1. REGISTER NOW! You need no reminder, I assume, that the deadline for registering at the earlybird rate is August 1. So, this isn't a reminder. It's just a soothing co-affirmation. You also already know that if you are presenting, you MUST be registered by this date and the final version of your submission (for those of you who submitted a single paper or a panel) must be uploaded. If not (please excuse the shouting) YOU WILL BE UNCEREMONIOUSLY DROPPED FROM THE PROGRAM. There is always a bit of rush right at the deadline; much love for my fellow procrastinators. However, if it is any spur at all, I will note that the workshops on the 21st are likely to fill, and when they do, you will be out of luck... 2. ROOMS AT THE EMBASSY SUITES As many of you have noted, the (extended) room block is filled at the Embassy Suites, and the hotel is nearly full as well. I may be able to eke out another room or two--so it's worth checking back--but beyond that it's unlikely we'll be able to get more rooms. I am checking into securing a block at a neighboring hotel, and will announce here if I can manage that. 3. KEYNOTE If you needed another reason to be excited about coming to IR16--and really, how could you be *more* excited, I will remind you that Micha Cárdenas (http://michacardenas.org/) will be delivering the opening keynote, entitled "Stitching Poetics: Networked Bodies and Algorithmic Identity." The abstract for her talk: Despite recent legal gains for gay and lesbian couples, transgender people of color continue to be the number one target of murder among LGBT people in the US. How can the interaction between speculative media and social justice be understood, specifically in a context of the struggle for justice for trans women of color in the Americas? To do so, I propose the material/conceptual operation of the stitch to add to the operations of the cut and the fold as discussed by Gilles Deleuze, Félix Guattari, Sarah Kember and Joanna Zylinska. I will discuss media art by Adam Harvey, Zach Blas and the Electronic Disturbance Theater, alongside a discussion of my own practice-based research project, Local Autonomy Networks. These examples are the basis for a comparison of the practice-based research methods of speculative design, contestational design and community-based design with the goal of creating media poetics that can reduce violence against trans people of color. Hope you are all enjoying the last gasps of summer. Will be in touch with other developments shortly, and with the full program in the next couple of weeks. - Alex -- // Alexander Halavais, Sociologist, Semiologist, and Saboteur Extraordinaire // Associate Professor of Social Technologies, Arizona State University // http://alex.halavais.net/bio @halavais