translation was arranged and sent out. AIR-meet has been the place to send notice of the lists where our cfp is circulating. More to go. - Working committee member Alex Kuskis arranged the book display with Richard A. Koenigsberg, PhD and his Library of Social Science Book Exhibits group, after assuring us that Canadian authors would be represented and space and other issues addressed. Authors who wish to launch books or internet authors wishing to launch web sites should contact organizers with proposals. aoir@ecommons.net - Tech committee has met with Hilton Hotel (which is being very supportive). David Mitchell, program co-chair, came to town and had successful meetings with Ryerson and Toronto tech committee (Jason Nolan) Ryerson University has come on board to help, which is very welcome. - Fund raising is starting, slowly. No news yet on our grant request. Contact aoir@ecommons.net if you have sponsors you wish to propose, or if you wish to donate. - Steve Jones will give an invited lecture to the Knowledge Media Design Institute on February 13 (4 - 5:30, 40 St George St. University of Toronto) and on February 14th we will hold a Valentine special event 12 - 2 PM for volunteers and prospective sponsors for AoiR 4.0 (McLuhan Video conference room 140 St George St). - Volunteer, working and steering committees are all meeting in the next six weeks. contact bev@ecommons.net to get involved in Toronto. - Pre conference workshop list is in process, and we will report soon on further developments. Katherine Parrish playing a key role. - Thanks to my organizing committee, which is just terrific. 2.9.2 Mitchell: Over the past month or so I have been working with a sub committee which is planning for the technical needs for the conference. I visited Toronto last week and met with the Rogers Communication Centre at Ryerson University to ask for their help on the technical side and also perhaps with demonstration events. They were quite excited and later one of their members (Many Amrylou) accompanied me to the Hilton where we met Jason and Katherine from the Toronto team -- and together planned for connectivity needs. This week we met via videoconferencing to continue our group's discussion of technical needs and ideas. I am also trying to find funds to support bilingual translation for the conference. I will keep you posted on any progress here. 2.10 AoIR Ethics Working Group (Charles Ess, Chair) 2.10.1 There has been light discussion of very modest modifications of the ethics report (e.g., formatting, availability in HTML, wording regarding audience, requests for citation, etc.) - impeded, appropriately enough, by the solstitial holidays and a sense of well-deserved rest following the approval of the report. More to come, however! 2.11 AoIR Research Annual Working Group (Mia Consalvo, Chair) 2.11.1 The Research Annual Working Group has actively begun narrowing down appropriate themes for the first volume of the annual, which will include a selection of the research presented at the first three AoIR conferences. We are also determining a pool of potential contributors from conference presentations that fit the themes and represent some of the best work to come out of the conferences and the association. 2.12 AoIR Net Resources Working Group (Charlie Breindahl, Chair) 2.12.1 There has been no activity in the 'Net WG. ------------------------------------end of executive committee report------------------------------ The Association of Internet Researchers is a scholarly association dedicated to the advancement of the cross-disciplinary field of Internet studies. It is a resource and support network promoting critical and scholarly Internet research independent from traditional disciplines and existing across academic borders. The association is international in scope. The association's web site is at http://www.aoir.org. Membership information is available at http://aoir.org/airjoin.html _______________________________________________ Air-l mailing list Air-l@aoir.org http://www.aoir.org/mailman/listinfo/air-l